October 2009

Stories from October 2009.

Emma Brewster -- Community Food Education Associate, Just Food

Questions you might never have.

* When do you need a hall pass at 1155 Sixth Avenue? When you try and leave the building with 11 large boxes and bags.
* How many people does it take to carry 11 boxes and bags downstairs? Five.
* How do you give security your hall pass if all your hands are full? Place it prominently on the top of a bag and direct them to it.
* How long does it take to hail a cab at 2:30 on Friday afternoon when you are standing on Sixth Avenue with 11 large boxes and bags? 25 minutes.
* How many boxes fit in the trunk? Eight.
* Which of the four entrances to Judson Memorial Church do you use? Only the one at 239 Thompson Street.
* How many people does it take to bring the boxes and bags into the Assembly Hall at Judson Memorial Church? Three, two to unload and one to hold the “open door” button so that the elevator won’t beep incessantly and force the doors closed.
* What does cabbage want to be when it grows up? Sauerkraut and kimchi, at least according to Jessica Prentice, whose fermentation and slow cooker workshops went off without a hitch.

Miriam Goler -- Fresh Food For All Associate, Just Food

Part of my job working on Fresh Food for All, Just Food's farm to food pantry program, is to organize farm trips so that food pantry staff, volunteers and clients can visit the farm where they are getting their produce, see the fields and meet their farmer.  We had spectacular weather for all of our trips this year, except for our trip to Golden Earthworm Farm.  It was raining when we left St. Albans in the morning, and it was still coming down when we arrived at the farm.  Feeling that because of the weather, this trip needed a little extra cheer, we had picked up a couple pies from Briermere Farm on our way.  Upon arriving, everyone went quickly from the bus to the barn, which had been beautifully set up for us to picnic out of the rain.  Despite the inviting lunch tables and the promise of pie, Horace Hall, a volunteer from St. Albans Baptist Church Food Pantry, was not content to relax in the barn.  He immediately found Matt and James, the farmers, and asked them "where are the two giant pigs?"  Upon receiving an answer, Mr. Hall went tromping off into the rain to go visit the pigs he had become friends with on the trip the year before.  His excitement was so contagious that he even got a train of followers to admire the pigs with him before we all sat down to lunch and strawberry rhubarb pie!

Melissa McEwen -- Development Associate, Just Food

Today I visited Veritas Farm for work. It was an unusually cold day and rain sputtered intermittently. I wondered how NY had skipped from 80 degree to 50 degree days.

Veritas specializes in pastured raised meat, but they have expanded their vegetable operations in the past two years too. Various fat birds like these ducks waddled around to welcome me, temporarily distracted from a pile of windfall apples salvaged from this summer’s hailstorms.

The farm is very old and was a former homestead that was overgrown when former Brooklyners Paul Alward and Stephanie Turco took over. They cleared the land with hard work and a herd of goats, but it still is very lush with forest greenery.

Large herds of highland cattle roamed looking hardy and even a little happy in the rain. This frighteningly fat, but good-hearted Gloucestershire Old Spots pig wanted a back scratch.

Farmer Stephanie told me that they personally accompany all their animals to slaughter and ensure they get the best treatment possible.

This was a great farm and I would go here often to buy their meat. They were really serious about grass-fed, which is important to me because grass-fed meats are much better nutritionally. Grass-fed meats are much closer to the wild game humans would have hunted down for most of our existence as a species. As such,, they are higher in omega-3 fatty acids and vitamin E. I don’t really bother buying anything else and the added bonus is that farms like this are truly a wonderful place for animals to live and not fake free-range…the thick coated highland cattle live outside 365 days a year!

Justin Butler -- Capacity Building Coordinator, United Neighborhood House of NY

On Thursday, October 15th, over 30 representatives from 21 of the city’s largest community centers met at their first “Neighborhood Food Meeting” to talk about ways they can collaborate on food justice issues.  I coordinated the meeting, and the research and site visits leading up to the meeting.  

These agencies are members of United Neighborhood Houses (UNH), an umbrella organization for 38 multi-service community centers in all five boroughs, serving over half a million people each year, at over 400 sites.  UNH provides these dues-paying members with supportive services, advocacy on policy issues, and programmatic funding.  When talking to people from our member agencies before the meeting, many of them were excited about making meaningful change in food access, but were unsure of where to start. 

The Neighborhood Food meeting attracted staff with an incredible diversity of expertise—head cooks, assistant directors, pantry coordinators, senior center directors and staff, child care staff, food purchasers, housing services staff, and others.  

The main issues discussed at the meeting were: how to adapt a successful model for restructuring meal menus to serve fresher, healthier food using restrictive federal meal-reimbursement dollars, and train agency chefs to cook more from scratch with the new ingredients; how to combine our voices to impact city, state and federal policies that address food access, particularly meals for children; and how agencies can start sourcing the food they serve in their cafeterias from local small and medium-sized farmers.  

This last possibility—community centers buying their food locally—is the most exciting for me.  It would be a huge institutional shift, which could be replicable for countless, similarly funded community centers across the country!  Of the 30 questionnaires collected at the end of the meeting, 11 members were interested in exploring a local purchasing option. UNH is working with the Council on the Environment of NYC (CENYC), the New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets, Just Food, and others on this initiative.  

This promise of this group is remarkable—stay tuned, or maybe look for headlines in the paper, about our next move.  

Email Justin at justin@unhny.org to find out more.