Turnips! How could I forget you? (and why I love CSA's)

I'm a veggie addict. Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) boxes are what got me hooked. A weekly box of fresh, seasonal vegetables and fruits purchased directly from your farmer--decision free. Does it get any better than that?

You don't have to chart out a meal plan before going to the market to avoid farmers' market syndrome (farmers market syndrome: the tendency to either a. buy everything in sight until you're out of cash; or, b: be so overwhelmed you come home with a bag of dates and bunch of beets, requiring a follow up trip to the grocery store to make an actual meal).

You get pushed out of your ruts: what is that green cauliflower on an acid trip? Romanesco?  You try this fractalized cauliflower because how could ever let a CSA veggie go bad? (oh yeah, it happens, and you feel awful. CSA guilt runs deeper than your regular fridge cleaning guilt).

You get creative: two ways to cook cabbage? That's not going to cut it through a winter CSA. Turns out there are a ridiculous number of ways and types of cabbage that will keep you creative through those long winter nights.

You get connected. To a farm. Don't you love those newsletter stories and recipes that come with your box? And, if you're lucky, you get connected to your CSA community in the city. 

I was off the CSA sauce for a couple of years. I sowed my wild oats at the markets, going from farm to farm stand, finding my favorite carrots here and the best beets there. Meeting new farmers along the way. And it was good. But, I was getting back into some veggie buying ruts again. Sure, I'd throw in a kabocha squash or yellow cauliflower to mix things up, but really, who was I kidding, it was all greens, broccoli and sweet potatoes. And turnips? I totally forgot about you. Then, before you knew it, I was buying most of my produce at the local co-op. Luckily, this is a great option, I can buy a lot of local, but I can also buy a lot from Mexico and South America.

I decided it was time to give a CSA a go again--a trial 4 week box spread over 8 weeks, split with a friend. How much more non-committal could I get? Totally against my old, hard core (read: self righteous) credo of supporting a CSA for the full season, but CSA's take many forms and shapes these days. This path allows me to have it all--I can still make those frequent stops at the farmers market and get my CSA fix in despite of being a cook for (mostly) one.

Today, I dug in my veggie crisper newly filled with my CSA booty and found turnips. You'll be surprised to hear, I shuddered. I felt forced to cook something outside of my repertoire. Ugh! Turnips. What do I do with them?? I took a deep breath. I washed them, I cut them into large pieces. I put them into a baking dish, drizzled with olive oil, salted, peppered and thymed them and set them to roasting. What did I find just a short 20 minutes later? Caramelized, delicately sweet, golden goodness. They were so good, I forgot to take a photo.

I'm thankful for my CSA reprieve--it gave me the freedom relax a bit, explore and have fun--I may not be a devout CSA lifer--but it sure is a good to be back again for now.

Food Donations Go Local

Local food feeding locals who need it most? It's possible.

After a day of feasting on local food--of being thankful for my favorite season at the market here in San Francisco (hello pears, persimmons and pomegranates! It's been too long. And aren't all those greens in rare form this time of year? )--I've been thinking about the food pantries throughout the Bay Area that are feeding people not just Thanksgiving meals, but every single day. With the cost of living skyrocketing, some people must choose between paying the rent or buying that next meal. I've spent some time serving meals in a local food pantry at Glide Memorial, and I'm always humbled by the diversity of people who gather in line to get free meal--yes you'll see those colorful souls of the street SF is known for, but they are sitting next to the office worker coming from downtown.

So often our movement for seasonal organic produce excludes so many, so often this movement is criticized for it's elitism -- but in San Francisco, fresh produce is not only on the shelves of Whole Foods, but it's making it to the food pantries too. Farm to Family is a statewide program that connects growers and food pantries throughout the state. It just makes sense. In good years growers always have a surplus. Or what about those veggies that aren't picture perfect for market but are perfectly good eating? And for anyone who has had a good season in the garden you know you've always got something to share at the peak of the season, or sometimes you have a desperate need to get rid of those squash! But can be incredibly hard to find ways of donating that food, Farm to Family fills the gap.

Another piece of the SF foodie movement that is growing strong is small vendors making everything from pickles to sausage--but they don't have many places to sell them. Enter the New Taste Marketplace-- once a month the site of the food pantry at a local church becomes a place where local vendors sell their wares for donations to the food pantry--foodies pay a donation to get in and then the vendors in turn also donate money to the food bank. The Food Pantry feeds more than 600 families each week at a farmers market style food pantry. The next New Taste Marketplace is coming up this Saturday, December 10th. This is the kind of holiday shopping I can get behind.

Urban Farming in SF: a tour begins

There's something I love about getting to know a garden, one garden, through the four seasons. You learn how the sun changes its arc in the garden throughout the year. You know how the finished compost feels, how the soil smells on your clothes after a long days work, you know the history of the place and you have a vision of its future.

But lately I've been inspired by farm touring, visiting and working on projects throughout the city. Workdays are where you really discover a place -- you put your hands in the soil, you discover where the weeds are hiding out, you turn the compost, you make a deal with a willow tree and prune it to shed much needed sunshine on the veggie plots. I get inspired by: garden design, new compost systems, problem solving, tool sheds, the people of the garden, the potlucks, and the bounty at every urban garden I visit.

School garden workdays are the best -- parents, kids, and garden teachers coming together to get the garden in shape for a new season. I recently made the trip to my friend Brooke's beautiful garden at the SF Community School. I came late in the day but I took on the big willow pruning project with Brooke's friends, met dedicated parents learning to help water for the summer, and got a tour of the garden.

a dad from the school MacGuyvered organization in the shed!

thanks for sharing your garden Brooke!!

stumbling upon urban farming interweb gems

I've spent the past few days of work delving into the world of social media. And I've stumbled upon so many good urban ag and food policy pieces along the way...here's a couple worth sharing: check out this video of one of my inspirations: urban homesteader/author/comedian Novella Carpenter.



And Pollan hits the NY Times Book Review with an interesting perspective on the food movement -- yes, the first section is Pollan you've already heard, and yes, it is a survey of food mov't lit, but skim through to the second section and you'll start hitting new territory. (and I must admit, I'm enamored with the design of the NYT Book Review online, worth a visit unto itself...). What does the food movement look like? And where will it go? It's up to us to shape it...

I'm keeping up the calendar...

Hi all -- Yes, I've been a terrible blogger lately, my hope is to remedy that soon...BUT I am keeping up the calendar of events. Note I'll start to include a lot of biking adventures on the event list since I'm loving my bike right now--and it's such a natural extension of my evolution in living sustainably.

Meals on Wheels -- is more than just a meal

If you're in the Bay, pick up the latest issue of Commonground and see my article on Meals on Wheels! It was a really fun one to write despite the quick turn-around, I learned a lot and got to talk to the amazingly humble and inspiring Boulevard chef Nancy Oakes.

Good to stretch those writing muscles a little bit more...what's next?

Progress report: May is Biking There

36 miles logged, 280 minutes biked. And yes, I can feel it and it feels good.

BUT I'm officially stumped by my bag dilemma. Riding with my dying bagpack is just not going to cut it -- it's not comfortable, sweaty back and all. Many considerations follow: To get panniers or to not? New messenger bag or two strapper? A fold-able side basket or front. I want to stay light and airy -- hard for my Virgo tendencies to bring EVERYTHING with me everywhere. I want to be flexible. I'd like to have the same stuff for commuting and for casual rides around to see friends.

The search continues...by bike.

May is also: lots of great things to do!

Yes, I've been neglecting this little blog a bit -- but I'm back in the groove. LOTS of fun farming and food events hitting the city this month. Check out my 'Get Out' section for more details.

May is You Can Bike There!

I just started riding my bike about a month ago--it started very slowly, with a ride to the bike shop a mile away, then one or two rides to work and a night out on the town motivated and accompanied by friends (thanks Edna!) and now all of a sudden I've been recruited for the Team Bike Challenge for May?! As a member of the Garden for the Environment team, I've been officially challenged to get on my bike. So far, so good. Two days in and two days of putting about 7 miles on my bike each day. My goal: to be on my bike at least once per day 5 days a week. Go Team!

Inspired by: watching your garden grow

Love this video project by a fellow-Phoenician, Mathew Moore. This artist/farmer took time-lapse photos of different vegetables from seed to harvest. Watch broccoli, kale and squash seeds burst out of the soil and grow into gorgeous plants--to watch is to know what each broccoli head at the grocery store must go through before hardest. It is breathtaking to watch as the squash plant appears to breathe and move throughout each day following the sun. Bay Area based writer and urban farmer Jason Mark writes about this "ballet of biology" here.

Garden for the Environment CSA gets a shout out!

The GFE weekly veggie box gets a shout out in SF Foodie and Urban Dirt! And read my gushing ode to this project here. Four months after we passed this project along to the next generation of Awesome Farmers, the garden is looking better than ever and a beautiful box gets donated to the Larkin Street Youth Services Center each week.

As the SF Foodie article points out that one box per week won't save the world, but it is progress. Progress is every person who tastes something memorable out of that box and is moved to eat more fresh vegetables. Progress is every person who helped put the box together contributing to something bigger than themselves--it is the long line of volunteers who planned, planted, tended, harvested, delivered, and prepared the produce that is donated each week.

It is amazing, this started with a just a handful of people, with a whole lot of doubt, and grew into something bigger than we imagined.

Report from a special 18 reasons event: A Diet for A Hot Planet

Food & climate change -- you don't hear much about how these two issues intersect -- Anna Lappé's new book A Diet for a Hot Planet will change this. Last Friday night, I attended a thoughtfully crafted, cozy meet and greet with Lappé' at 18 Reasons. With walls adorned in food art (in this case a wall painting made of curry inundating the room with smells and invoking food memories in us all) Lappé told great stories of..

• why she started this book: despite the fact that agriculture is second only to transportation in generating potent global warming gasses, no major news outlets were reporting on this key issue.
• infiltrating corporate food conferences to learn about the greenwashing skills of big food marketers
• her public speaking debut at Bioneers in front of thousands of people, side by side with her mom, Francis Lappé Moore
  

I first came across Anna Lappé when I picked up a great cookbook called Grub. Lappé and her co-author Bryant Terry breathe new life into the cookbook genre creating not just a list of delicious vegetarian recipes but a guide to food activism resources and a party planner too. They embrace both the personal and the political of this new food movement.

Lappe continues this trend with a Hot Planet -- as she states on her website: "I plunge into the heart of this era’s newest food fight with a simple message: if we are serious about addressing climate change, we have to talk about food." I look forward to cracking open this book and seeing what she has to say.

A great event to be sure and I can't suggest going to 18 reasons enough. Yes, I will admit, I have balked at the $10 fee for many of their events, but pick one that features a little free food and it will be better than the six pack of microbrews you would've bought instead. 18 reasons, coordinated by the talented Rachel Cole, is a special place--a model to be shared in every city. Turn a quaint gallery space (big enough for one, long dining table) into a gathering spot around food/art/and community. Have cookbook swaps, author events, food classes, potlucks and feature farmer nights. Do it!

A Don't Miss Author Event 04/13!

If you're interested in the intersection food and climate change - go to the Commonwealth Club tomorrow night! Hear the mother and daughter Lappé duo talk, with my favorite, Raj Patel, as moderator. It is sure to be a great night, as my recent visit to 18 reasons was last Friday at the meet and greet for Lappé's new book - A Diet for a Hot Planet.

The price of cheap food = modern day slavery

No, I'm not exaggerating. I just finished watching a documentary called Immokalee
(from a free documentary site worth visiting) about the modern slave conditions of tomato pickers in southeastern Florida.

A couple of years ago, I began to hear the story of Immokalee from places like Grist, the NYT Magazine, and Raj Patel, but I didn't dig deeper to learn the real story: large corporate buyers for restaurant chains like Taco Bell are paying slave wages for their tomatoes.

The domino effect of cheap fast food quickly translates into poor living conditions and poor health of the primarily Latino, Mayan, and Haitian day laborers. Perhaps this story is all too familiar--cheap corporate labor leading to cheap consumer prices-- but what is different is that it's happening right here in the US. What is different about this story is that there is an organization called the Coalition of Immokalee Workers fighting against these conditions - an organization that has been a force for over 10 years.

So what are these slave labor conditions? (Quoted from the CIW website)

• "Florida tomato pickers earn an average of 45 cents per 32-lb. bucket of tomatoes, a rate that has not risen significantly since 1978. At today’s piece rate, workers have to pick over 2 ½ tons of tomatoes just to earn the equivalent of Florida minimum wage for a 10-hour workday.

• As a result of intentional exclusion from key New Deal labor reform measures, farmworkers do not have the right to overtime pay, nor the right to organize and collectively bargain with their employers.

• In the most extreme conditions, farmworkers are held against their will and forced to work for little or no pay, facing conditions that meet the stringent legal standards for prosecution under modern-day slavery statutes."

In honor of the 04/18 Farmworker Freedom March, organized by the Coalition of Immokalee, I will dig up some more information on this story. For now, you can put images to these words here.

Monterey Fish Market's Paul Johnson weighs in on Salmon politics

The Salmon fishery in California has been closed for two years now & no one has really heard about it. That is about to change on April 1st with a summit on salmon @ Fort Mason.

To find out more read this blog post by Paul Johnson, founder and president of one of the nation's most sustainable local fish markets, Monterey Fish Market.

(disclaimer, on the water front is my 9 to 5 blog, I'm so excited that we got this special blog post I had to share)

Pushing the bounds = home cooked Indian food

My next food adventure = Indian food. I love it - the flavors, the textures, the naan, the endless vegetarian options. My friends of the delicious homebrew are telling me I can actually cook it. I'm not sure I believe them. But I am excited about shopping for new spices at the bulk section at Rainbow and actually using the coffee grinder that has been especially set aside for the grinding of things like these beautiful coriander seeds.

Erin and Larry's lessons learned from years of experimenting in the kitchen are as follows:

• garlic & ginger paste form the foundation for all good sauces - grind garlic and ginger in a food processor with a tiny bit of water to make a paste
• whole black peppercorns are profound
• must have whole cumin and cardamom at the ready - don't be shy - and don't forget the tumeric
  
• 5 spice recipe (toast with oil in a pan and add to any dish for a taste of India): black mustard seed, whole cumin, whole fenugreek, fennel and nigella seeds

I'll keep you posted on my attempts in the kitchen! Please send me your recipes and advice :)

SF embraces urban agriculture...

There's a good reason to applaud Newsom today -- the Mayor announced new plans to open up city land to urban agriculture! That's right, SF will soon be growing food at our libraries, our parks and even our police departments. Read more here.

Get Inspired: the Greenhorns

Lately, I've been delving into research on urban agriculture in a lot of ways and searching for inspiration in many others. In my searches, I revisited a project that has grown through it's many tendrils from a documentary featuring young agriculturalists to a young farmer/activist resource for all.

A beautiful film. An celebration of the movement. Get inspired by their blog the irresistible fleet of bicycles and their flickr page. lose yourself cause it's is the first day of Spring!

Spring time is seed time

Spring is on it's way! It's time to buy those seeds and get a new spring garden going. This is my favorite time--looking at all the different seed packets so full of potential. Going back to the seeds that were tried and true--trying something new. Finding your seeds is the beginning of an adventure, a setting of the stage.

I love to find heirloom varieties and local seed companies. Heirlooms will blow you away with their endless unique tastes and shapes and colors -- and they increase diversity in the garden.

Here are some resources to get you going...

Get your seeds close to home:
Local seeds are popping up everywhere! If you find a seed company nearby they will do better in your climate, not to mention helping your favorite local businesses. There's a new store on my street, Succulence, and they sell these beautiful baker creek heirloom seeds. One of Baker Creek's stoers is in an old bank. I love that. Sloat, Three Bees Nursery, Flowercraft, and even Cole Hardware are great resources for heirloom organic seeds in SF.

Starts - give your garden a jump start: A great way to get some momentum going in the garden is plant some starts. Farmers markets are great spots to look for healthy, unique veggie starts. In SF, try Alemany Farmers' Market and the Ferry Building Farmers' Market on Saturdays.

Other resource to find heirloom and organic seeds:
seed savers exchange
hudson valley seeds
native seed search
local seed swaps - look for your local ecology center or garden gathering spaces

Finally, learn how to save your own seeds for next year! There's a free class this Sunday at the new Hayes Valley Farm (see 'get out')

Dream big this spring--get inspired. If you've never done it before just try and plant one thing, one of your favorite veggies (you're officially warned, tomatoes are really hard in foggy climates like SF!). Because eating something you've grown from seed, something you planted and cared for and killed snails for, will begin to change the way you think about food, it will change the way you think about the afternoon sunlight, it will change the way you relate to your favorite farmer at your local market, it will change the way you look at your neighbors lawn. It will change everything. Here's to breaking ground!

march in the garden...

Spent my Saturday with my hands in the dirt @ Garden for the Environment. Here's what March is looking like in the garden...

transplanting leeks

a bouquet for the weekly CSA box

a little spring cleaning