A 3,000-year-old root indigenous to the South Pacific islands, kava is used in tea-like herbal beverages consumed socially at establishments known as kava bars. Around 200 such bars exist across the United States — and a new one has just arrived in New Hampshire.
Root Awakening, now open on Main Street in Nashua, is being touted as “New England’s first kava bar” by owner Greg Gately. Kava, he said, is lauded for its relaxing effects on the body and mind, and it’s also a popular natural remedy for anxiety and muscle and joint pain.
“What I like to say is that it slows down that 9-to-5 tick. It calmly relaxes you,” Gately said. “It’s definitely something that you want to finish off in two or three big gulps, like a shot … [and] instead of saying ‘Cheers,’ in the islands we say ‘Bula.’ It’s the celebration of life.”
Gately, whose mother is from the South Pacific, was born and raised in California’s Bay Area before moving east to New England for college. He said he first became introduced to the Fijian root and its properties through a friend, who owns several kava bars out on the West Coast.
A fresh kava drink with a pineapple chaser. Photo by Matt Ingersoll.
“I really started drinking it heavily when I started going for my MBA program,” he said. “It helped me focus whenever I had a big milestone and had to put my head down and hit the books for four or five hours. … Kava really allows you to kind of focus in a really good, natural way.”
Inspired by his kava bar-owning friend and looking for his next move in life in the wake of the pandemic, Gately began looking for spaces last year to launch his own kava concept.
Root Awakening, he said, was built on the foundation of providing visitors with a “non-alcoholic alternative social experience” to traditional bars, using kava beverages as its vessel.
Three kava root varieties — sourced from the Fijian, Vanuatu and Tongan Islands of the South Pacific — are currently available at Root Awakening. Premium raw kava drinks come in a single-serve 10-ounce “kava shell,” or a plastic cup made to resemble half of a coconut shell. You can also get them in larger serving bowls called tanoas — small and large-sized tanoas are respectively 80 and 120 ounces, serving two to three and four to six kava drinkers.
“We chop down the roots, dry them out and then we grind them into a fine powder,” Gately said. “It’s going to then be brewed up almost like a tea. It gets rinsed in a giant tea bag, and then I squeeze out the active ingredient, which is called the kavalactones.”
The result produces “an earthy and pungent” drink that Gately likes to top off with a customer’s choice of a pineapple or strawberry as a chaser. He also serves single-serve mango-flavored kava shots that can be mixed with any beverage of your choice, as well as a total of five flavors of Leilo, a ready-to-drink canned kava product available in 12-ounce cans.
So far, Gately has reported “literally 95 percent” of his patrons to be first-time kava drinkers.
“I almost have an elevator pitch now about what kava is and what to expect,” he said. “A lot of folks are nervous about their first drink. They’ll look at the person they’re with and they’ll say to each other, ‘Are you ready? On three.’ … Usually my first-timers will drink two to three shells.”
As an alternative to kava, Gately does also offer multiple flavors of East Coast kombucha on tap. He also carries drinks like cold brew coffee, ginger beer, coconut water and orange cream soda, and hopes to soon expand his menu to include small perishable food options. Community events like trivia nights, open mic nights and comedy shows are also being planned for the space.
Root Awakening Kava Bar Where: 300 Main St., Unit 603, Nashua Hours: Monday through Saturday, noon to midnight, and Sunday, noon to 10 p.m. More info: Visit rootawakeningkava.com, or find them on Facebook and Instagram @rootawakeningkava Root Awakening requires customers to be at least 18 years of age or older to consume kava beverages. Drinks should not be taken with alcohol or prescription medications.
Featured photo: Greg Gately of Root Awakening Kava Bar in Nashua prepares ground kava root for two single-serve premium raw kava drinks. Photo by Matt Ingersoll.
A look at the spicy world of New Hampshire’s craft hot sauces
Growing up in an ethnically diverse community in northern New Jersey, Gabe DiSaverio was introduced to spicy foods at a young age.
“A lot of my friends growing up were Asian and Indian … and I was eating hot food before I was even 10 years old. I remember always going to a fast food place in New York City that was called Curry in a Hurry,” he said. “Even as teenagers in high school, my friend group and I were doing all these eating challenges, like who could eat the hottest, spiciest, most unique foods.”
New England Hot Sauce Festival Where: Smuttynose Brewing Co., 105 Towle Farm Road, Hampton When: Saturday, July 30, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Cost: $10 in advance online and $15 at the door; kids ages 10 and under are free Visit: newenglandhotsaucefest.com
DiSaverio originally started making his own hot sauces “kind of casually” before eventually, with the help of his culinary-minded sister, Adriana, deciding to jumpstart his passion into a business. Today he owns The Spicy Shark, a line of products that includes seven craft hot sauces, a wing sauce, a Sriracha, a hot honey and two hot maple syrups using all natural ingredients. A self-described “Jaws fanatic” since the age of 8, DiSaverio said the “shark” part of the business comes from combining spicy foods with his other lifelong passion, shark conservation.
Photo courtesy of Pogo’s Peppers.
Since selling its first bottle in early 2019, the Portsmouth-based company has gone on to win multiple national awards for its sauces, and DiSaverio and his team have participated in various hot sauce festivals and expos all over the country. But all the while, these experiences led him to a pivotal question: Why wasn’t there such an event anywhere in New England?
“These festivals are awesome, and I kind of said to myself that since I’ve heard nothing of someone putting one on around here anytime soon, then the heck with it. I’ll do it,” he said.
The inaugural New England Hot Sauce Festival, happening on Saturday, July 30, at Smuttynose Brewing Co. in Hampton, has already generated substantial buzz among its participating vendors. Nearly 30 New England and Northeast-area hot sauce companies will be there, and that doesn’t include the more than 20 others that had to be placed on a waiting list. Food challenges, including hot pepper and hot wing eating contests — and a world record attempt by Canadian competitive eater Mike Jack — are planned throughout the day, along with live music, food trucks and more.
DiSaverio is a regular proponent of Save the Sharks and several other nonprofits that focus on shark conservation and education. In keeping with his passion, proceeds from the festival will benefit the Blue Ocean Society in Portsmouth and the Seacoast Science Center in Rye.
For DiSaverio, the festival’s immense anticipation is a testament to a growing culture.
“I think it’s an understatement to say that New England is not exactly known as a ‘spicy’ region, and that’s fair, up until the last five years or so,” he said. “But as I’ve gotten more entrenched in the hot sauce community, the amount of new hot sauce companies that have popped up in New England is unbelievable. … I think a lot of it has to do with the ethnic diversity that continues to grow within our country … and there’s this growth of more people seeking out those cultures.”
With New England’s first hot sauce festival right around the corner, we took a deeper dive into New Hampshire’s growing hot sauce scene. Here’s a look at how some companies turn up the heat and enhance the flavor of their products, as well as what their top suggestions are for how you should use them.
Smokey Tom pineapple pulled pork Courtesy of Dandido Sauce, dandidosauce.com
4 to 5 pounds pork butt ⅕ of a bottle of hot or medium Dandido Smokey Tom hot sauce 1 can pineapple chunks 1 sweet onion, thinly sliced 1 Tablespoon cumin
Combine ingredients in a slow cooker and set on high for 7 hours.
Coming in hot
DiSaverio, who worked for Boston Beer Co. for 17 years prior to founding The Spicy Shark, said the surging interest in craft hot sauces is not unlike that of the local craft beer scene.
“You go into any beer store now and there’s craft beer that’s falling off the shelf onto your head,” he said. “Where we were around 10 to 15 years ago with craft beer [is] where I feel like we are now with craft hot sauces. You’re starting to see this huge explosion.”
Phil Pelletier of Manchester, for instance, got into making his own sauces in 2017 when his wife, Melissa, bought him a ghost pepper plant. Her goal? She wanted to see if her husband, an avid lover of spicy foods, could handle the intense heat of the peppers.
Photo courtesy of Naked Hot Sauces.
“Every time we’d go out to eat … she’d always try to get me to get the spiciest thing to try,” Pelletier said. “So when I got that plant, I had to figure out what the heck I was going to do with all those peppers, because each plant will produce up to 200-plus ghost peppers, easily.”
The Pelletiers are now the husband-and-wife team behind Smokin’ Tin Roof, a specialty sauce company also offering items like a hot pepper jelly, a bacon stout mustard and a spiced pumpkin butter. All of their products, Pelletier said, are created using ghost peppers that are dehydrated and pulverized into a powder. He adds them in different amounts to control the heat level.
Smokin’ Tin Roof’s sauces include the Smoky Peppah, made with roasted red bell peppers; Grow a Pear, a sweeter pear-based sauce; and Burnin’ Raspberry, a raspberry-based sauce.
“The way I developed all of them was by creating a flavor first … and then I would add the ghost pepper powder to give it the amount of heat that I wanted to have,” Pelletier said. “We don’t want the flavor to get destroyed with the amount of heat that we add to it, which is key for us.”
Marshall Irving of the aptly named Hots Hoss, a small-batch producer of countless flavors of craft hot sauces, similarly began dabbling in his own unique flavors late last year.
“I’ve always been the spicy guy, even as a kid,” he said. “Last October, my mother came up from Florida and went to the Concord Farmers Market. I work in Concord, and so she visited me and handed me a bag of some ghost peppers she got from the farmers market. … Then literally that night, I went home and I looked up probably 10 or 20 different hot sauce recipes online.”
Photo courtesy of The Spicy Shark.
Since then, Irving has gravitated toward all types of other peppers, experimenting with other ingredients to create his own flavor profiles. He’s done everything from a strawberry carrot habanero hot sauce to a black truffle sauce with Fresno and habanero peppers. New flavors are regularly posted to Hots Hoss’s social media channels and when they’re gone they’re gone.
“I haven’t repeated a batch yet,” Irving said. “I’ve been working on making a bunch of different new recipes and just kind of seeing what sticks and what the crowd favorites are.”
According to DiSaverio, most of the bigger mass-market hot sauce brands — think Tabasco, TexasPete or Frank’s — are considered Louisiana-style and are known for their simplicity.
“They [contain] vinegar, mostly cayenne or tabasco peppers, and salt. That’s it, three ingredients,” he said. “They’re very vinegar-y, [but] that’s what Louisiana-style is.”
Chef Adam Parker, who founded NH Hot Sauce nearly 15 years ago, said he set out to make his own products after growing disenchanted with what was available on the market at the time. For each of his four sauces, he likes to individually roast and concentrate the peppers that are used.
Photo courtesy of Smokin’ Tin Roof.
“What that does … is it really starts to bring out the natural flavors that are in those peppers, as opposed to [the sauce] just being something spicy that you put on your food,” said Parker, who has most recently served as the owner of The Utopian, a cozy scratch-cooked bistro in Amherst.
Kevin Taillon, another chef by trade with his own craft hot sauce company on the side, bottled the first of what would become Naked Hot Sauces in 2015 — a green chile pepper-based sauce called Garden Variety. The sauce received such a positive reaction that it inspired Taillon, who co-owns Fire and Spice Bistro in Newfields with his wife, to make more. Eventually, he began experimenting with other types of sauces and started to sell them at local farmers markets.
Scale of spiciness
In 1912 a pharmacist named Wilbur Scoville created what he called the Scoville Organoleptic Test. Now more commonly referred to as the Scoville Scale, it’s used as a measurement method to determine the pungency of different types of peppers, with each being assigned a range of numbers, or Scoville Heat Units (SHU). The more units assigned, the hotter the pepper is.
“The Scoville Scale goes from zero to 16 million. It’s the scale of the amount of capsaicin, which is the portion of the pepper that causes the heat,” DiSaverio said. “So you’ve got this scale of 16 million, which is pure capsaicin, and even the hottest peppers are in the 1 to 2 million range. … That’s a measure of the pepper itself, and basically what it means is how many drops of water it would take to dilute that drop of capsaicin so that you wouldn’t be able to feel the heat.”
Even bell peppers without a trace of heat in them, Irving said, are technically on the Scoville Scale, but at zero units. As you move your way up the scale, you encounter different types of peppers assigned to different tiers based on their Scoville units — a jalapeno, for instance, sits at a range of about 2,500 to 8,000 units, while a much hotter habanero pepper is about 100,000 to 350,000 units. Ghost peppers are even higher, from 855,000 to just over 1 million units.
The hottest pepper on the Scoville Scale, ranked at about 1.4 million to 2.2 million Scoville units, is known as the Carolina Reaper. In fact, in 2017 Guinness World Records declared it the hottest pepper in the word, citing tests that were conducted by Winthrop University in South Carolina.
Ed Currie — a.k.a. “Smokin’ Ed” — of the PuckerButt Pepper Co. in Fort Mill, South Carolina, is the creator of the pepper. He also happens to be a friend of DiSaverio’s and will be supplying Carolina Reaper peppers for the New England Hot Sauce Festival’s pepper eating contest.
“There are so many more different peppers available now in the United States to buy because of the demand … and now you’re seeing people like Ed who are cross-pollinating and cross-breeding to make new peppers … and experimenting, just like with beer,” DiSaverio said.
The Carolina Reaper is used as a base pepper in several of Taillon’s sauces, like the Reaper Madness, and the Red Reaper, which blends them with red Fresno peppers. Dandido Sauce, based in Manchester, also offers its “extremely hot” Dandido Black — its newest product, according to sales consultant Jennifer Renaud. The sauce blends Carolina Reaper peppers with wasabi, hot cinnamon and ginger, among other fresh ingredients.
Can you take the heat?
Here’s a snapshot of various peppers most commonly used in New Hampshire’s craft hot sauces. Peppers are ranked using a method known as the Scoville Scale; each is assigned a range of numbers, or Scoville Heat Units (SHU), based on the amount of capsaicin, the active ingredient in the pepper. The more units assigned, the hotter the pepper is.
Nurse Shark, Thresher Shark or smoked maple Sriracha breakfast egg bake Courtesy of The Spicy Shark, thespicyshark.com
12 eggs ½ of a bottle of Nurse Shark (jalapeno hot sauce), Thresher Shark (chipotle hot sauce) or smoked maple Sriracha 5 ounces baby kale 5 ounces baby arugula 1 small Vidalia onion, thinly sliced 1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese (optional) 2 three-finger pinches each of salt and pepper Extra virgin olive oil (enough to coat the bottom of a large skillet)
Preheat the oven to bake at 375 degrees Fahrenheit. Beat eggs in a large bowl and set aside. Heat oil in a large skillet on medium heat. Saute onions for a few minutes, or until translucent. Add salt, pepper, kale and arugula to the onions. Mix and cook for a few more minutes, or until the kale and arugula are wilted. Remove from heat. Coat a 9-by-12-inch baking pan with olive oil, nonstick spray, ghee or butter. Evenly spread the mixture from the saute pan into the baking pan. Sprinkle mozzarella over the mixture. Pour the eggs over the mozzarella. Gently move everything in the baking pan slightly with a fork, so the eggs can reach the bottom. Bake for 35 to 40 minutes, or until lightly browned. Let it cool for a few minutes before cutting.
Universal flavor
When it comes to hot sauce, local makers say their usage opportunities are consistently endless.
“The interesting thing is … you can have it [with] your breakfast, lunch or dinner and it can still be amazing in every way, shape and form,” Parker said. “I like using it on eggs. … Sometimes I’ll mix some into a sour cream or even some yogurt and use that as a dipping sauce.”
Depending on the flavor, Pelletier said, his sauces are great for everything, from ingredients in tacos and nachos to their use as salad dressings or chicken or pork marinades. A regular client even purchases his raspberry sauce by the half-gallon to use as an ice cream topping.
“We get more ideas as people talk to us and come back to buy more when they see us at a show,” he said. “They’ll go, ‘Oh, yeah, I put this sauce on this and, boy, did that make a difference!’”
Most of Dandido’s sauces are also great when incorporated into your cooking — or even as ingredients in shrimp cocktail sauces, co-owner Ed Baroody said.
“It’s not just something to put on top,” Renaud said. “You can build a chili off of it, [or] you can add it to your baked potato in your sour cream. … I’ve even scrambled it into my eggs.”
Irving’s best friend, Rylan Hill, is the head chef of New Hampshire Pizza Co. in Concord — the eatery has incorporated Hots Hoss into its specials, notably using a blackberry hot sauce Irving made for a Delmonico steak pizza special that was topped with chimichurri, pickled red cabbage, leeks, mozzarella and Gouda.
“I put my hot sauce on everything,” Irving said. “That’s the thing about hot sauce. It’s a topping, it’s a condiment, it’s a dipping sauce. … You can do anything with it.”
Scovie Awards Dubbed the “Oscars of hot sauce” by Gabe DiSaverio of The Spicy Shark in Portsmouth, the annual Scovie Awards recognize the most acclaimed fiery foods and spicy products from around the world. The awards ceremony is held every year at the Sandia Resort & Casino in Albuquerque, New Mexico, usually the first weekend in March — a panel of judges rates all applicable submissions in various categories like appearance, aroma, texture, originality, flavor and overall impression.
To date, The Spicy Shark has taken home a total of 11 Scovie awards in either first, second or third place categories for its products. DiSaverio said he is most proud of two of those awards in particular: winning first place last year for his Hammah Gatah 7 Pot Primo pepper sauce, and winning Best in Show, the grand prize award, in 2020 for his hot maple syrup. Manchester’s Smokin’ Tin Roof has a Scovie Award of its own — its Smoky Peppah sauce, made from ground ghost pepper and some pineapple and sweet red bell peppers, was awarded second place in 2021.
New Hampshire-made craft hot sauces
Here’s a list of some of the Granite State’s spiciest hot sauce companies — visit their websites directly or follow them on social media to find out how to order them or where to pick them up.
Dandido Sauce dandidosauce.com, @dandidosauce Try this sauce: The Dandido Black This “extremely hot” sauce, the company’s newest product, blends Carolina Reaper peppers with wasabi, hot cinnamon and ginger, among other fresh ingredients.
Effin Sauces Co. effinsauces.com, @effinsauces Try this sauce: Sweet Lava This apple cider-based vinegar hot sauce is made with bell and habanero peppers, offering a unique balance of sweetness and heat.
Hots Hoss marshall4@hotshoss.com, @hots.hoss Try this sauce: Strawberry carrot habanero One of the more recent offerings from Marshall Irving of Hots Hoss, a one-man operation of small-batch craft hot sauces in Manchester, this sauce combines habanero peppers with strawberry and carrot flavors.
Naked Hot Sauces nakedhotsauces.net, @nakedhotsauces Try this sauce: Reaper Madness One of several Carolina Reaper-based offerings from chef Kevin Taillon of Naked Hot Sauces, who also owns Fire and Spice Bistro in Newfields, the Reaper Madness is best recommended for use on tacos or cheesesteaks.
NH Hot Sauce nhhotsauce.com, @nhhotsauce Try this sauce: Pull Fire Pull Fire, made with red Fresno peppers and fresh garlic, is one of four products from NH Hot Sauce, brought to you by longtime local chef Adam Parker.
Philbur’s Hot Sauce philburs.com, @philburs Try this sauce: Philbur’s No. 21 Hot The hottest offering from Philbur’s of Portsmouth, this sauce starts with sweet roasted peppers, jalapeno and habanero, along with extra ghost and scorpion peppers and a fresh herb finish.
Pogo’s Peppers pogospeppers.com, @pogospeppers Try this sauce: Jalapeno lime Pogo’s Peppers of Rye creates this sauce using roasted jalapenos and bright lime flavors, making it a versatile addition to just about any dish.
Rubin’s Hot Sauce rubinshotsauce.com, @rubinshotsauce Try this sauce: Inferno This sauce features a unique proprietary blend of twice the normal amount of home-grown Carolina Reaper peppers that’s then infused with a citrus-based blend of tropical fruits.
Smokin’ Tin Roof smokintinroof.com, @smokintinroof Try this sauce: Smoky Peppah A 2021 Scovie Award winner, taking home second place in the national competition, Smokin’ Tin Roof’s Smoky Peppah sauce is made from ground ghost pepper and some pineapple and sweet red bell peppers.
The Spicy Shark thespicyshark.com, @thespicyshark Try this sauce: Megalodon Named after the largest shark that ever lived, this craft sauce is brought to you by The Spicy Shark of Portsmouth, featuring “a sweet cherry start with the blazing finish of the Carolina Reaper pepper.”
Volcanic Ash Hot Sauce volcanicashhotsauce.com, @volcanicashhotsauce Try this sauce: O.G. Volcanic Ash This small-batch sauce features a blend of fresh habanero peppers with slowly caramelized onions, garlic, premium olive oil and a touch of sea salt.
Waldo Pepper’s Hot Sauce waldopeppershotsauce.com, @waldopeppershotsauce Try this sauce: Chipotle Ghost Featuring a blend of chipotle and ghost peppers with other ingredients like cider vinegar, carrots, onions, ground garlic, ginger and lime juice, this sauce is great for spicing up your eggs, burgers or chicken.
The Canterbury Fair celebrates close communities for the 61st year
By Katelyn Sahagian
ksahagian@hippopress.com
The Canterbury Fair is back after its pandemic pause and will once again highlight local artisans, feature a popular barbecue chicken dinner and offer shopping with its used book sale and the What Not sale, a type of white elephant and antique market.
Rick Crockford, a co-chair of the fair, said that this fair is meant to celebrate small towns and communities.
“It started out in the ’50s as a way to get people excited mid-summer about small-town life,” Crockford said. “It’s remained largely, crafty and agricultural. It’s much more low-key than [fairs at] other places.”
The reason the fair started was to help pay for a new parish house at Canterbury United Community Church after a fire had destroyed the original one in 1943. In 1959, a chicken barbecue was added to the fair’s normal activities and, according to the Canterbury Fair’s website, the fair raised close to $2,000.
In addition to the barbecue, there will be regular grilled foods, like hot dogs, burgers, sausage grinders and veggie burgers, Crockford said. He said his personal favorite part of the event is the frappe bar from Jordan’s Ice Creamery.
After the food comes the entertainment and local artisans. Children’s entertainers and musicians will perform throughout the day, and Crockford said that the Morris Dancers, a group that performs a traditional British style of dancing, is a longtime fair favorite.
“They have cymbals on their feet and sticks and they do old English dancing,” he said. “There’s a caller who runs the dance; it’s very cool. They’ve been at probably every fair for the past 15 years.”
Photos courtesy of Donna Miller.
For new entertainment, Crockford said that he was especially excited to welcome drummers from the Native American Abenaki tribe.
As for local artisans, Crockford said there will be everything from jewelry to leather goods. Even a local guitar maker will be showing off his instruments.
“We have an unwritten rule that the vendors we rent space to have to produce something themselves,” Crockford said, adding that they didn’t want people to be reselling items they had purchased.
Crockford said that the used book sale, which will be at the Old Town Hall, and the What Not sale, at the elementary school, are among the biggest draws for most visitors. The proceeds from both sales will be used to raise money for the Canterbury Fund, which gets donated back to the town’s schools.
While the vendors are exciting for adults, kids will get the chance to have their face painted and play different games. Kids of all ages can enjoy spending time with the animals at the petting zoo.
Crockford said that the fair isn’t a big fancy shindig, but it is still special and can attract people from as far away as Maine and Vermont.
“We don’t have any rides, and there’s no fried dough,” Crockford said. “[The fair’s] mostly people who want to appreciate local craftspeople and support them financially. See a little bit of the old-timey fair before everything got all rushed.”
The Community College System of New Hampshire Board of Trustees has voted to freeze tuition costs for all seven of the state’s community colleges for the fourth consecutive year. According to a press release, the tuition cost is currently at $215 per credit — which comes to $6,450 for a full-time course load — for New Hampshire-residing students, and has been so since 2018. Since 2011, the cost has increased a total of $5 per credit; factoring in inflation, tuition costs at New Hampshire’s community colleges are approximately 24 percent lower now than they were a decade ago, and community colleges remain the most affordable higher education offered in the state. “CCSNH has worked aggressively to control costs and keep higher education financially within reach, as part of its mission to ensure New Hampshire residents have affordable opportunities to remain in the state for college and careers,” Katharine Bogle Shields, chair of the CCSNH Board of Trustees, said in the release. Enrollment at New Hampshire’s community colleges is open and ongoing now through Aug. 29 for the fall semester, which will include on-campus and online course options.
Mental health series
Dartmouth Health continues its year-long monthly webinar series about mental health, “Heads Up: A Year-Long Mental Health Awareness Journey,” with a segment on the effects of social media on youth mental health. According to a press release, “Social Media and Youth — How do we strike a healthy balance?,” the third webinar in the series, features a panel consisting of Dartmouth Health Children’s child psychiatrist Steven Schlozman, MD; Heather Inyart, executive director of the Manchester-based youth development organization Media Power Youth; and Kenny Olibrice, a junior at Manchester Central High School and a youth advisor for Media Power Youth. The panelists discuss the ways in which social media can be emotionally constructive and destructive for youth; ways in which young people can de-escalate conflicts and create a more positive space online; and ways in which parents and caregivers can have open communication with teens about their social media activity and encourage healthy online habits. “What we do know, and what has stayed consistent across multiple platforms, is that teens are much more susceptible to the messages — both positive and negative — that are put out across social media platforms,” Schlozman said in the webinar. For more information on the “Heads Up” series, visit dartmouth-health.org/mental-health.
Attendance recovery
The New Hampshire Department of Education announced in a press release that it has partnered with Graduation Alliance to implement a school attendance recovery program in New Hampshire through September 2024. The $936,000 program, which is being funded with federal Covid-relief funds, will be offered to 2,000 secondary and middle school students throughout the state who are considered to be disengaged, chronically absent or at risk of not obtaining their high school diploma. Outreach counselors will provide personalized support to enrolled students and their families to help students improve their school attendance and academic performance. “New Hampshire, like most of our nation, has seen a dramatic increase in chronic absenteeism over the past few years, and ENGAGE New Hampshire will allow school districts to provide students with additional layers of academic and social-emotional support and adult mentorship without creating more responsibility for already overburdened teachers and staff,” Graduation Alliance CEO Ron Klausner said in the release. “We’re excited to promote school engagement and high school completion in the state of New Hampshire through this partnership.”
Return of the Yellowbirds
The Aviation Museum of New Hampshire will host a “Return of the Yellowbirds” event in Manchester, inviting former employees, family members, passengers and fans of Northeast Airlines to gather in celebration of its 50th anniversary. The pioneering Boston-based Northeast Airlines, which brought the first passenger air service to New England in the 1930s, is remembered for its famous 1960s “Yellowbird” pop art imagery and jingle. “You still hear it today — people who worked for Northeast loved the airline. They thought of it as one big family,” Aviation Museum Executive Director Jeff Rapsis said in a press release. “This summer’s reunion is a chance for Northeast veterans, as well as family, friends and the airline’s many fans, to celebrate a special company, renew old friendships, and also carry the Yellowbird legacy into the future.” The event will take place Sunday, July 31, from 4 to 8 p.m. at the DoubleTree by Hilton Downtown Manchester (700 Elm St.) and will include a gourmet buffet-style dinner, special guests, live music, a display of more than 250 historic Northeast Airlines artifacts and uniforms, the premiere of a video honoring Northeast Airlines and more. Tickets cost $75 per person. Call 669-4877 or visit aviationmuseumofnh.org.
USNH Trustees chair
Joseph G. Morone, former president and CEO of Albany International Corp., has stepped down from his position as chair of the University System of New Hampshire Board of Trustees, USNH announced in a press release, after serving 10 years on the board and the last three years as board chair. “Joe’s tenure as chairman occurred during a pivotal period in higher education when the safety of our students, faculty, staff and communities, and the continuity of our mission, were severely disrupted by the ever-changing effects of the pandemic,” Morone’s successor, Alex Walker said in the release. “Joe guided the board through strategic decision-making processes that will advantage the University System of New Hampshire during the fundamental shifts expected in higher education in the coming years. … His service will be long remembered by those who worked with him.” Walker, president and CEO of Catholic Medical Center, has served on the USNH board for six years and will serve as chair through June 2023. The board consists of 28 trustees, according to the release, and oversees three public higher education institutions in the state, including Keene State College, Plymouth State University and the University of New Hampshire, which enroll a total of 32,000 students.
A tornado, categorized as an EF-1, touched down in Chesterfield during an active Tornado Warning on Monday, July 18, the National Weather Service reported. The NWS defines EF-1 as a tornado having wind gusts between 86 and 110 miles per hour. This is the second tornado confirmed in New Hampshire this year; an EF-1 tornado touched down in Charlestown in May, according to a press release from the New Hampshire Department of Safety’s Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management.
A new mural painted on the Arms Park River Stairs in Manchester was unveiled on Friday, July 22. Manchester Mayor Joyce Craig attended the unveiling and posted about it on her Facebook page. “I am blown away by how beautiful and vibrant this mural is,” she said in the post, also thanking the artist, James Chase, and Manchester Connects, which commissioned the mural.
United Way of Greater Nashua, in partnership with the Teachers and Paws Project, will host its “Stuff the Bus” donation drive at its office in Nashua (20 Broad St.) and at the Staples stores in Nashua and Amherst, from Wednesday, Aug. 3, through Saturday, Aug. 6, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. each day. Individuals and companies can “stuff the bus” — a real school bus on site at the United Way location — with school supplies that educators might otherwise have to pay for out of their own pockets. Visit tinyurl.com/uwgnschoolsupplies.
Celtic crushers Rebel Collective hit Bank of NH Stage
Concord’s Capitol Center for the Arts continues its happy trend of bringing homegrown acts to the smaller Bank of NH Stage when Rebel Collective appears there on July 23. The raucous, Celtic-infused sextet started out at True Brew Barista, a nearby Bicentennial Square hub for local bands before the owners retired and closed it in July 2020.
At that time, 2015, the group consisted of three cousins on main instruments and a rhythm section, and was a casual affair. “We’d always joked about doing a pub band,” guitarist and singer Michael Green said by phone recently. “One year, we decided to throw something together and have a show, and we had a lot of fun.”
After True Brew, they went on to play St. Patrick’s Day events, at Manchester’s Shaskeen and Salt hill Pub in the Upper Valley. Their sound was informed by Green’s roots. “I am about half Irish, with my grandmother being straight off the boat. That said, it wasn’t part of my upbringing really, and it was through the music of the Pogues and Dropkick Murphys that I started getting into the history of Ireland and my own ancestry.”
When the band got booked to play the New Hampshire Highland Games, Scottish songs were added to their set, creating a boozy hybrid that sets them apart. They’ve opened shows for the Dropkicks, Flogging Molly and Derek Warfield, all the while writing original songs, a few of which appear on 2018’s Old Sad State.
The title cut of that EP is a true, if half remembered, story of a wild night “with a bottle of Pogues whiskey, singing for the fair maidens and hoping they’ll feel frisky” that ends “out in the street, singing for salvation in the moonlight.” Though the hooch is named after Green’s “favorite band forever,” he’s no fan, not by a long shot.
“It’s god-awful and I don’t recommend it,” he said, but he is thankful that, as Shawn Colvin once noted, he got a tune out of it. “We weren’t feeling too good the next morning, but I’m lucky in the fact that I might make bad decisions, but at least they usually make good songs.”
Rebel Collective changed significantly when accordion player and high harmony singer Brian Waldron moved to Florida in 2021. Brought on board were fiddler Esther Bostick and guitarist Jordan, whom Green calls Granddaddy SG for his 1960s vintage Gibson. With Green, Ross Ketchum on mandolin, guitar and vocals, and Pete Provencher and Connor Veazey on drums and bass, the new direction is “really similar in a lot of ways” to what they were doing before, Green said, but with an edge that comes from swapping a squeeze box for a rocking ax.
“It’s not heavy, but it’s not clean, and it really fills up the sound … we’ve committed to making a bigger, cohesive sound,” he said. “It’s led to having more fun [and] while we miss having Brian’s beautiful voice we gain by having other singers. Our gang vocals are a little bit thicker. We’re the same, just different.”
After releasing one studio effort, they’re not in a hurry to make another record. They have plenty of other novel pursuits to fill the time, including a Flag Hill Whiskey release party in the fall, along with another Highland Games. Besides, given their Celtic Crush repertoire, audiences often can’t tell the band’s own material from cover songs, which pleases Green.
“I’ve had people come up and thank me for playing this old traditional song, and they’re talking about one of my originals; I don’t correct them,” he said. “It’s a kind of a barometer; if you’ve written a song and it immediately resonates like they’ve heard it before, you know you really wrote a good one. I let them say their piece and take it as a compliment.”
The Concord show will benefit Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA) of New Hampshire, a nonprofit the band has been helping out for years, including playing their annual fundraiser and tasking one of their dancers to high step crowds into filling a tip jar at shows. “We were able to raise a couple thousand for CASA last year,” Green said. “So we’re really excited to take this great opportunity at this great event and use it as a way to continue doing our work for them.”
Rebel Collective When: Saturday, July 23, 8 p.m. Where: Bank of NH Stage, 16 S. Main St., Concord Tickets: $18 at ccanh.com
“A foot-tapping, lip-smacking good time” is promised at the annual Bluegrass BBQ, returning to White Park in Concord for its third year on Saturday, July 23. One of the chief fundraisers for the Concord Coalition to End Homelessness, the event will feature several barbecue options to choose from, along with a full lineup of local bluegrass artists performing throughout the day.
“We launched this event during Covid and it’s been very, very well received by the community,” said Greg Lessard, CCEH’s director of housing initiatives. “It’s been growing, too. We served 200 meals the first year and 550 the next year. … This year, we’re planning on 600.”
Scenes from the Bluegrass BBQ. Photos courtesy of Mulberry Creek Imagery.
The menu includes a total of five ordering packages for food. The “pitmaster special” is the most generous portion of barbecue and includes a meal of Texas-style brisket, pulled pork, smoked sausage, baked beans, coleslaw, pickled red onions and a pecan garlic barbecue sauce, along with a bun and a drink. There’s also a pulled pork sandwich meal with each of the same sides, or you can order the sandwich separately. A grilled hot dog meal with a bag of chips and a drink and a vegetarian meal featuring a hummus and tabouli wrap round out the food offerings.
Bill Wilcox of Wilcox & Barton, a local civil engineering company with a corporate office in Concord, is also a barbecuing enthusiast. He’ll be the chief pitmaster at the event, Lessard said.
“He’s a civil engineer, but he’s a chef as a hobby. … He has a custom-made smoker that was built down in Houston,” Lessard said. “He basically does all of the cooking, and then we’ve partnered with the Concord Food Co-op … [to do] all the prep work for the non-meat products.”
As during previous years, the event is tailgate-style — attendees are encouraged to place their barbecue orders online and then arrive at the park with chairs and picnic blankets to pick up their food and enjoy the music. A total of four bluegrass acts are each expected to play 90-minute sets. Paul Hubert will kick things off at 11 a.m., followed by Concord bluegrass and Americana group Bow Junction at 12:30 p.m., Whiskey Prison and 2 p.m. and soloist Hank Osborne at 3:30 p.m.
The Coalition has already raised more than $51,000 through 70 business sponsorships, and all food sale proceeds will go directly toward its programs. In the event of inclement weather, Lessard said, the barbecue will take place the following day, Sunday, July 24.
Live music schedule • Paul Hubert: 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. • Bow Junction: 12:30 to 2 p.m. • Whiskey Prison: 2 to 3:30 p.m. • Hank Osborne: 3:30 to 5 p.m.
3rd annual Bluegrass BBQ When: Saturday, July 23, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. (food service runs from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.); rain date is Sunday, July 24 Where: White Park, 1 White St., Concord Cost: Options include a pitmaster special ($40), a pulled pork sandwich meal ($25), a hot dog meal ($10) and a vegetarian hummus and tabouli wrap meal ($25); place your order in advance online for pickup at the event Visit: concordhomeless.org/bluegrass-bbq
Featured photo: Scenes from the Bluegrass BBQ. Photos courtesy of Mulberry Creek Imagery.
