(Earth Eats theme music, composed by Erin Tobey and performed by Erin and Matt Tobey)

KAYTE YOUNG: From WFIU in Bloomington Indiana, I'm Kayte Young and this is Earth Eats.

SHANE GIBSON: And with spice bush you can make tea with the leaves, the twigs, the berries.

KAYTE YOUNG: This week on our show we learn about spice bush tea, and acorn pancakes from an outdoor educator. Chef Arlyn Llewellyn shares some garlic lovers soup recipes, a commercial netmaker tells her story, and we take a bike ride with River Bailey for some coffee outside. All that and more coming up in the next hour here on Earth Eats, so stay with us.

(Music)

KAYTE YOUNG: Earth Eats comes is produced from the campus of Indiana University in Bloomington Indiana. We wish to acknowledge and honor the indigenous communities native to this region and recognize that Indiana University is built on indigenous homelands and resources.  We recognize the Miami, Delaware, Potawatomi, and Shawnee people as past, present, and future caretakers of this land.

Renee Reed has the week off, but we do have a couple of news stories from Harvest Public Media.

Fifteen Asian pacific countries recently signed a massive trade deal that sidelines the United States. The pact is the first to bring China, Japan, and South Korea together as trading partners. As Harvest Public Media's Christina Stella reports, analysts say the deal expands China's ability to buy agricultural commodities from countries besides the U.S.

CHRISTINA STELLA: Professor Whendong Zhang at Iowa State University says responding to the regional comprehensive economic partnership probably isn't a high priority for the incoming Biden administration, but pressure could eventually mount for the White House to counteract any narrative that China is becoming the world's trade superpower.

WHENDONG ZHANG: This definitely should trigger more discussion and nudges for the future Biden administration to consider rejoining PPE and accelerating the association of Europe.

CHRISTINA STELLA: Analysts are partly reading the deal as a message that China is looking to take more of its business elsewhere in the future.

WHENDONG ZHANG: There will be a lot more incentives for China to further diversity away from the United States.

CHRISTINA STELLA: He says the deal makes it easier for China to buy more dairy from Australia and New Zealand. Christina Stella, Harvest Public Media.

KAYTE YOUNG: While the Thanksgiving holiday looked different in many American households this year, the cost of the Thanksgiving meal may have been a bit lower for some families. Harvest Public Media's Dana Cronin reports. 

DANA CRONIN: Every year the Farm Bureau surveys how much it costs to purchase the ingredients for a classic Thanksgiving meal for 10. This year $46.90 cents which comes out to less than $5 per person. John Newton is the Bureau's Chief Economist, he says this is the lowest it's been in a decade, mainly due to a drop in turkey prices.

JOHN NEWTON: You can have a classic Thanksgiving dinner for less than $5 a person, we're giving thanks this holiday we should give thanks to the farmers.

DANA CRONIN: Newton says farmers faced a lot of challenges this year due to the pandemic, however the cost of certain menu items did go up, namely breads and stuffing. I'm Dana Cronin, Harvest Public Media.

KAYTE YOUNG: Later on in the show we have a story from Harvest Public Media on a facial recognition system for cows.

(Earth Eats news theme)

Pacific seafood depends on skilled workers, and not just the ones out on the boats. In workshops that dot the Oregon coast, industrial craftspeople make and modify the fishing gear behind our seafood meals. In this piece from Josephine McRobbie and Joe O'Connell we meet two of these makers, who are factoring sustainability into their gear designs.

(Guitar chords)

JOSEPHINE MCROBBIE: Sara Skamser makes and modifies commercial fishing nets in Newport Oregon.

SARA SKAMSER: Midwater net will say start out with a hundred-foot mesh in the way it's tapered is a funnel is really the mesh size.

JOSEPHINE MCROBBIE: She got her start on small fishing boats.

SARA SKAMSER: I love the fishing; I love being at sea. I did crabbing, I did some troll work, mostly with salmon fishing.

JOSEPHINE MCROBBIE: Net skills like sowing and splicing became one more thing to help Sara land a gig.

SARA SKAMSER: In the late 70's / early 80's I was bucking to get on a boat - big money, big boat. And I was a welder, all these boats are steel. I had good sea legs, had proven myself to be strong enough to handle everything. And you know a winning personality and you name it and I just needed this net skill to get on these boats where guys were making a lot of money and so that's why I was doing the nets. 

JOSEPHINE MCROBBIE: That big money-big boat dream, it hit a dead end. 

SARA SKAMSER: So, I asked one of the owners if I could possibly get in, and these guys just absolutely turned like purple. And just... (the owners said) "Uh... no." They didn’t' take me seriously. I was just was left out of the picture because I'm a woman. 

JOSEPHINE MCROBBIE: So, Sarah channeled her energy into netmaking. 

SARA SKAMSER: We've kind of cornered the shrimp net market, and so the bottom line to that is I invoice those people now. 

(Trendy transition music) 

JOSEPHINE MCROBBIE: Networkers have a special skill set - maneuvering a needle loaded with twine has to become second nature. 

SARA SKAMSER: You know, you can't just kind of get it. You have to really get it. You have to move like lighting. 

When you're bringing 5-inch mesh to 8-inch mesh, you do a thing called debating where you're picking up two meshes into smaller mesh. And so you do one, skip one, do two, skip one, do one, skip one, do two, skip one. And I'm saying that in my head all the time. 

(In the background, Sara repeating as like a mantra "Do one, skip one. Do one, skip one, do two, skip one...")

And so, you have to have your hands moving really fast to get this to pay. 

And so, you have to have that singsongy rhythm going otherwise you... you're not gonna... you're a person that a net shop would not want. 

JOSEPHINE MCROBBIE: Sara and her team have earned quite a reputation for their work. 

SARA SKAMSER: I have young fisherman coming to say, "You might not remember me, I met you in the 80's." They go, "I've always wanted to be able to order one of your nets and my owner said I can order a net." It just lifts a person up to know that I have touched so many lives with these nets. 

JOSEPHINE MCROBBIE: About a half hour south on the coastal highway, Leonard Van Curler is also making fishing gear. Some of the tools he uses are similar to Sarah's. 

LEONARD VAN CURLER: We've got a needle right in front of you, and that's what it's called, a needle. 

JOSEPHINE MCROBBIE: But what he's making is a totally different animal, made to catch a totally different animal. The Dungeness crab, one of Oregon's most lucrative catches. 

LEONARD VAN CURLER: This summer, it went up to $8 a pound for crab. 

JOSEPHINE MCROBBIE: To catch the dungeness, Leonard needed crab pots, and lots of them. He already had the welding skills he needed to make them himself. 

LEONARD VAN CURLER: So, I started making crab pots in earnest. I started building a couple hundred a year.

JOSEPHINE MCROBBIE: And he tinkered with the size, design, and materials as the years went on. 

LEONARD VAN CURLER: I wanted to improve the crab pot. Everybody wants to make the best mouse trap, right? 

JOSEPHINE MCROBBIE: In some ways, making a crab pot is simple. 

LEONARD VAN CURLER: Well I told everybody rule number one is make sure they can get into it (laughs). Rule number two is keep them, but I mean make sure they can get into it. 

JOSEPHINE MCROBBIE: But other parts of the process, bending steel, wrapping it with rubber, knitting wire mesh - these things require a practiced hand. 

LEONARD VAN CURLER: It took a while to learn to net, you know. You watch a guy for one minute you know what the initial process is, you learn how to roll hand when you're knitting. And then after doing it for 40 years you learn how to make it look good. 

JOSEPHINE MCROBBIE: Crab pot design, it's both form and function. 

LEONARD VAN CURLER: That's the neat thing about this fishery, it's totally sustainable because of the escape ring we put in the pots. Anything smaller than a 4- or 6.25-inch crab doesn't stay in the pot. They're made so that the crab can go in there, walk through the triggers, then the triggers close back down, and he can't walk back out again. Unless he's small enough to get through the escape rings. The escape rings will let him walk right out again if he's small enough. 

JOSEPHINE MCROBBIE: Design also matters to Sara Skamser.

SARA SKAMSER: I redesigned the ye old traditional shrimp net, that's just using, we use knotless netting from Japan that goes through the water easier. 

JOSEPHINE MCROBBIE: At the back of Sara's shrimp nets is another innovation that she helped perfect. 

SARA SKAMSER: And it basically is a barbeque grill, it looks just like a barbeque grill made out of aluminum at the back of the net at an angle. So, it's 3/4 inch between the bars of the barbeque grill, a big hole at the top.

JOSEPHINE MCROBBIE: All the fish you could accidentally catch with a shrimp net, this excluder helps keep them out. 

SARA SKAMSER: The shrimp are small - Oregon pink shrimp, and so they go through the grid, and the fish just go swimming right out. And so, there's no... virtually no by-catch. 

JOSEPHINE MCROBBIE: As it co-evolves with regulations, new gear like these excluders is making a difference in the local habitat. 

SARA SKAMSER: We found solutions for bycatch reduction and it's very exciting. The shrimp fishery is deemed an NSCE certified sustainable first pink shrimp fishery in the world that's going on right now. 

JOSEPHINE MCROBBIE: She gets a kick out of opening lines to more sustainable gear. 

SARA SKAMSER: We built a halibut excluder for cod in Alaska, and we built 17 of them, it was brand new. And a fisherman came in, he's been fishing cod for 35 years. He was really not liking it. He's like, "There's just holes everywhere." 

I said, "No, there's slots. The cod will stay in." 

And so he goes up there and so he said, "Put it on my cod trowel." 

And they were fishing clean. And then he saw. And so, he saw it right away that that did make a difference. And then he got on the radio and he goes, "Hey, you guys got a halibut excluder over there? I got two, you're gonna need one man. This shit works good." 

And so, he took ownership of it, and the fleet took ownership of it, and the fisherman take ownership of it, and then they start competing to fish clean, and that's the secret. 

KAYTE YOUNG: This story produced by Josephine McRobbie and public folklorist Joe O'Connell features the voices of Oregon based commercial fishers and seafood entrepreneurs. O'Connell conducted the original research in August 2019 for the Oregon Folklife Network with support from the National Endowment for the Arts. 

(Trendy guitar music)

Shane Gibson is the director of Environmental Education with Sycamore Land Trust. A few years ago I met with him and Shawn Fisher's 4th grade class at Unionville Elementary, a public school just outside of Bloomington in southern Indiana. This school has developed a curriculum called EARTH, it stands for Environment, Art, Resources, Technology and Health. 

The school's approach makes for an easy partnership with Gibson who focuses on the environment but also on health. His visits always include extra outdoor time for the kids and often a discussion on the nutritional aspects of edible wild plants. On this day in the fall of 2017 they take a walk past the playground down to their outdoor classroom. They're making spice bush tea together and sampling some pancakes made with acorn flour. On the walk they'll be looking for wild edible plants. 

SHANE GIBSON: I see some of you have your clipboards today. And I think that's a good idea - clipboard or notebook. I might just start talking about different types of plants and you might just jot the name down of that plant and then you may have time later to research more details. Anytime you're outside it's a great time to make observations and who knows what we might see. I've already seen some really awesome dragonflies at the pond. I've saw turtles kind of cruising along the edge of the pond. 

KAYTE YOUNG [NARRATING]: Just a few feet from the door of the building, Gibson stops and gathers the students for a quick lesson. He's just been to Bradford woods for an adult education session. 

SHANE GIBSON: They were thinking we get to be in a place like Bradford Woods with all this wild area to find wild edibles. But I want you to know is that just like growing a garden in your backyard, wild edibles are right here out your backdoor, at your feet, all around you. What is this right here? 

Say it again? 

CHILD: Dandelion

SHANE GIBSON: Dandelion greens. Dandelions are very nutritious. Every part of the dandelion is edible. The roots, the leaf, the flower. 

KAYTE YOUNG [NARRATING]: Next stop, under an oak tree. 

SHANE GIBSON: An oak tree is one of the most beneficial trees to all wildlife. From the smallest insect to the deer to the turkeys. I saw something recent that said it supports over 900 different species, the oak tree. So really really important.

And it was one of the most important if maybe not the most important food for the early people in Indiana, the first people in Indiana, the American Indians. So something about acorns is that they have a bitterness in them from something called tannin. And tannin, how they get rid of that bitterness is to boil the acorns, throw out the water, boil them again, throw out the water, and that gets rid of the tannin. You can roast it, you can grind it, and make acorn flour or acorn meal, because I made acorn pancakes that we're gonna try later. 

CHILD 1: I'm so excited for that tea though. 

CHILD 2: And the pancakes

(Children chatting in background.)

KAYTE YOUNG [NARRATING]: They arrive at the outdoor classroom a clearing in the woods at the edge of a pond with wooden benches arranged amphitheater style. Gibson has set up a makeshift outdoor kitchen equipped with a camp stove and pots of hot water. The kids take their seats on the benches. 

SHANE GIBSON: What we're gonna do today with the spice bush is to just put the spice bush in the hot water, let it steep, and then it'll be ready to drink. And with spice bush you can make tea with the leaves, the twigs, the berries. The red berries, the native Americans, there were two distinct flavors of the berry where they would take the skin off and that was one flavor, and then they would use the harder seed for another flavor. 

KAYTE YOUNG [NARRATING]: Gibson lights the stove and heats up the water for the tea. The kids line up and slip leaves and branches from the spice bush into the hot water. 

SHANE GIBSON: And we're gonna do pretty small...

KAYTE YOUNG [NARRATING]: Then it's time to taste some spice bush tea that Gibson made ahead of time, along with the acorn pancakes and maple syrup from his own trees. 

SHANE GIBSON: And we'll just pass it on. 

KAYTE YOUNG [NARRATING]: I go around to the 4th graders for an informal survey on the taste. 

CHILD: Eh. 

CHILD: I think that it has a lot of texture in it but with the maple syrup it tastes a lot better. 

CHILD: It does taste like syrup. 

CHILD: It's pretty good it's like the best thing I've ever tasted. 
CHILD: I mean I ate it but that... it taste really good. 

CHILD: I just didn't like the acorn pancake. 

CHILD: I didn't either

CHILD: It's like too dry. 

CHILD: I like the tea; I just didn't like the other stuff. I think it was too dry like you did.

CHILD: Yeah the tea's amazing.

CHILD: Yeah the tea's good. 

KAYTE YOUNG [INTERVIEWING]: Did the maple syrup make it better? 

CHILD: No not really. But the maple syrup was good, just the bread wasn't. 

CHILD: Crunchy. It was really good. 

CHILD: It taste not good. 

KAYTE YOUNG [INTERVIEWING]: Which one, the tea? 

CHILD: Yeah. 

CHILD: I really love the acorn pancakes. They taste exactly like real like pancakes or waffles, they're just so good. I like it. 

CHILD: Taste like water. It taste like cold water but like, sugary. 

(Children giving mixed reviews of pancakes and tea in the background)

RENEE REED: Make sure you never miss an episode. Subscribe to our podcast. It's the same great stories in your podcast feed. Just search for Earth Eats wherever you listen to podcasts. While you're there, please leave us a review. It means a lot to us and it helps other people find us.  

CHILD: I think it's good.

CHILD: Yeah, me too.

CHILD: I didn't really like the pancake that much though. 

CHILD: I liked it with the syrup, it wasn't really my favorite without the syrup, but with it it was good. 

CHILD: It had a lemony taste to it. 

CHILD: Nature gives you a lot of nutrition. 

CHILD: I like the tea. 

SHAWN FISHER: That was pretty amazing guys, what do we say? 

CHILDREN [ALL TOGETHER]: Thank you! 

(Trendy guitar music) 

KAYTE YOUNG: Shane Gibson is the director of environmental education with Sycamore Land Trust in south central Indiana. He offers educational programming in area schools on topics such as wild edibles, native plants, and wildlife. You can find out more at the Sycamore Land Trust dot org. 

After a short break we'll head into the kitchen of Function Brewing with Chef Aryln Llewellyn for two cozy soup recipes. Stay with us. 

(Music) 

(Music)

We’re joining Chef Arlyn Llewellyn in the kitchen of Function Brewing. Arlyn is sharing what she calls “A Tale of Two Soups”. It’s a garlic lover’s soup. One version is vegan and the other is made with chicken. We’ll be walking through the steps of the two variations somewhat simultaneously. You can zoom in on the part that matters most to you. If you get lost, no worries, we have both versions on our website. Let’s get started. 

ARLYN LLEWELLYN: In both cases we need to roast a whole head of garlic. So we just add a complete intact head of garlic. And we wrap it up tightly in aluminum foil. And we’re gonna... put that… you can either put that on a sheet pan or you can put it straight on the rack in the oven, at 400 degrees and 40 to 50 minutes. And the way to tell if it’s done is to take tongs and just squeeze it and it will have a nice give to it when it’s all roasted. Get that going in the oven.  
Another early step that we’re gonna do for the vegan version is to make our mushroom broth. So we have a half of cup of dried porcini mushrooms, which smells so amazing. I feel like I could… I know if you hate mushrooms maybe it smells terrible. But for me it's like the most satisfying savory smell. 
I thought we’d talk a little bit about my approach to making a recipe vegan. One of the things is to think about specifically how you want the flavors to come across rather than just doing straight substitutions. So somebody might look at the chicken soup recipe which came first. I’ve made this at a restaurant several times and say “well you should just substitute vegetable stock for chicken stock”
But in my experience vegetable stock is not always a great substitute. Depending on the context it can taste very muddied. Because chicken stock, beef stock, while they have vegetables those are so in the background. And the stock itself is bringing a very strong specific meaty flavor. So in this case I would much prefer a very strong meaty flavor of a mushroom, rather than the complex… and as I said sometimes muddled flavor of a veggie stock. So we’re just gonna make our own mushroom stock, although you can certainly buy mushroom concentrate in the soup aisle at the grocery store as well. 
So I have a half a cup of dried porcini mushrooms, and just add… three cups of boiling water to it. And you want this to hang out for at least half an hour, wouldn't hurt for it to go for at least an hour or more. At a minimum you want the mushrooms to become really plump, and the water will become a nice brown color. That is the mushroom stage on the meat side, at this point we would also get a bone-in, skin-on, chicken breast going in the oven. Roasting at 375 to 400 degrees for... depending on the size of the chicken breast, and how efficient your oven is, you’re looking at 30 to 45 minutes approximately. So those are the early stages if you were making soup for dinner you could do this in the morning if you wanted, or the day before, and just refrigerate these components, because this stuff does take a little bit longer. But everything else is gonna come together much faster. 
You can fast forward in time… in the case of both soups we’re gonna be back dicing up some Yukon gold potatoes. And you’re just cutting these into pieces that would be appealing to you in a soup. Once we have diced up our potatoes, we’re gonna put them in a nice big soup pot with our broth. 
In the case of the chicken soup, we just have chicken broth, so it's pretty straightforward. We just put the potatoes in the pot and then pour in 3 cups of chicken stock. Get the lid on it and bring it up to a boil on medium-high. As soon as you reach a boil, you’re gonna turn it down to medium-low and let it simmer, until the potatoes are just starting to become fork-tender. You don’t want to overcook them because then the potatoes will be real mushy and they’ll just sort of fall apart in the soup.
The mushroom stock - we have one step first, which is that we need to pull these mushrooms out of the water they have been rehydrating in. We just want to chop them up. So we’ll set those aside. 
KAYTE YOUNG [NARRATING]: Chef Aryln says that there’s often some grit from the dried mushrooms that settles on the bottom of the bowl. And you don’t want that in your soup. 
ARLYN LLEWELLYN: So we just want to pour it carefully rather than just dumping it. And the sediment will mostly stay at the bottom. And we’ll just have to sacrifice the last couple tablespoons of broth, in order not to transfer all that grit. 
So we’ll put a lid on that. And same thing we’re just gonna bring it up to a boil on medium-high, and then once the boil is reached down to medium-low, and let it simmer until the potatoes are just starting to become fork-tender. 
So we have our potatoes cooked and stock that have become fork tender. And then to add to those… we’re gonna be adding cream cheese. Eight ounces of cream cheese. We have a nice vegan cream cheese for the vegan one, and a traditional dairy one for the chicken soup. Lots of vegan cream cheese options out there to choose from. My favorite is Kite Hill, it’s gonna be bringing a lot of body and richness to the party. 
We’re gonna ladle out approximately a cup’s worth of the broth and potatoes into a metal or glass bowl. As well as our roasted garlic cloves. So I guess we started with a full intact head of garlic, we’re gonna have to squeeze out the cloves now. But that is… I find... personally very satisfying. You end up with this really gooey, sticky, very savory garlic mixture that just wants to pop out of the cloves when you apply pressure to it.
If you don’t have an immersion blender and you have a blender that can handle the heat, you can just ladle this straight into your blender. 
And then we’re gonna add our cream cheese to this mixture. So this how we’re getting somebody in the soup, because these potatoes are gonna blend up with the cream cheese and create a nice rich base. Which we will stir back into the rest of the soup. 
I don’t know about you, but immersion blenders are like my favorite kitchen appliance. Although the challenge is definitely when you’re using a smaller amount like this, is to try to make sure you keep the immersion blender immersed, because if it gets a little too high, most of the brands have holes on the side, and you could end up shooting hot liquid out. So you do wanna make sure you have kinda a small bowl, you tilt it to the side, you stick your immersion blender all the way in. If you’re concerned about this at all, again you can just use a traditional blender. 
Okay, so now that we have blended the cream cheese, the potatoes, and the broth, we’re just gonna stir that right back into the rest of the soup mixture. 
And now we have a nice creamy soup that’s still brothy as well. And then to this, again we’re working on the vegan version, that we have blended with the... part of, with the cream cheese and the roasted garlic, and now we’ve combined it back together.
We’re going to add two and a half cups of broccoli florets. So we’re gonna add that to our still warm soup that’s been blended with the cream cheese and roasted garlic. As well as broccoli, we’re gonna add our re-hydrated mushrooms. We’re also gonna chop up some - I have cremini mushrooms here, or you could use portabella mushrooms, or any wild mushroom you have. You're just gonna slice these up into pretty small slices, and that will go in as well.
And we want half a head of minced garlic cloves. So I wasn’t kidding around when I said this was a garlic lover’s soup, we want this to be vampire-proof and great for your immune systems, especially in cold and flu season. This is not a starter garlic dish. And then we’re gonna add a pound of shelled edamame. 
KAYTE YOUNG: And these are the green soybeans which can be found in the frozen foods section. Just make sure you get the ones that are removed from the shell. There’s no reason to thaw them, just add them as they are. They’ll bring texture and some extra protein. 
ARLYN LLEWELLYN: And edamame has a nice little snap to it so...
KAYTE YOUNG: Looks good too.
ARLYN LLEWELLYN: Yeah there’s a lot of green poking out from the broccoli and the edamame. Again, during cold and flu season that's particularly nice to see some green going on. 
KAYTE YOUNG [NARRATING]: Allow the soup to simmer until the edamame is heated through, and the broccoli is tender, 5 to 10 minutes. 
ARLYN LLEWELLYN: And then you’re just gonna season to taste with salt and pepper. And we're gonna add salt to taste and a generous amount of black pepper to round it out.
KAYTE YOUNG [NARRATING]: And now back to the chicken version of this garlic lover’s soup. We still need to finish that one. 
ARLYN LLEWELLYN: We’ve removed our lid from our soup pot that has our potatoes and has our chicken stock simmering in it. Potatoes are nicely fork-tender. We’re going to turn off our heat for just a moment and then we are going to ladle out a cup or two of the potatoes and the broth into a heatproof metal or glass bowl and we will blend it with cream cheese. 
And then the roasted garlic that we squeeze out with of the roasted garlic head. And once we’ve blended that out with an immersion blender or a traditional blender we’ll stir that back into our soup. And to our soup we will now add two and a half cups of broccoli florets. And we’ll put the lid back on it and let it simmer about 5 to 10 minutes. At that point we’re gonna turn off the heat completely and we’re gonna add in all the shredded or chopped chicken meat we pulled off that chicken carcass earlier. I don't want to add it before this because I don’t want it to overcook, it's already fully cooked. And it hanging out in a simmering broth is just gonna dry it out. And then we’re gonna add salt and pepper to taste. Again we didn’t season earlier because we wanted to taste the whole thing together. And the chicken stock, and the cream cheese will have already added some salt. So we’re gonna taste that and see what else it might need. 
KAYTE YOUNG [NARRATING]: So there you have it. A garlic lover’s soup prepared two ways - one vegan, and one chicken. These recipes come from the kitchen of Function Brewing, where Arlyn Llewellyn is the chef and her husband Steve Llewellyn is the brewer. 
Check out both of these recipes, as always, at EarthEats.org. 
We gave both of the soups a taste. 
[TO ARLYN] That is some intense garlic. I think because some of its fresh, or you know hasn’t been cooked for a really long time, it’s really got an intensity. 
ARLYN LLEWELLYN: Right. But not that raw garlic bite I don’t think. It is, it’s very garlicky, but it isn't that sharp, it’s just really pronounced. And then in the background you definitely get some of that roasted garlic caramelization which brings the sweetness, creaminess from the cream cheese. 
That was the chicken one I was just trying, I’m gonna try the vegan one now. 
Vegan one is definitely still very garlic-y, but it’s also very mushroom-y. I think it pays homage to that earthy robust flavor of the mushrooms. So they're... it's interesting that they have so many ingredients in common, but they are such different soups. 
KAYTE YOUNG: They are both really good. So if it were me I would do this one, but I would use real cream cheese. So I would make a vegetarian, but not a vegan. 
ARLYN LLEWELLYN: Right, right, yes, that makes sense. 
KAYTE YOUNG: Let us know what you would do. And if you make either of these soups, drop us a line. We’d love to hear how it turns out. E-mail us, EarthEats@gmail.com. 
After a quick break we'll hear from Harvest Public Media about new technology for managing disease in livestock. And we'll travel down the Monon Trail on two wheels for a unique coffee experience. Stay tuned. 
(Music) 
(Music) 
This is Earth Eats, I'm Kayte Young. To the human eye, each cow in a herd can look nearly identical. But new technology is being developed to identify cattle through facial recognition. Harvest Public Media's Seth Bodine reports how this research may lead to a faster way to track cattle in the event of a disease outbreak.
SETH BODINE: There's nothing super complex about the way Jake Calvert identifies his cows. He uses colored ear tags on his ranch in Norman Oklahoma and says this follows what he says the KISS principal. 
JAKE CALVERT: Keep It Simple Stupid. Green is for grey cattle; pink is for our purebred cows and that's cause all of them exhibit just a little bit more femininity than our grey cattle. Yellow's the bulls. 
SETH BODINE: Calvert can name a few of his cows even without tags, like Angie, a retired show heifer. Take the numbered tags off though and it gets a little tricky. 
JAKE CALVERT: It'd be tough for me to say, "Oh that's 24" And that's obviously the only red cow in the herd - 48. I'd be able to tell her.
SETH BODINE: Without ear tags, brands or ear tattoos, a herd of cows looks like well... just a bunch of cows. But not for a new technology. 
K.C. OLSON: The artificial intelligence looked at the pictures for millions of iterations. And effectively taught itself which features of the bovine had the most picturesque of the species. 
SETH BODINE: That's K.C. Olson, he's a professor at Kansas State University. He and his team showed an A.I. a lot of cow pictures, then they played a game of "Have you seen this cow?"
K.C. OLSON: And 94% of the time the artificial intelligence got the right answer. 
SETH BODINE: The ultimate goal is to develop an app called Cattle Tracks. Ranchers would snap a picture of the cow then it'd be sent to a database with location and other information. Joe Hoagland's company is developing that app. He says it could lead to a speedier way to track a cow in the event of a disease outbreak. 
JOE HOAGLAND: We could trace it and quarantine it and manage it much like what we're doing today with the coronavirus. 
SETH BODINE: Highly infectious disease like hoof and mouth disease could shut down the cattle industry. Right now cows would have to be tracked mostly through paper documents and sales records to figure out how far ahead it had potentially spread. Rosslyn Biggs is a beef extension specialist at Oklahoma State University. She says time is of the essence if the disease were to occur. 
ROSSLYN BIGGS: We need to be able to limit it because undoubtedly we will have significant interruptions in our supply chain here in the United States, our export markets will undoubtedly cut us off depending upon the disease. 
SETH BODINE: Michael Kelsey is the executive vice president of the Oklahoma Cattleman's Association. He says he's open to new technologies as long as they're not too cumbersome. 
MICHAEL KELSEY: That will be the key, is how easy they are to use in an industry that we can keep the speed of commerce flowing, keep the transport of livestock, the transition of livestock from buyer to seller and all those types of things in place. 
SETH BODINE: Calvert is a small rancher and says he's skeptical of facial recognition, but he says other ranchers may jump onboard because it's cheaper than radio frequency ear tags. 
JAKE CALVERT: Producers that are concerned about traceability are gonna jump on the bandwagon. The facial recognition software maybe the ticket because a $9, even $20 a year subscription to a phone app is gonna be far cheaper than tagging 500 calves with RFID tags. 
SETH BODINE: The U.S. Department of Agriculture says it's aware of research into cattle recognition and will continue to evaluate it. But right now there's not plan to officially use the technology to trace cattle. Seth Bodine, Harvest Public Media. 
KAYTE YOUNG: Find more from this reporting collective at HarvestPublicMedia.org. (Music)

(Music)

[TO RIVER BAILEY] So which bike were you thinking of? KAYTE YOUNG: So which bike were you thinking of? 
RIVER BAILEY: This Surly, Long-haul trucker.
KAYTE YOUNG: Alright. And you have several bikes for different applications? 
RIVER BAILEY: [Background discussion] 
KAYTE YOUNG: [Narrating] Have you ever heard of coffeeneuring? What about coffee outside? 
My guest this week, River Baily, is gonna fill us in on the trend. In fact, he's taking us along for the ride.  
We met up at River's place on the northside of Indianapolis. He lives with his wife and daughter in a lovely neighborhood of winding roads, mature trees, and handsome mid-century ranch dwellings. We snake through the neighborhood, cut between two houses to find a trail through a patch of woods. A trail littered with golf ball sized walnuts; I might add. Tricky to navigate on a bike, if you were... well basically if you're me and you're not used to trail riding in the first place. But I managed. It's a shortcut that lets us avoid some busy roads.  
We still end up crossing two major roadways before we turn onto the Monon trail heading south. The Monon is a 27-mile path that follows a former section of the Chicago - Indianapolis and Louisville railway. The rails-to-trails path runs from the town of Sheridan in the north, south through Carmel, Broad Ripple and into downtown Indianapolis. It's smooth sailing once we hit the Monon. 
And on this November afternoon, the trail is lined with the colors of an Indiana autumn. The air is crisp, and we definitely need gloves, but all in all its a great day for a ride. After a couple of miles of easy cycling, we cross the white river, then turn off the trail into a quiet park. 
We stop at a couple of wooden benches arranged to look out over the river. The woods along the bank reflecting shades of gold and brown. We are here so that River can show me his coffee outside routine. 
RIVER BAILEY: I'm River Bailey, biking enthusiast and coffee-making-outside-person. 
KAYTE YOUNG [NARRATING]: He pulls a stylish boxy bag from the wire basket attached to the front of his bike. A wald basket, I later learned. They have a following. 
RIVER BAILEY: -Different devices, coffee making devices, and I brought a cup for you and a cup for me. This is one of the things we could use - called an AeroPress, a kind of trendy little coffee making device for single cup of coffee nowadays. I think we'll do pour overs. This particular pour over is called a helix, it just folds flat and then you'll see it expands like so.
KAYTE YOUNG [TO BAILEY]: Oh, that's nice. So, it's like the cone for a molita or something, but it’s really compact and lightweight. It's made of wire and it collapses. 
RIVER BAILEY: This is our stove, which is just a little pocket rocket. Here's our kettle. This is traditionally used for camping mostly, they're titanium for backpacking and so it’s a little titanium kettle and cups. You can use anything though it doesn't have to be titanium. 
And this little pocket rocket stove is really awesome. It also just collapses as you can see and then expands. And then you just screw it on top of your fuel canister. 
KAYTE YOUNG [NARRATING]: The type of fuel for this camping stove is called IsoPro. It’s a blend of isobutane and propane and it comes in a squat canister that connects directly to the tiny stove piece.  
He's got a small kettle full of water and the camp stove is assembled.  
RIVER BAILEY: And so, you don't need a lighter, if you've got this thing. 
KAYTE YOUNG: Okay so, it looks like a little key almost.  
RIVER BAILEY: Yeah and it’s a firestarter. It's just a little...
[Dull scratching sound] 
KAYTE YOUNG: Like a metal and flint kind of thing.  
[Hissing sound of propane, and then of the fire catching]
RIVER BAILEY: that little kettle on, whoops
KAYTE YOUNG [NARRATING]: So, for coffee outside, just like coffee inside, at home, the coffee is up to you. Bring your favorite roast and grind it just before you leave or bring a portable hand grinder if you must. 
RIVER BAILEY: So that was like helix, it’s a pour over device, and then this is also a pour over device, but the nice thing about this little GSI clip-on, it’s got a name. Clip-on pour over that is you don't have to use a filter; it’s just built in you can just rinse it out. Just put this on the side of your cup like so. Like strong coffee? 
KAYTE YOUNG:  Yes. 
RIVER BAILEY: Lots of people do this coffee outside thing, it’s kinda trending now, especially on bikes. I think some people call it coffeeneuring, which is a funny name for it. 
You don't have to do it when you're biking obviously. I mean the other day I took a hike with a friend and brought all the stuff in a backpack and we just made coffee outside for us and that was nice too. But I like coffee and I like biking so, combine the two, it’s a win for me. 
KAYTE YOUNG: For me, I feel like it, it makes almost a destination out of it, out of the ride.  
RIVER BAILEY: Yeah, yeah. Exactly. Mid-way through the ride too, so that the coffee kicks in I guess, instead of just at the beginning or at the end. 
This location is really nice, it’s just a good place to reflect and meditate. Just kinda get away from the city, even though you're in the middle of the city you don’t really feel like it. 
It's on the White River, it’s in a little park in Broad Ripple and there's benches and leaves and trees. It’s under a weeping willow tree which is really nice. It's just really picturesque. The river is just... right now I mean it’s just gently flowing and there's some ripples, little white-water ripples down to the left. 
The best way to tell this is done and this kettle is...  is basically I just watch for that condensation, the steam, to start coming out of the spout. It doesn't whistle or anything. I think it's kinda starting to steam a little bit out of there. 
Yeah, we'll give it a shot. It's probably hot enough.  
So, this particular pour over one is the one that doesn't have a paper filter so if the coffee runs through faster, which doesn't seem like a good thing, but it still tastes really good. You just want to pour it slowly in a circular motion. I've never been a barista or anything like that, but just from what I've read and seen. 
It looks hot.  
KAYTE YOUNG: Yeah, it's certainly steaming. 
RIVER BAILEY: And these are double walled titanium cups, so they won't burn your hands either, you can hold them.  Might just be just enough water actually. Alright
KAYTE YOUNG: I brought my own half and half because I....really  
RIVER BAILEY: Oh, one of those.  
KAYTE YOUNG: Yup, I really don't enjoy coffee without it. 
RIVER BAILEY: Yeah, yeah that looks good. Yeah, it’s really good. I'm not usually a sipper, I did it for the microphone. My dad on the other hand is a sipper, he sips everything. 
Alright, cheers.  
KAYTE YOUNG: Yeah, that's nice. 
RIVER BAILEY: Decent, huh?
KAYTE YOUNG:  Yeah. Coffee is probably my... one of my favorite things about camping. So, I don't know why I've never really thought to bring coffee out on a hike. You know, coffee making supplies out on a hike.  
RIVER BAILEY: I sometimes bring it when we're commuting and traveling. You know instead of stopping at a coffee shop or something, I'll just have it in the back of the car and make it and...
KAYTE YOUNG: Yeah, I'm always pretty coffee self-sufficient when I travel.  
RIVER BAILEY: Yeah.
KAYTE YOUNG: Like I bring my own...  
RIVER BAILEY:  Me too.
KAYTE YOUNG: -setup. Ah yeah, this is great. 
RIVER BAILEY: And if I have time, a lot of times I'll stop at a like a bakery or something and bring along a pastry or something to go with it and just to make the event just a little bit more special. And there's, there is a group up here in Indianapolis, that... I think it's "Indianapolis Coffee Outside" or something, but I've met with them a few times and had coffee outside with the group. So, it's organized, I think they do it once a month, all year-round, but it's been kinda a solo thing for me.  
KAYTE YOUNG: So, you spend a lot of time outside, is it usually biking somewhere? 
RIVER BAILEY: Usually, yeah. Not always, we also do a lot of hiking and camping, but if I can combine biking with hiking and camping then it’s a win, because I really like just riding my bike. 
KAYTE YOUNG: So, would you say that some of your interest in doing coffee outside or even just camping and outdoor stuff is... do you like gear? 
RIVER BAILEY: Yeah I'd say I... you probably noticed, that's why you asked that question. I'm definitely a gearhead. I'm always looking at... for another piece. I mean there’s three different coffee making devices right here, and at home we have even more. And I'm always looking for new bags or biking and bikes. You know, you can only ride one at a time, but I do like having choices. I follow a lot of people I think on Instagram that test gear and do things like that so... it could be fun to get into that. 
KAYTE YOUNG: Yeah, that would be dreamy.  
RIVER BAILEY: Yeah, I think so too. 
KAYTE YOUNG: Okay so let's go through all of the things that you have to have. So...
RIVER BAILEY: Water, is definitely an essential, and coffee. And a stove, you definitely want to your stove and your fuel. Sometimes I've gotten out here and forgotten my fuel. And some kind of device to light it, so whether it’s a lighter or this little fire starter stick thing. And then a pot to boil the water in. And then you want just something to make your coffee, whether it’s a pour over or these AeroPresses are really popular. Can't get much more simple than just a simple pour over thing.  
KAYTE YOUNG: Yeah pour over is definitely my favorite method at this moment.  
RIVER BAILEY: If you're really hardcore you know you bring the whole beans and put your beans in here and use this little Burr grinder. And then coffee just comes down in here. 
KAYTE YOUNG: Yeah, and then if you're me you would have to bring your little jar of half and half. 
RIVER BAILEY: Yes. But the cup is also pretty important. One time I didn't... I also forgot my cup and I tried to make a pour over with like a plastic bottle that I found. Which is kinda gross, but the bottle seemed pretty clean. So, but... it didn’t work. It worked... but it blew over when I was trying to make it. And I was trying to make a picture of it while I was making it, but to prove how clever I was being, and it didn't work out. But I confessed in the post that I made it, that it didn't go as smoothly as it all looks in the photos. 
KAYTE YOUNG: Well, that was a very good cup of coffee, and this is definitely the perfect day for it. 
[Narrating] So, there you go, coffee outside. Grab your coffee and your gear before you head out on your next ride or hike. Find a sweet spot and brew yourself a cup. It's especially nice in chilly weather. Enjoy. 
RIVER BAILEY: Little clips for the bag, just... these clips are made so that the bag won't bounce out.  
KAYTE YOUNG: So, it is made for the...
RIVER BAILEY: It is literally made for this basket, yeah. 
KAYTE YOUNG: This bike basket. Oh wow. 
Check our website to find River Bailey's checklist for everything you need to make your own coffee outside, EarthEats.org. 
That's it for our show this week, thanks for listening. We'll see you next time. Take care. 
[Sound of water boiling]
(Earth Eats production support music, composed by Erin Tobey and performed by Erin and Matt Tobey) 

RENEE REED: Get freshest the food news each week, subscribe to the Earth Eats Digest. It's a weekly note packed with food notes and recipes, right in your inbox. Go to EarthEats.org to sign up.  

The Earth Eats team includes Eobon Binder, Mark Chilla, Abraham Hill, Josephine McRobbie, the IU Food Institute, Harvest Public Media and me, Renee Reed.  

KAYTE YOUNG: Special thanks this week to Shane Gibson and everyone at Unionville Elementary, Arlyn Llewellyn and everyone at Function Brewing, Joe O'Connell and River Bailey. 
RENEE REED: Our theme music is composed by Erin Tobey and performed by Erin and Matt Tobey. Additional music on the show comes to us from the artist at Universal Productions Music. Earth Eats is produced and edited by Kayte Young and our executive producer is John Bailey.