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Help create fabulous food; garden in a challenging climate.

The experience

Nearly everything we do supports of one thrill: adventures in food. Come enjoy the pleasures of the table, learn things in getting there and assist at our weekend Table d'Hôte.

Assist us in all things needed to keep a semi-remote, rural estate functioning: garden both for food and beauty; dive in on both major and minor maintenance; repair, repurpose and recreate the miscellaneous; build minor and major spaces needed in the life we live.

What you offer

25 hours of help per week

Kitchen Hand: Help prepare, finish and serve meals.

Building & Repairing: Help with a wide range of repairs or building.

Gardening: Help grow plants and cultivate gardens

What you get

2 days off per week

Private Room: You will have a bed in a private room. In other words, a room just for you.

Shared Dorm: You will have a bed in a shared room, which means you will share the same room with other travelers.

Tent: You will sleep in a tent at a camping site.

Breakfast: You are entitled to a free breakfast, every day of your stay.

Lunch: You are entitled to a free lunch, every day of your stay.

Dinner: You are entitled to a free dinner, every day of your stay.

Free Laundry: You can use our laundry room freely.

Bikes at your disposal: You can use our bikes any time you want.

Pick Up: We will pick you up when you arrive, and take you to our property.

Basic Internet Access: Basic speed internet for you to work remotely

Requirements

Beginner English

Over 18 years old

Welcomes solo volunteers, couples, and partners of volunteers

What's not included

Flights, Travel Insurance, Internal Transportation and Visa

Program Details

We moved north from Vancouver to escape the noise and the craziness and to find a spot to live in beauty. We found one and now are on the edge of nothing but more nothing all 400 km to the Pacific. We are 20 km outside of a small town halfway between nowhere and not much. Sharing that is a pleasure.

But Jenn could not abandon her passions as a chef so our mainstay is now a part-time weekend Table d'Hôte at which we try to offer as much as possible from our own garden or local growers. Yes, there are plenty of people living in mid-nowhere who love great food.

The position assists at all stages from menu design through preparation and serving to clean-up. Specific tasks vary depending on skill and interest. You could discover the difference between being a cook and a chef.

While food is our central focus, keeping a rural estate functioning demands much else. There is always a never-ending list of garden and workshop and maintenance tasks; DIY or it will never get done. Between kitchen times you will chip away at these; the gardens in particular during the growing season.

We garden in a challenging climate: sub-boreal climate, poor forest soils, 900 m elevation and the season is very short. Still, we have managed to approach self-sufficiency in several crops: garlic, carrots, beans, peas and maybe onions this year.

In general, you would help us in
- assistance in the kitchen and in serving guests, perhaps canning too;
- garden maintenance in all respects; food, ornamental and landscape;
- repair and fix-ups of anything;
- general household maintenance;

For this position, an ideal candidate would have some background in restaurants as cook or sous chef or server OR as a passionate amateur in the kitchen playing with food, cooking and/or baking or ???

Activities & Shift

The tasks/projects you are given are tied to the length of your stay. Short-term stays less than a month are given narrowly defined projects; for longer-term we seek generalists. Depending on your skill set and the length of your stay, we may together create a new target .

Work shift is normally 9:30 am to 2:30 pm with Sunday and Monday free.

Part of how we celebrate life is in preparing food together, serving it with thanks and sitting down to share it. Our menus are balanced with minimal factory processed foods but do not follow any particular diet theme. They are not gluten-free, dairy-free, vegetarian or vegan or follow any other principle. If your diet choices limit what you can eat or you have specific needs, YOU MUST ask if we can accommodate them. Separate meal preparation will not be considered.

You prepare your own breakfast and lunch. Jenn and/or Bruce most often do the dinner but you are called on regularly to help or take over.

Rules

No browsing or communicating with your phone use during work time.
No smoking/vaping, neither tobacco or pot during your stay.
No recreational drug use.
No excessive drinking.