Food in Boston

Plenty of local food-related events going on in the next month or so:

Next Thursday, Slow Food BU will be having a panel called The Foodie’s Dilemma: How Boston’s Cheapskates Can Eat Sustainably featuring a mix of local & visiting luminaries.

There’s an interesting new initiative afoot to build a statewide Local Food Cooperative, modeled on the Oklahoma Food Cooperative. Meetings are being held around the state, with the local one being in Cambridge on March 8:

Mass. Local Food Coop Meeting and Potluck

The new Massachusetts Local Food Cooperative will hold a potluck lunch featuring an informational and organizational meeting Saturday, March 8th, from 12 to 2 p.m. at the Central Square Branch of the Cambridge Public Library, in Cambridge, MA

The aim of the new coop is to enable Massachusetts consumers to purchase from local farmers and food producers using an online shopping cart and a volunteer distribution system. The group’s coop management software allows producers to post information about their products and allows consumers to search and view a variety of products. The payment goes to the farmer and the cooperative takes a small percentage to cover the coop’s costs.
Anyone interested in this new way to find and purchase local food and products is invited to join the discussion. For more information about this meeting or others planned throughout the state during the next month contact Kelley O’Connor at 978-422-7669 or kelleyoconnor@gmail.com.

Slow Food Boston has a film series going at Theodore Parker Church Sanctuary, in West Roxbury. The two yet to play are Eat at Bill’s on March 9, and The Real Dirt on Farmer John on April 13. Both start at 4 PM, and run $5.

The Boston Gardeners Gathering is on Saturday, March 22nd. I don’t see them on the web, but the following is culled from a BNAN pdf:

The 33rd Annual Gardeners Gathering will be on Saturday, March 22, 2008 at the Curry Student Center, Northeastern University from 11:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. The Gathering is free and for ALL gardeners and others who would like to be gardeners; the emphasis will be on community gardening. Garden gloves will again be available at the discounted price of $2.00 a pair. As we are unable to mail to each gardener, we need your help in telling others, please spread the word.

Thanks to the Lionette’s newsletter for a number of these items — it’s a great resource, and I don’t say that just because they mention this blog favorably. Really!

Despite the hibernation-friendly weather, there are a few local-food related items to report from this past weekend.

• Made it to the NOFA Winter Conference on Saturday. Highlights for me included historical perspectives from farmers with 25+ years experience growing organically in the region, (re)connecting with a great bunch of folks, and a 400-person potluck lunch. Man, these organic farmers know how to have a good time.
• Here’s a reportback on Saturday’s pig butchering workshop at Lionette’s, from chefs study blog. Sounds like it was educational, and delicious.
• Kerry Bodine dropped me a note about her new blog, Wicked Flavory, “A blog for folks in New England who think about where their food comes from.” It looks great, too — check out the blue cheese photo on the current top post. Added to the feed reader.
• Technically this was a few days ago, but the website for the Real Food Challenge had its “under construction” launch. Though they’re not going to be up to full speed until the start of the ‘08-‘09 school year, there’s already some good resources in place, and the beginnings of a powerful coalition of colleges and universities.

The NOFA winter conference is coming up this Saturday! It’s in Worcester, just an hour out of Boston. Workshops on a range of food and sustainability issues, a big ol’ potluck lunch, and a chance to holla at Agricultural Commissioner Doug Petersen — what’s not to like?

Tuesday’s local food forum at Lucy Parsons included a ton of information, questions, and ideas crammed into 90 minutes. Rather than try to capture it all, here’s a few snippets that stuck with me.

I don’t think you need an excuse to hold something like this, but a nominal reason for the event was the recent release of Vandana Shiva’s new book from South End Press, which includes a troubling-but-inspirational essay from James Lionette of Lionette’s Market, who kicked off the night’s discussion. Other panelists were Adrieanna Bozeman & Kettia Louis, interns at the Food Project; Matt Kochka, grower at ReVision House; and Jean Claude Bourrut, grower at the Farm at Long Island Shelter.

Economics

It still doesn’t sound like anyone’s getting rich around here producing or selling real, local food. That said, some of the panelists see potential for a better economic picture, especially if the proximity of producers and consumers in local food systems can be better taken advantage of.

There are certainly innovative arrangements being made already to get good local food to Bostonians in an economically sustainable fashion. For example, ReVision House does some interesting collaboration with local farms, including redistributing food from Drumlin Farm in their CSA, and from Allandale Farm at their farm stand. These have both been successful ways of getting local food to people in their part of Dorchester.

The Challenge of Winter, and Limited Land

This came up a number of times: how can we feed ourselves locally through the winter? A decentralized root cellar network could help. James Lionette argued that there’s a gap on the demand side: too many people still act like children and turn their nose up at turnips & cabbage, but those are what were traditionally eaten around here in the winter (along with meat & other animal products, of course). Jean Claude Bourrut’s farm feeds 2,000 shelter guests daily; there’s no way they could produce enough food on their 2 acres to store a significant supply for that many people. ReVision’s Matt Kochka ran the numbers and came up with ~900 farms within 40 miles of Boston, which still don’t produce enough to feed everyone in the metro around the year. Jean Claude followed this up by reiterating that there just isn’t enough farmland to support the people in & around Boston as long as we’re going to use it for golf courses & the like.

A farmer from Lincoln’s Blue Heron Organic Farm shared some thoughts about how much potential suburbs have for producing food. The main barrier has to do with the relative market values of real estate and of food. Suburbs can overcome this using conservation policies, as is the case in Lincoln where they and many other farms are located.

A recent emigrant from the Berkshires pointed out that there is, in fact, a thriving local food system there, and it’s an easy trip from Boston for anyone who’d like to get a bit of the experience.

Things aren’t all bad; we can always make sprouts in our kitchens, and can & otherwise preserve food during the summer. Getting through the winter in these parts has traditionally been done by preparing in the harvest season.

Local Grains?

A little (expensive!) spelt & bulger is produced in the Champlain Valley, but generally the economics of producing grains in the NE are much less favorable than for veggies or animal products. There was some confusion about King Arthur Flour being owned by one of the big agribusinesses; it looks like they’re actually a 100 percent employee-owned business. Maybe the point was more about their grain coming from industrial producers?

Farm Bill

We talked about the general situation with the farm bill, as well as its impacts on our local food system. People from the Food Project who had recently visited Senator Kennedy’s office heard that nobody had been in touch with the senator about the importance of preserving the Community Food Projects money — if I understand correctly, this helps keep the Food Project running in Boston, and similar initiatives throughout the country. More info at the above resource, and at Slow Food USA. It looks like the bill is about to hit the Senate floor, so there’s still time to contact Senators Kennedy and Kerry & let them know about our needs here in Boston.

Just saw on the Slow Food Events site that there’s going to be a fascinating looking panel on the costs and challenges of local & sustainable food at Lucy Parsons next Tuesday, 7 PM. If it’s half as good as the combination forum / potluck that the JP Forum put on last month, we may learn things that we didn’t even know we didn’t know. I myself am excited at the prospect of meeting Jean Claude from the Share our Strength farm in person — talked to him on the phone for the survey, but haven’t had a chance to say ‘thanks’ in person yet.

The 2007 American Community Garden Association conference was this weekend at Northeastern. Various factors prevented me from spending much time there, but the parts I did experience were good fun:

• Volunteering at registration and for a workshop missing one of its presenters reinforced a lesson I’ve learned before: gardening people are, by and large, friendly and laid-back folks.
• I’d forgotten that there was a Boston Community Garden Council, but there is and it meets every month. I fear that another monthly meeting is not something I should contemplate, but it would be interesting to check out once.
• Will Raap, founder of the Gardener’s Supply companies, presented at the opening session. While his talk veered dangerously into advertisement zone, I really appreciated his discussion of the company’s origins in the 70’s energy crisis, and their work to build a sustainable food economy in Burlington.
• The Saturday morning talks by gardeners and coordinators from New Orleans was really moving. In particular, Noel Jones of the God’s Vineyard project told a story of perseverance in the face of very difficult circumstances. The NOLA food map is a totally different kind of inspiration — while I can see how the absence of food in New Orleans post-Katrina created the necessity for that particular example, I think every community should have one. Certainly Boston.
• A Sarasota gardener’s story about the city’s seizure of her garden’s land (for development purposes) really emphasized the importance of having city buy-in to the value of community gardens. My understanding is that Boston is in good shape in this area, but it’s a sobering reminder of the possibilities.
• Living south of the Charles, I confess that I have little idea about food and garden issues north of the river. I was lucky to be able to attend a tour to Somerville, visiting the Union Square farmer’s market and the Somerville Growing Center, both well worth experiencing.

Regular readers have remarked that I’ve been in a FiB slump for the last few months, but this event, like all good conferences, was a real burst of inspiration. Fortunately, I’m involved in the early stages of an exciting new & related venture, which I’ll be saying more about in the future.

The American Community Garden Association’s annual conference is in Boston this year, from August 9-12. Some of you may recall me plugging it at the Food Project’s conference this spring. For anyone who wanted to make that event but couldn’t, there is a Public Policy and Food Security component to the Friday and Sunday workshops that may be of interest. There’s also a whole slew of garden and related tours, plenty of other workshop tracks, a local foods dinner at the Boston Nature Center, etc.

If you’re thinking about signing up, I’d advise taking a look at your options a bit ahead of time - it’s possible to take on the whole three day event, or a subset, depending on your schedule. After June 15 (Friday!) the rates go up. If you’re not already an ACGA member, you still save by signing up for a year, but if you’re reading this, it’s probably not a bad idea to join regardless of that fact.

Most immediately, there’s a hearing next Wednesday on the bill. If you can’t make that, MPHA also has a PDF you can print out, write your endorsement and offers of support, and mail to them (how old-school).

(via US Food Policy)

Being a huge fan of food-related bicycle rides, I’m happy to pass on the following press release. Last year’s tour sounded like a blast, so it’s great to see another happening.

I’m also happy to be getting the word out more than two days in advance, which makes for a big improvement in my average lead time.

SAVE THE DATE:

BOSTON’S 2ND ANNUAL Tour de Farm BIKE TOUR
SATURDAY, AUG. 11, 2007

Please join Farm Aid and Boston-area cycling and farming organizations for the 2nd annual Tour de Farm bike tour.

The Tour de Farm will showcase innovative urban farms and food projects that are strengthening Boston’s local and sustainable food system. Riders will visit an urban farm in Roxbury, a CSA (community supported agriculture) farm and greenhouse in Dorchester, a new community farm in the Blue Hills Reservation and Boston’s oldest commercial farm. Riders will sample fresh, locally grown food, learn of the benefits of local agriculture and how they can actively support these efforts. The ride will go through the neighborhoods of Roxbury, Dorchester, Jamaica Plain, Brookline, Mattapan, Milton and the beautiful Blue Hills Reservation.

The Tour de Farm is a free event and all are welcome. New this year, the tour will offer a shorter option for less experienced or younger riders of approximately 15 miles of mainly flat terrain. The longer of the two loops, approximately 25 miles, includes some moderate hills. The ride will start and finish at Boston’s Franklin Park, beginning at 9:00am and concluding by 1:00pm.

Pre-registration is required. For more information about the Tour de Farm and to pre-register, contact Mark Smith at Farm Aid, 617-354-2922, or via email to mark@farmaid.org

The Tour de Farm is sponsored by the following organizations:
Farm Aid (http://www.farmaid.org/)
MassBike (http://www.massbike.org/)
The Food Project (http://www.thefoodproject.org/)
Victory Program’s ReVision Urban Farm (http://www.vpi.org/)
Brookwood Community Farm (http://www.brookwoodcommunityfarm.org/)
Urban AdvenTours (http://www.urbanadventours.com)
Allandale Farm ( http://www.allandalefarm.com/)
Bikes Not Bombs (http://www.bikesnotbombs.org/)

Following are the people and organizations I talked to for today’s Farming the City Conference. Everyone was enthusiastic about helping and very generous with their time — thanks again! Also a big thanks to the conference organizers, presenters, and other attendees.

Non-profit farms:

• Bob Burns and Danielle Andrews at The Food Project, in Roxbury.
• Matt Kochka at ReVision House, in Dorchester.
• Jean-Claude Bourrut at the Farm at Long Island Shelter, on the harbor.
• Mark Smith of Brookwood Community Farm, on the Canton / Milton line.

Community Gardens:

• Jeremy Dick of Boston Natural Area Networks, downtown.
• Betsy Johnson of the South End / Lower Roxbury Open Space Land Trust.

From the Boston metro’s only for-profit farm, John Lee of Allandale Farm, in Brookline.
Finally, representing the 43 orchards in the Boston metro, Ben Crouch of Earthworks, in Roxbury.

I’d welcome any information about producers or related organizations not listed here, along with other information related to the survey. Still working on how to communicate what I learned, and figuring out where the information will be of use. More to come!