Alaska News

Shannon Kuhn: The fruits of a life well lived

Every once in a while you meet someone who is so full of life it's infectious. Ira Edwards is one of those people.

An outdoorsman, foodie and scientist, Edwards accomplishes more after work than most people do in a week. His list of hobbies is enough to make you tired: fishing, hunting, cooking, brewing (cider, mead and beer), skiing, gardening, canning -- I'll stop there.

Having grown up in the Valley and attended Palmer High School, Edwards is an Alaska kid to the bone. From gardening with his family to raising livestock with 4-H and working at a local taxidermy shop in junior high, he learned about plants and animals firsthand.

As a teenager, Edwards fell in love with PBS cooking programs starring Julia Child and John Paul Prudhomme and taught himself to cook. The oldest of six (five boys and one girl), he took charge of shopping and making dinner for the family. "My mom wasn't the world's best cook," Edwards freely admits, and his taste buds encouraged him enough to take over in the kitchen. Edwards, 39, still has his "Prudhomme Family Cookbook" from when he was 13. He keeps his freezer full of seafood caught each summer to make the Louisiana-style recipes he grew up cooking.

Edwards was a high school and college athlete, competing in nordic skiing for the University of Alaska Fairbanks. His career path has been as varied as his hobbies, from working as a biologist for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game to consulting for the Aleut Corporation. He is a graduate of the Public Safety Training Academy and says he used his law enforcement skills as a state park ranger. "I couldn't enforce against poaching as a Fish and Game biologist and wanted to do something about it."

In 2010, Edwards' life changed forever.

While on the job clearing a ski trail at the Nancy Lake State Recreation Area, Edwards was crushed by a tree and paralyzed from the waist down.

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After multiple surgeries and years of physical therapy, Edwards is once again an athlete. Well-known and loved in the nordic and adaptive ski communities, Edwards has been coaching skiing for 20 years. In the winter, his "side job" is working as a ski rep for the Rossignol company. He's finished the Mayor's Marathon and several others in the handcycle division and continues to coach junior nordic on his adaptive skis. At 6 feet 4 inches tall, he jokes, "I'm about the same height as the kids on my sit-skis."

Outside the athletic community, Edwards has a drive for self-sufficiency that manifests itself through food. I first met Edwards at a backyard apple pressing party he hosted a few weeks ago. I never thought of Alaska as a real apple producer, but Edwards is proving it's possible. A mere eight trees produced 16 bushels, and when he added apples from friends' trees around town, Edwards gleaned around 100 bushels this summer. These became pink and golden applesauce, rosy spiced apple butter and pies, but the real golden ticket is hard cider. Edwards grows apple varieties rich in tannins because he presses the majority of them for juice, which will be fermented for cider.

Last season was the first apple pressing since his accident. This year, he is "back into full production." We're talking about softball-sized apples here.

But it's not just apples. "Every day since the end of August I've been doing something related to the harvest," Edwards says. He takes me on a tour and points out the tubs of kale and carrots in need of processing, the salmon he has smoked and canned, the bushels of apples still waiting to be pressed. "I don't ever slow down, but at some point I just have less to do."

For Edwards, it's about the Alaska lifestyle -- he loves fishing, hunting, brewing his own cider and beer and gardening. "I'm definitely ready for the zombie apocalypse," he quips. Last weekend, friends from across town came to barter their harvest goods. "It's a lost art that we are trying to bring back," Edwards says. "If you produce something of value, there is always a way to trade for other goods and services."

At the end of the day, Edwards relaxes by his wood stove. He is already planning the construction of a greenhouse next summer and looking forward to putting yet another moose in his freezer.

"Life is what you make of it."

Shannon Kuhn lives in Anchorage, where she writes about food and culture.

Shannon Kuhn

Shannon Kuhn lives in Anchorage and is co-founder of the Anchorage Food Mosaic. She writes about food and culture and can be reached at play@alaskadispatch.com (subject line: Shannon Kuhn).

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