Summer Fare #45

David Levi:

While I do love to actually cook, so much of the food that I eat and that I promote is not cooked. So I want to get us away from the idea that food is something that is inherently cooked or 99% of the time cooked. I actually, I love raw food.

Rafael Adams:

When people first see somebody paddleboarding across the water, they're just like, wow, that looks amazing. It looks like that person is literally just gliding across the surface of the water. It looks like something that just doesn't seem possible in some ways. And then when they find out how easy it is and how healthy it is, how simple it is, they think, well, maybe I should try that. You know, maybe it's something I could do.

Anita Demetropoulos:

I think it's important for children to use their imaginations while playing. Being able to just put everything aside and just go out there and create whatever comes to mind is really important. So we buy toys that encourage children to do that, stay away from electronics, battery operated toys, and our focus is on imaginative play and being creative.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Genevieve Morgan, who's sitting in front of me.

Genevieve Morgan:

It's really exciting for us. Now people have two ways to listen to us, which is twice as nice.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Yes, it's wonderful. We're on the am, we're on the fm, and we're also at both sides of the morning on Sunday mornings. We've moved our time.

Genevieve Morgan:

Tell everybody what time we're airing now.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

We're now airing at 12 o' clock high noon on the AM station, which is 1310. And we're also airing at 7am on WPEI, which is it happens to be a sports related station out of the Portland area. The nice thing is that people are recognizing the value of our content.

Genevieve Morgan:

Well, I was just gonna say we're 45 shows in and we thanks to you all listening. It seems as if our reach is growing and our audience. Audience is growing. And I think you and I have both been talking about how we'd love to hear more from our listeners about the next year to come because everything is happening so quickly and our reach is just growing. So let us know what you guys think out there.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Absolutely. I think it's important for people who are listening, if you're out there listening right now, to know that you do have a voice, that we listen to you. We've had multiple shows that have included guests suggested by our listeners. We spend a lot of time communicating with people on Facebook and email and really building this community. So that has been part of what we are doing on the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and podcast. And clearly it's working because our show now has that extra hour and we've moved to high noon and we're going full force into the future. And thanks to our sponsors too.

Genevieve Morgan:

Yeah, we wouldn't be nowhere without them.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

That's absolutely true. These have been a group of really dedicated individuals who have shown up and they understand the importance of health and wellness and it's a larger place in the world. So if you're listening and you know one of our sponsors, please be sure to tell them that you heard about them on the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and podcast.

Genevieve Morgan:

And speaking of, we have three really interesting, varied guests today for our summer fair show.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

I think you who are listening are really going to like these interviews. They're quite varied. The first one is Chef David Levy, who's opening up a new restaurant. Isn't that right, Genevieve?

Genevieve Morgan:

Yep. I think he's planning to open it up in Portland in the fall and he's got a lot of unique ideas and interesting concepts.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Yes, he talks a lot about foraging, which is something that I like doing. I like going out into the wild and looking at the types of plants that possibly could be edible, as long as they're safe.

Genevieve Morgan:

Lots of berries this time of year.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

That's true. Lots of berries. We also have Raphael Adams of the South Portland Paddle Shop, otherwise known as Sopo. Sup and Genevieve, you know him well?

Genevieve Morgan:

I do. He was in the surf article that I wrote last summer for Maine magazine and I actually went out as a first time paddle boarder with him and it was a great experience. And I know that he and I both want to get you out there this summer.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Oh, I'm looking forward to it. I love the water. I love being out there. And we also have Anita Dimitropoulos who is coming in from Island Treasure Toys in Yarmouth. They now have a second. It's really an inspiring story. They're 10 years in, a whole decade in and they have two toy stores in Yarmouth and Freeport. And they're just such a great couple, the Demetropolis couple.

Genevieve Morgan:

And I know people out there might be thinking, well, what do these people have to do with health? But I think you can speak to the fact that they are all aspects of what we consider a healthy community.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Well, they're a healthy community and they're also all people who offer a kind of sense of play, that health and wellness doesn't always have to be about working out or being on a diet. It's about going out there, enjoying the woods. As we've done our into the woods show just last week. It's about the going out there and playing. It's about seeing what you can eat from out there in the environment. So it's really health and wellness does not have to be a bad thing. It doesn't have to be a hard thing.

Genevieve Morgan:

That is so true. In fact, probably the less effort and the more fun, the healthier you're gonna feel, particularly in the middle of summer.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Well, especially if you're out foraging, paddle boarding or playing with toys. So those of you who are listening, thanks for doing so and thanks for becoming part of our world. We really appreciate it. We hope you enj our guest today, The Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast is pleased to be sponsored by the University of New England. And as part of our collaboration with the University of New England, we offer a segment we call Wellness Innovations. This week's Wellness Innovation has to do with pharmaceutical research, and that is that South African daffodils may be a future cure for depression. Scientists have discovered that plant compounds from a South African flower may in time be used to treat diseases originating in the brain, including depression. At the University of Copenhagen, a number of these substances have now been tested in a laboratory model of the blood brain barrier. The promising results have been published in the Journal of Pharmacy and Pharmacology. Scientists at the University of Copenhagen have previously documented the substances from the South African plant species Crinum and Certanthus, akin to snowdrops and daffodils have an effect on the mechanisms in the brain that are involved in depression. This research has now yielded further results since a team based at the Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences has recently shown how several South African flowers contain plant compounds whose characteristics enable them to negotiate the defensive blood brain barrier that is a key challenge in all new drug development.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast, we're talking about summer fare. And with us we have Chef David Levy of Vinland. David's been out teaching classes. He's doing locally sourced food. There's so many exciting things that he's doing and you're going to actually tell us that right now. Vinland is a concept, but it's an exciting concept and it is related to summer fare. Welcome to the show.

David Levi:

Thank you. Hi, Lisa. Hi, Jen. So Vinland is my upcoming restaurant, and it does not exist yet, although hopefully will exist here in Portland by around the middle of this coming fall. And it's a restaurant where I'm going to be using all local ingredients and a lot of wild ingredients. That's actually a major passion of mine, foraging wild food, especially mushrooms and herbs. So actually we have delicious and nourishing wild things all around us. And I find that incredibly exciting that you go into the supermarket and so many of the things are coming from California or Mexico or, or God knows where. But right on the side of your building here is purslane. It's popping up through the bricks. Purslane is the richest plant source of omega 3 fats. It's absolutely delicious. It was Gandhi's favorite food. Purslane is one of my favorite summer greens to throw in a salad or to cook with. Incredibly nutrient dense, a little bit mucilaginous, a little bit slippery in the mouth. It's a succulent plant. If you have a garden, you've probably seen it, chances are good you've weeded it out. So next time I would say when you pluck it, put it in your salad. Some of the other wild plants you'll just see growing absolutely everywhere would Be lamb's quarters. Close relative of beets and spinach. More nutrient dense than either of those two. Chickweed is absolutely everywhere at this time of the year. Wood sorrel with its very, very bright acidity. Sheep sorrel as well, unrelated plants, but both called sorrel. Both of them are high in oxalic acid, also high in vitamin C. And so they have a very bright, citrusy flavor. And that's really just, you know, the tip of the iceberg. But we have all these exciting plants growing all around us that are just coming up. You know, we don't have to actually do anything to bring them forth. And they're often much more exciting than what we can find in the supermarket, to say nothing of the fact that they're growing with no inputs, with no fertilizer, no pesticides. In fact, you don't even have the carbon footprint of transporting or packaging the goods.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

How did you get interested in doing this type of cooking? Cooking with foraged foods and wild foods?

David Levi:

Well, when I was a kid, I lived in upstate New York in the New York side of the Berkshires. My folks still live there today. And my mom would take me and my little sister out to pick strawberries and blackberries, black caps, red raspberries. So I really loved doing that from the time I was a little kid. There's always something kind of special about finding something sweet and delicious out there in nature. And my sister and I also loved picking what I later found out was wood sorrel. I thought it was just. I think we called it lemon clover, but we would just eat tons of it. And our mom would say that we would get a belly ache. We never did, actually. So I was drawn to it the way I think a lot of little kids are drawn to it, but didn't actually start foraging in a serious way until my mid-20s, when I started coming to Maine and went up to Deer Isle and was invited to go out into the woods to pick some chanterelles for dinner, which kind of blew me away. You know, I was not working professionally as a chef yet, but was very serious about my cooking. And the fact that chanterelles were just there waiting to be taken in the woods was. Was a real eye opener. You know, something that you might pay $40 a pound for at D&Deluca if you're lucky enough to find it. And here were far superior ones, you know, hadn't been, like, rotting on a store shelf or in a truck for a week or two. Incredibly delicious. Such intense flavor. It was right there. And So I thought, all right, you know, I need to find every chanterelle on this island. And thankfully for the chanterelles and the other wildlife, I didn't, but found plenty and then really started getting into learning mushrooms. So I've now very confidently harvested probably two to three dozen species of mushrooms, none of which have poisonous lookalikes, by the way. There are only a small handful of wild mushrooms that look anything like anything dangerous. So we have a bit of mycophobia, you know, fear of mushrooms in this culture, which is a little sad. It's something that we inherited from the English. You go to Europe, and all the Europeans love to forage mushrooms, except the English. But you go to Scandinavia, Russia, Italy, France, Czechoslovakia, everywhere the woods are just full of foragers at every time of the year that you can possibly find mushrooms. Generally, it's a pretty fundamentally safe thing to do once you, you know, take that basic step of learning what you're looking at. And again, you know, just opens you up to a whole range of flavors and textures. And, you know, even the physical beauty of some of these mushrooms, like black trumpets or chanterelles, is really pretty astonishing. And it can totally transform a dish.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Where did you get your training? Where did you learn about mushrooms and foraging? And is this something that's standard to chef training in the United States?

David Levi:

Absolutely not standard, and that's unfortunate. That's something I'd love to see change. I think that culinary schools, which are so valuable in so many ways for so many people, are like many institutions of education, relatively conservative. And so they haven't, for the most part, really caught up with this raging new interest in wild food. I mean, now you're seeing Rene Redzepi from NOMA and Magnus Nilsson from Favicon. Say nothing of Thomas Keller here in the States, who have been such proponents of using wild food. You see them on the COVID of all the culinary magazines. And that's really where the attention has been these last few years in fine dining. Moving on from molecular gastronomy, that previous movement, which was very focused in really scientific techniques, a valuable movement, but, you know, there's kind of a reaction against it, looking back towards nature now. So in terms of my own education in foraging, it's never really true to say that you're self educated because you're always learning from others. But I was learning a lot from books, from the Internet, from my friend Giles, who is not a professional chef, he's an abstract painter. But he and I got fascinated with foraging at the same time and just started Tearing through books and teaching each other and foraging together. I learned from wildman Steve Brill, this incredible forager down in New York, and then took it a step or two further when I did my Stodge, my culinary apprenticeship at Noma, which I then followed up with Stodge at Favakin in northern Sweden. And both of those restaurants are using such an incredible array of wild foods and using them to such great effect too. It's not just that they're there on the plate, but they're incorporated into these magnificent dishes. So that was an incredible experience in so many ways. But one of them was broadening and deepening my own knowledge of wild foods and how to use them.

Genevieve Morgan:

Well, also, I think in those cultures in particular, growing seasons are very short. So you have a very particular idea about agriculture and how it's come to play in our evolution of nutrition. Do you want to speak to that for a little bit?

David Levi:

Yeah, that's a big one. So agriculture is a tricky word. You know, I. I love small farms and I have some great friends in this area who have small farms and are really doing right by their plants and their animals and the land. That said, I think that agriculture as such, as defined from say, horticulture or pastoralism, is generally not good for the land. And that's a tough thing for us because our whole society, Western civilization, is founded on agriculture, which I would define as the monocropping of annual grains in the west, primarily wheat, but you know, there are the other grains too, barley, rye, millet, whatever. And certainly corn and rice would fit into that model as well. So when you take a piece of land and you clear every living thing and then plant rows of identical monocrops, that's bad for the soil. It's obviously bad for biodiversity. It leads to erosion. It's why the Fertile Crescent is now all desert. And it's not like historians just have a weird sense of humor and they decide to call Iraq and Egypt and Syria the Fertile Crescent. So that land used to be incredibly rich and abundant. We live in a land where agriculture is as such, you know, in terms of extractive, large scale monocropping of grains is still a pretty recent thing. And yet there's already been a very serious toll on the Great Plains. It's lost two thirds of its original topsoil. What's left is denuded of many of its nutrients. The Oglala aquifer, which is the world's largest aquifer beneath the Great Plains, is now at least half empty, maybe 60% empty. To say nothing of the fact that it's becoming polluted and it's replenishing at a microscopic rate. I mean, we're talking about water that not only goes back to the last ice age, it actually goes back quite a bit further and replenishes over the span of millions of years. And, you know, we sucked it more than half dry in 100 years and are accelerating that. So all of that is kind of a long way of saying that it's not a sustainable model, nor is it particularly good for us because these grains are nutrient dense. I'm sorry, they're not nutrient dense. They're calorie dense, but nutrient poor. And also often loaded with what is called in Western a price circles or some circles, antinutrients, chemical defense mechanisms in the seed that can block mineral absorption and do other things to basically convince the animals to not eat them, which is obviously in the plant's interest. So I think that we really need to look at ways that we can live in balance with the land, as the indigenous cultures of this continent did since time immemorial, which might involve growing a certain number of plants in a horticultural setting, which is to say a polyculture of plants. And not all annual plants. Perennial plants are better because you don't have to disturb the topsoil. But some annual plants grow on a small scale. Well, you can do that and not destroy the land. The Abenaki did it. Plenty of others did it, and they also hunted.

Genevieve Morgan:

You mentioned NOMA and Dario Cecchini. Where is that and who are they?

David Levi:

Well, these are two places where I stodged last year. So Dario Cecchini is by many people's estimation, the world's greatest butcher. He's an incredible butcher, no doubt about that. But there are a lot of great butchers in the world. So what really sets Dario apart is his enormous personality and also his fierce love of the artisanal way of life and opposition to industrial food. He's an 8th generation butcher in the small town of Panzano in Chianti. This little village right Between Florence and Siena. It's an incredibly beautiful place. And he loves what he does, maybe more than anyone I've ever met. And he does almost nothing else. He works seven days a week. He works every single day, usually 14, 15 hours a day, but he never tires. And that's because it's such a labor of love. He truly loves meat and he takes great responsibility for the meat as well, seeing that it's coming from really good small farms and that he's doing the absolute best that he possibly can with it, that he's turning into extraordinary food. And he now has a couple of restaurants in that town of Panzano. So I worked with him doing the butchering then also in the restaurants. And it was just an incredible experience, learning a little bit of his craft and even more so learning his, or just kind of through osmosis from being in the presence of his tremendous love for his way of life. Coming to love it myself and see the enormous value in that. I actually moved from there to Copenhagen, where I did my two month long stage at Nomad. So Noma is maybe the world's best restaurant on the San Pellegrino list, which is the big prestigious list out there for avant garde restaurants. It's been number one for the last three years. And Noma is a restaurant that has redefined fine dining. It's pushed it away from the old molecular gastronomy movement and, and moved it towards wild nature, which is something that is very beautiful in my estimation. And the other great thing about Noma, from my point of view, is that they've done this all with Nordic ingredients. Now, while it was amazing working with Dario in Tuscany, and we certainly have access to great beef here, and that's primarily what Dario works with, beef. I think if I had stayed in Tuscany and really immersed myself more in the Tuscan cuisine, that would be pretty tough to do with local ingredients because we're never going to have olive oil or lemons or so many of the things that are just quintessential to Tuscan cuisine. But our bioregion is actually very, very much like Denmark's. So pretty much everything that grows there grows here. In fact, the difference is that we have somewhat greater biodiversity, so there are things that we have that they don't have. So really we have just a broader palette to work with. But already Rene Redzepi from Noma, the head chef at no, has shown that what you can do with that Nordic palate is almost limitless and so incredibly refined. So I look forward to bringing back just a Little bit of that to Maine.

Genevieve Morgan:

The trend these days is vegan forks over knives. There's a real bent again towards cutting meat and meat products out of people's diets. It's considered healthier. But you really have a different take going back even further, which has to do with eating meat.

David Levi:

Yeah, that's absolutely true. And you know, it's a tricky subject to get into care very deeply about what they eat. And when you're talking about vegans or most vegetarians, or people on the flip side following a western price style diet or a paleo diet, something like that, these are people who have put a lot of thought into what they're eating. They generally have strong nutritional grounds for what they're doing. Often also there's a moral imperative based on their understanding of what the ecological consequences are of their food choices. So I think it's absolutely essential to begin any kind of investigation of that kind of thing by acknowledging that people have these positive motivations, they're trying to make the right choices, and to not pretend that I or anybody else has the absolute correct answer. So I could just say that my way of thinking about how we should eat, how we can best nourish ourselves, while also protecting the land. We can start by looking at cultures that have lived in equilibrium with the land for eons, for many thousands of years. And when you look at indigenous cultures, I'm defining indigenous as opposed to societies based on cities, which is really, if you look at the etymology of civilization, it's all about cities. So if we're looking at non urban societies, non agricultural societies, societies based on hunting, foraging, pastoralism, small scale horticulture, you see that no matter where these people were in the world, most of their calories were coming from fat, and mostly highly saturated fat. And it was generally animal sources. The one big exception would be people who had access to coconuts. You look at the coconut eating cultures and often coconut oil accounts for 50% or even more of the total calories. And then much of the rest is fish. You can look at the Maasai or the Samburu in East Africa, living near the equator and on their traditional diet, getting virtually all of their calories from cattle. They're semi nomadic cattle herders. They do drink the dairy from the cows and also to drink blood from the cows. They keep the cows alive and they tap them for blood. It's like a human being giving blood. It's not particularly painful or traumatic or anything. And they do also, of course, eat the meat of the animals. And these people have extraordinary health. They have virtually no incidence of heart disease or stroke. They have unbelievable strength. I mean, some of the greatest distance runners in the world are from these, from these tribes. And then in as different a climate as you could possibly find, you go to Greenland and you see that the Inuit, before colonization, before being switched to a western diet, were getting over 80% of their total calories from fat and virtually 100% of their total calories from animals. And they certainly ate, and to a large extent still eat a lot of fish, although really the staple are marine mammals. And they had no incidence of cancer. Danish doctors who lived there for the better part of their lives never saw a single case of cancer until they started finding Greenlandic Inuit who had been switched to a western diet, who were starting to eat flour and sugar, and bingo, just like that, they started getting cancer and heart disease and stroke, none of which have been present before. So I think that when we look at the diets of indigenous people, and this is true also for the Abenaki, also for the Lakota, also, well, for most of the indigenous people of what's now the United States, you see a diet based heavily in animals. And when you look at the exceptions, you look at the more agricultural societies of the desert Southwest, very beautiful societies in so many ways, but you actually do find obesity there, whereas you don't find it in the other cultures. You do find tooth decay and evidence of cancer in the remains of these agricultural peoples. And so again, again, again, I think that we can see that indigenous peoples having an animal based diet and a diet very high in fat and very nutrient dense, tend to be taller and stronger, much more cancer free, much more cavity free as well, larger bone mass. And I personally have found that since I switched to that kind of diet, my health has improved enormously. In fact, when I went off grain three years ago, I was able to tackle asthma. I had had severe asthma for 30 years, was on three daily medications, and it was a huge encumbrance in my life. And just getting off grain wound up solving it for me.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

For people who are interested in foraging, for the, interested in, I don't know, finding the purse lane along the building and getting out into the woods and the chanterelles, what steps can they take? How can they learn more about foraging? How can they learn more about the type of eating that you're describing?

David Levi:

Well, there are a lot of great resources out there. It's well worth getting at least one guide, really, preferably a couple of books you can use as a reference point. So you see a mushroom, you're wondering what it is. You look it up in one book. Once you're pretty sure that you can idea and preferably get a book with really good pictures with not just the Latin names but also the common names. And then cross reference it. You know, look it up in a few other places, see if it has any dangerous analogs. That's a word that's often used for lookalikes. Or you can just say type into Google, you know, dangerous look alikes. Like if you type into Google dangerous lookalikes for chanterelles, you'll probably find Jack o' lantern. But the jack o' lantern really does not look very much like a chanterelle at all. If you've ever really seen a chanterelle, you're not going to mistake them. If you've never seen a chanterelle before, then based on this description, you might wonder if a jack o lantern is the right thing. So you really need to look at the pictures closely. You need to be sure about what you're picking. Jack o', lantern, by the way, is a bioluminescent mushroom. So taken into a dark closet. But there are so many wonderful things that you can harvest where there's just no confusing them. There's just no way to confuse a hen of the woods or an oyster mushroom or a black trumpet for anything that's going to do you any harm at all.

Genevieve Morgan:

Do you teach that in your class as well?

David Levi:

I do, yeah. So actually one place that you could learn these things would be to come to my class classes. So I guess I can make a little plug. My website is Vinland Me for Maine, and I have this ongoing series of classes, Portland Food and Cooking class. I say food and cooking because while I do love to actually cook, so much of the food that I eat and that I promote is not cooked. So I want to get us away from the idea that food is something that is inherently cooked or 99% of the time cooked. I actually, I love raw food, fermented foods. So I've already taught one foraging class. I've often incorporated wild ingredients in my cooking classes. I'll be doing another foraging class before too long. Now that we're getting into summer, we're starting again to prime time for mushrooms. Chanterelles, black trumpets, bolettes, porcini would be one of those bolette mushrooms, oyster mushrooms, shaggy mane, all kinds of great things. And then the array of wild greens is far greater. And again, many of them are really pretty easy to id. So the Internet's a great tool. Wildman Steve Brill. He's a legend in the foraging community. So I recommend going to his website. It's very, very user friendly and look around for foraging tours. David Spar is a wonderful mycologist, mushroom specialist here in Maine and I believe he gives tours.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Well, thank you so much for coming in and talking to us today. We've been talking with Chef David Levy of Vinland and we hope that you that you'll come back and talk to us more about some of the exciting work you're doing with your upcoming restaurant and and all the things that I think our listeners are eager to hear about.

David Levi:

I'd be really happy to do that. Thank you so much. Lisa. Thank you, Jen.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

as part of today's summer fair show, we have with us Raphael Adams of Sopo SAP. What does soposup stand for? Rafael and welcome.

Rafael Adams:

Thank you. Soposup stands for South Portland Stand Up Paddling. So we are a shop in South Portland. We've been open for about a year and a half now and we teach stand up paddleboarding to people. We do rentals. We have a lot of fun classes too, things like yoga. We do fishing on stand up paddle Boards. Everyone who works at SOPOS Hub also does a lot of surfing on paddleboards. And we sell paddleboards.

Genevieve Morgan:

Well, I first went paddleboarding with you about a year ago for an article in Maine Magazine. I think it was the July issue of last year on surfing. And I wanted to put in a piece about stand up paddleboarding because it's something that a beginner can do. So describe how you actually, anyone can get on a paddleboard. I think. What was the youngest and oldest person, person that you'd.

Rafael Adams:

I've had people, I think anyone as young as even two or three on a paddleboard with an adult. I've had a woman take her mother who was 86, out on the paddle board. So they did that together. I had a woman just call right before I came in here today, and she said, you know, I'm older, I'm 65. Can I do this? And I asked her if she could, you know, if she could clean her kitchen. Basically, if you can clean your kitchen, you can probably stand a paddle board. It's that easy to do it.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Why are older people or younger people, why are people drawn to stand up paddleboarding?

Rafael Adams:

I think when people first see somebody paddleboarding across the water, they're just like, wow, that looks amazing. It looks like that person is literally just gliding across the surface of the water. It looks like something that just doesn't seem possible in some way. And then when they find out how easy it is and you know, how, how healthy it is, how simple it is, they think, well, maybe I should try that. Maybe it's something I could do.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Is this something that is unique in Maine? Is there stand up paddleboarding?

Rafael Adams:

No. Stand up paddleboarding really started probably about 10 years ago, and it started in Hawaii and it was begun by more or less Laird Hamilton, depending on whose story you listen to. But the easiest way to explain it is that it was started by Laird Hamilton, who's a big wave surfer who a lot of people know about and especially people who are into fitness and health issues. So he started it as a way to just take advantage of flat days, basically in Hawaii. Maybe if there weren't any big waves, he wanted to still get out there. And then him and some of his friends realized that it was actually a really great training way to practice for big waves. Because you ride a paddleboard and surf in very similar fashion to what you ride a really small board in big waves. You have to do these big car V type turns. You're not riding it like a really small surfboard slashing back and forth. When you're on a small board on a big wave, you can't make very fine, sharp turns. You have to take advantage of this giant, massive size of water that you're riding. And so the moves translate between paddleboarding and big wave surfing really well. And then I imagine he was just taking it out on flat days. He'd probably take some of his kids out on the boards when the waves were only one or two foot, and it was just a lot of fun. And then when he did it, other people started seeing that and were like, wow, you know, what is Laird doing now? They started getting boards, and then it went from Hawaii to California really quickly. And it's been. I haven't been to California since it's taken off, but I think it's pretty crazy in California where if you're anywhere near the water and you're looking at the water, you're pretty much always going to see at least a handful of people doing it. And it's taken a while to come here, I think probably maybe four years ago, five years ago, is when you might have seen the very first paddle boards in Maine.

Genevieve Morgan:

Rafael when you took me out, I was wearing a wetsuit, and you were laughing at me because you said, you're going to just be so hot. And I thought, how can I be hot? The water in Maine is cold. And I think this was in June. And it turned out you were right, because you're actually not in the water as much as you would be if you were surfing or swimming.

Rafael Adams:

Right. A lot of people ask me, oh, am I going to need a wetsuit to go paddleboarding? And generally speaking, now, all of June, July, August, and deep into September, you really don't need a wetsuit. A wetsuit's only going to help you out if you're constantly in the water. So, you know, if you're in the water for half an hour or more, even in July, you can be in the water here without a wetsuit for half an hour. But after half an hour, you're going to start losing that body heat. A wetsuit is going to. It's just the water doesn't even penetrate a wetsuit. By the time you get back onto the board and the sun hits the wetsuit, and you're basically, like, cooking like you're in a microwave. So that's another great freedom of it. You're just in board shorts. A hat. I wear a hat when I go paddle boarding. You know, some people, you can get away with just regular street clothes and go Paddleboarding. Once you get your confidence up, if you're flat water paddling.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Why did you choose to open a shop that specialized in this?

Rafael Adams:

Well, I was a furniture maker before this. I made custom furniture for 15 years, high end custom furniture. And when I had free time on my hands, I did quite a lot of fishing. And I've always wanted to explore some of the other spots, some of the islands that are close to shore, and go fishing. So I got a paddle board as a means to do that. I tried fishing on a kayak, and I was never really happy with it. And canoes just kind of seem unsafe to me. And I was a surfer when I was younger, so it was sort of an obvious choice. And then probably like within, you know, within a week or two, I explored all these islands that I've always been dreaming about going to. But pretty soon I started leaving my fishing rod at home just because I didn't want to fish anymore. I just wanted to paddle. Just the actual act of having the paddle in my hand and moving across the water and, you know, three quarters of the world surface was suddenly basically open to me that wasn't open before. And that's what really captivated me. And then maybe about six weeks after I started, I took it into the surf. And at that point I was completely, completely, completely taken with it. I realized that there was just so much potential there.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Are you from Maine originally?

Rafael Adams:

I grew up on Long island in New York, and then I lived in Boston for six years before moving to Maine. And I've been in Maine now almost nine years.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Are there things that people should be aware of before they go out on a paddleboard from a weather standpoint or again, from a safety standpoint?

Rafael Adams:

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, anytime you go paddleboarding, anytime you do any water activity, but especially paddleboarding, you want to pay attention to the weather, get a really good forecast. Things like waves are more significant. Waves and wind, and I should say waves and chop. Maybe the tide is something you want to pay attention to. What you really want to pay attention to when you're on a paddleboard is the wind. And you want to pay attention to the wind direction and how strong it's going to be blowing. Because when you're on a board, there's no resistance under the board, which means that it moves really effortlessly over the water. And even in things like current, you can negotiate a current really well because the current literally just slides under the board without affecting it very much. But the wind also blows you. And when you're standing up, you're basically a sail. So that board's going to blow you all over the place. So anything over maybe like 10 or 12 knots of wind becomes a significant factor. And anything over 20 knots of wind is something that you would really only go out in if you wanted to be blown by the wind.

Genevieve Morgan:

You mentioned classes that you teach at your store. And I think paddle boarding is interesting in that it's a good workout. I was sore after I did it, but it also can be very social because you're on this board and so you can talk. So Lisa and I could go do it together and be working out, but talking to one another.

Rafael Adams:

Yeah. I mean, it is what you bring to it. You know, for instance, last summer I was. I'd be on the water probably anywhere from three to five hours a day, every day. Just about whether I was doing lessons or demos or just out. If I didn't have anything going on and there was somebody else working in the shop and I had some free time, I'd be paddling. And that was really sort of casual use paddling, where if I'm giving lessons, I'm not getting tired at this point. My balance is pretty good. There's always sort of this, like, under level of balance issues that you're working with almost subconsciously. But it's easy. I could do it all day. Well, there were quite a few races last summer, and it wasn't until probably September that I was. That the shop was quiet enough that I had an opportunity to take part in one of the races. And I had thought to myself, I'm on one of these things four or five hours a day. I'm going to enter this race and I'm going to win it hands down. It's going to be like this glorious moment for me. And I did, actually, I did some training maybe for about a week before the race. But I guess that's the equivalent. Now that I look at it, it's the equivalent of like training for a marathon for maybe a week beforehand. It's not going to work. So I entered this race, it was in Newport, Rhode Island. I entered myself in the elite division, which was the appropriate division because I'd done a lot of paddle boarding. I would have looked silly in sort of like the open division. And within about 50 yards of the race, I was winded. I had five more miles to go, and I realized that I hated racing. And I think, you know, in the back of my mind I was seriously thinking, like, can I just drop out of this race right now? And I didn't want to do it because I wouldn't have been able to look at myself in the mirror again. So I stuck it out. But it's a really competitive sport already, so you can get a serious aerobic workout or if you're just, you know, if you're doing what I was doing during the summer, four or five hours a day, I'm never really getting tired.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Well, we appreciate your coming in and talking to us today. We've been speaking with Raphael Adams of Sopo Sup in South Portland. How can people learn more about your shop?

Rafael Adams:

We do a lot of work on Facebook, so you can check us out on our Facebook page. And we've got a pretty nice website that details lessons, rentals. We try to do probably two or three different activities a week. We do yoga on paddle boards on Monday evenings and Thursday mornings. We run a fishing tour on Wednesdays we offer paddle birding tours. That's another exciting thing that we're offering. So we're going to be bird watching from paddle boards. I have Mike Windsor, the naturalist at Audubon, running that with me. So just check us out on Facebook. Check out our website. You'll see a lot of cool events and just events are actually great ways to just try out paddleboarding.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And your website is.

Rafael Adams:

Our website is soposup.com s o p o s u p.com Very good.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Thanks so much for coming in today.

Rafael Adams:

You're welcome.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

As part of today's Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast Summer Fare show, we have with us Anita Demitropoulos who began a toy store in my own hometown of Yarmouth called island Treasure Toys 10 years ago this year. So she's quite well versed in summer play and now is a second store in Freeport. So thank you, Anita, for coming in and speaking with us today.

Anita Demetropoulos:

You're welcome. Thank you for having me.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

I've been in both of your stores and there is a heavy emphasis on hands, on doing things that are tactile and really being involved in play. Why was that so important to you?

Anita Demetropoulos:

I think it's Important for children to use their imaginations while playing. I think that being able to just put everything aside and just go out there and create whatever comes to mind is really important. So we buy toys that encourage children to do that. Stay away from electronics, battery operated toys. And our focus is on imaginative play and being creative.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And you're a mother yourself?

Anita Demetropoulos:

I am. I have four daughters.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Did this enter into your decision to have a store of this type?

Anita Demetropoulos:

That's correct. My youngest daughter is now 13. So when she was three years old, we decided to start our own business. We were having a hard time finding really simple, basic toys, just even things like wooden blocks. Everything was plastic, everything was electronic. You push a button and it talks back to you. So it just all started out of our home. We decided to start an online business.

Genevieve Morgan:

What are some of the big sellers this summer?

Anita Demetropoulos:

Well, the big sellers are the. It's hard to explain on radio. Ogo Sport is this really big round disc that has. I think you've seen this, Lisa has a little compression area in the center so that it's almost like playing a volleyball. And you toss this little koosh ball, looking ball back and forth and it's a lot of fun. And where they're going every day, we sell them.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And is this specific to an age group or do different age kids like different types of toys?

Anita Demetropoulos:

This particular toy is appealing to five on up. You know, I have a daughter who is 21 and she's like, oh, we need to have this at home. So I think it appeals to all ages.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

What other toys for younger kids do you have available that are something that kids could use in the great outdoors?

Anita Demetropoulos:

One of the things that I really love is the zip line. And as long as you have two large trees that you can attach it to, children as young as four again can get on the zip line and pretend they're flying. Pretend they're superheroes. You know, it's all in the imagination, but flying through the air, having your feet off the ground is a thrilling experience for children

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

and older kids. Beyond the. So you have the Ogo that you described. You have the zip line. And I was in the store and there were adults in there who were kind of basically big kids. What types of things do they seem

Anita Demetropoulos:

to gravitate towards exactly? Hula hoops. Good old fashioned hula hoops. I have two suppliers, both of them are from Maine. They're handmade in Maine. And the hula hoop appeals to a lot of women. It's a great way to do exercise. It's Nice core strengthening. My daughter Amelia and I, we both use our hula hoops. And I would say the newest item that's come out that the men like. Again, hard to describe a football that looks gray, but when you wear these special glasses, there's a little laser light. And if you turn it to red, your ball will be red. It'll glow. If you have the green, it'll glow in green. And that way you can play at night. So I think the dads are really. They've been buying a lot of those for the kids. Saying it's for the kids, but we all know they're going to play with them.

Genevieve Morgan:

How about kites? Do people still fly kites?

Anita Demetropoulos:

Oh, yes, we have lots of kites. People love to buy them and go to the beach and fly their kites.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Do you think? Well, first of all, I know that your store has been very successful despite the economic downturn, and now so successful you've moved from one location to another location and you've doubled yourself in size. Do you think there's something about toys that helps people to maintain hope in the face of maybe not so ideal circumstances like a downturn in the economy?

Anita Demetropoulos:

Well, I would agree with that. Many people during this time turn to games, puzzles, those types of activities that they could still do in their home as an activity with the family. Have game night. And I spend a lot of time choosing games. It's really important. I feel it's important for everyone to get together of all ages and to be able to sit down and play games, from cards to strategy games to dice games and again, the puzzles.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So what you're describing, really, it's a toy store. We think of toys and children, but you're describing really toys, a family tool. It's a way to get everybody together doing something that's not video based.

Anita Demetropoulos:

That's correct. We believe in play and we play with the toys. Our employees play with the toys. We're happy to open up anything and show our customers it is a family event. This is not about buying something and sticking your child in the corner with a toy.

Genevieve Morgan:

You also have a lot of crafts and drawing supplies. And for the more perhaps introspective child who doesn't necessarily want to go out and throw football, you do cater to them as well. What are some of those?

Anita Demetropoulos:

Well, one of the things that we have coming in shortly is this new line called Red Box. And I'm so excited about it. They are craft kits that contain all the wood and. And the screws and nails and hammer and Everything that you need, even some paint to create your own toolbox. Go kart with wheels, the kids can get on the go kart. And that being able to create something from your own hands makes children feel very satisfied. It's so nice to be able to see a bunch of materials just sitting there, and you put it together, and then you get to play with it or write on it. It's a very satisfying feeling for a child. Just like sewing, you know, you have my daughter's now sewing. You have material, and boom. Now you have a skirt. It makes them feel really good.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

I've met your husband, Jimmy, and I've met, I think, two of your daughters, maybe. Has this contributed to the strength of your family, having two toy stores in Yarmouth and Freeport?

Anita Demetropoulos:

Absolutely. We still play games. They still come to the store and take things off the shelf to bring home. When Gabrielle was away at college, she just graduated from college. When she went to school, she would come home on a break and take games back up to school to play with her friends. And that felt really good to think that here These kids were 19, 20, 21 years old, and playing with a game from Island Treasure Toys. We recently brought home a water balloon toy where it pumps up your balloon for you. If you remember when you'd stick a water balloon on the hose and they always break because the hose is too big, this is the perfect size. Amelia is 13, and she had a ball. Her sisters were coming with their boyfriends, and she got those water balloons all ready to throw at them and get them wet. So we're still. We're still playing with toys.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And you seem to have sort of increased the size of your family, because from what I can tell, the people who come to work for you, they like it so much that they keep coming back to work for you again.

Anita Demetropoulos:

Is that right? This is true. We are one big family. I have many employees that keep coming back. Another gentleman I'm thinking of is Petey, and he just graduated from college, and sure enough, he wanted to come back. I know that he's gonna. He'll find his way and leave us eventually, but it is definitely thrilling to have them come back.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

How do people find out more about your store?

Anita Demetropoulos:

Well, we are located on Route 1 in Yarmouth, and we also have our store on 20 Bow street in Freeport. You can visit us online. We have a website, islandtreasuretoys.com we do stay really active with our Facebook and Twitter, so there's many, many ways to reach us. And when you come to the store. You can talk to anybody. Everyone is very well versed in the product and happy to help you. Good.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Any other thoughts on summer fare? Anything else you'd like to share with our listeners?

Anita Demetropoulos:

I think just getting outdoors with your kids and, you know, it's kind of strange probably coming from a toy store owner, but I always say less is best. Just, you know, honestly, mud pies and beach balls really are it. You know, I mean, the toys are great and they will encourage a lot of creative play, but really, children just need time to be well We've been

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

talking with Anita Dimitropoulos of Island Treasure Toys in Yarmouth and Freeport. We thank you for coming in and having a conversation about Summer Fair with us.

Anita Demetropoulos:

Well, thank you for having me. I appreciate the time to come in and talk to you.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

This is Dr. Lisa Belisle and you have been listening to the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast Show Number 45, Summer Fair, airing for the first time on July 22, 2012 on WLOB and WPEI Radio Portland, Maine. Today's guest is included David Levy of Vinland, Rafael Adams of Sopo Sup or the South Portland Paddle Shop, and Anita Demetropoulos of Island Treasure Toys. We hope that you are listening out there in listener land. Have enjoyed our show. We appreciate you helping us build a healthier, brighter community and we hope you'll take the time to connect with us. Send us a message on Facebook, Send us an email@infodorlisabelial.com Be sure to thank our sponsors and become a bigger part of our world. This is Dr. Lisa Belisle. Thank you for being a part of my world. May you have a bountiful life.