Civil Eats

Yesterday, more than 20 victims of foodborne illness, including surviving family members of those killed by contaminated food, gathered at the U.S. Capitol to share their stories, meet with legislators and voice support for legislation to reform our nation’s food safety system. These victims and their families urged Congress and the Obama administration to pass food safety legislation that will improve consumer protection. The families came together as part of the Make Our Food Safe Campaign, launched by major consumer and food safety groups in an effort to put a human face on the food safety crisis in the U.S. and to set a list of priorities for food safety reform. Read More

Scientific American recently published an article called How to Grow a Better Tomato: The Case against Heirloom Tomatoes. The author details how plant breeders are going about saving heirloom tomatoes from their own fatal flaws. The article was written in a combative tone with the author seemingly intent on provoking a knee-jerk reaction from lovers of good, real food not managed under laboratory conditions. It worked. Read More

I read with shame and sadness the stories out of Egypt yesterday describing the ordered mass slaughter of 350,000 hogs due to fears over swine flu. I am an omnivore and love the flavor of meat. It seems to me that humans are part of an evolving food chain stretching back millions of years. Yet, I also believe that given our position at the top of that chain, with our intellectual, emotional and spiritual capacities, we Homo sapiens have a responsibility to ethically and humanly care for all the life from which we draw our sustenance. Read More

When the news broke that First Lady Michelle Obama was putting in a vegetable garden on the White House lawn in March, I couldn’t help but wonder if it would be the most powerful “soft” policy position on food this presidency could take in the first 100 days. In just planting a garden, she not only might have begun to change our view of vegetables , while inspiring Americans to grow some of their own food and save a little money in this time of economic crisis, but she also might have gracefully encouraged us to diversify our diets — the basis for good health, and by extension, a healthier agriculture system. For this alone, she gets an “A” on her contribution to the administration’s agriculture policy in the first 100 days.

President Obama, on the other hand, entered his role with a stack of urgent crises on his desk. Food advocates couldn’t help but have lowered expectations of how he would address the decline of farming and of rural populations; lobbyists working in the USDA, FDA and EPA; the quality of school lunch; the 36 million Americans suffering from hunger; energy independence beyond the empty promise of ethanol, and more. The real food lobby has gotten used to these vital issues taking a back seat, but that didn’t mean they were going to stop asking our young, hip and multitasking president to change all that. Read More

President Obama made a speech yesterday before the National Academy of Sciences – and mentioned the important link between scientific knowledge and our national health and security. According to The White House Blog, Obama said:

Science is more essential for our prosperity, our security, our health, our environment, and our quality of life than it has ever been before.

And if there was ever a day that reminded us of our shared stake in science and research, it’s today.  We are closely monitoring the emerging cases of swine flu in the United States. And this is obviously a cause for concern and requires a heightened state of alert.  But it’s not a cause for alarm.

So, the question is: what does science say about the causes of the current swine flu epidemic? Read More

I heard California Secretary of Agriculture, A.G. Kawamura speak at a Commonwealth Club panel discussion last week. The topic: A National Food Policy – But What About the Hungry? attempted to address hunger in a transistioning national food system and included Paula Jones, San Francisco’s Food Policy Director, Paul Ash, the Executive Director of the San Francisco Food Bank, and Michael Dimock, President of Roots of Change. While the elephant in the room – how to feed people suffering from daily hunger – was difficult to pin down in terms of action and policy, it became very clear that an urban agricultural renaissance must be supported in order to meet societies’ food needs. Did you know that 2% of the population grows 98% of our food? That’s simply crazy.

A week before this panel I spoke on one with a botanist and an edible landscape gardener. I don’t purport to be an expert or have any answers to the perplexing food issues facing urban populations, or the nation for that matter, but I did cull together a list of ways to support this agricultural revolution. We all have a part to play. Read More

In a victory for local dairy farmers and consumers, Gov. Sebelius, President Obama’s pick to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, vetoed a controversial bill last Thursday that would have limited rbGH labeling on dairy products in that state. The bill, HB 2121, faced massive opposition from dairy, consumer, health, animal welfare and environmental organizations across the country; nearly 30 of which wrote a letter to Sebelius, urging her to veto HB 2121. Read More

Until now Confined Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs), the giant factory farming operations where most animals are raised for meat in the US, have been mostly criticized for the cess pools they produce and for mistreatment of animals and workers. But following from there, as Nicholas Kristof reported in the New York Times recently there is a risk that MRSA, a virulent bacteria without any cure, is being incubated in hog operations in the midwest — a bug that is easily transmissible to humans via our genetic similarities to pigs.  Now, a much bigger problem has presented itself — it seems a new virulent flu, which the World Health Organization is saying has “pandemic potential,” has been possibly linked to a CAFO in Perote, Mexico owned and operated by industrial pork operator Smithfield. Read More

We Americans can be notoriously self-centered when it comes to, well, everything. In the environmental and food-justice movements, voices from Europe or Africa struggle to be included in the American discussion. But as a young country, we would do well to learn from other countries who never stopped plowing, harvesting, and eating in a sustainable way.

Recently I joined 200 other young people to participate in a pilot agriculture-experience program in Japan. Read More

After a hot, sweaty introductory year of organic farming in Georgia, I decided to devote a second year to working as an apprentice farmer in Massachusetts.  Cooler weather was not my only reason for the migration; I wanted to be a CRAFT apprentice.  CRAFT (the Cooperative Regional Alliance for Farmer Training) is a loosely affiliated network of small sustainable farms , all of whom take on apprentices and send these young greenhorns on bi-weekly visits to other CRAFT farms for lectures, tours, and farmer networking.   Several CRAFT farmers were among the first sustainable growers in the country; Community Supported Agriculture was born here.  It is a fine place to be a student of farming. Read More

On this 39th anniversary of Earth Day, it seems our appetite for all things sustainable is increasing faster than ever. Every company, industry, and product is being repackaged and redesigned with sustainability in mind, and every newspaper, magazine, and television station has a growing list of sustainable themed programs. In the food world, everyone from large agribusiness to corner markets are flaunting their sustainable credentials…no one wants to be left behind. Read More

It’s Earth Day, and in the spirit of stewardship I’m thinking about good soil. Gardeners all over the Northern Hemisphere are preparing for another season of growing, often beginning with readying the ground and germinating seeds. Every gardener knows that peat is a magical growing medium, creating ideal conditions in which plants thrive. But choosing this ancient dirt could do unforeseen damage to the Earth, while an otherwise environmentally engaged gardener’s plot thrives. The question has been, are the alternatives worth using? I think the answer is yes. Here I lay out 5 reasons home gardeners should go peat-free from now on. Read More

The title of Nicolette Hahn Niman’s compelling new book, Righteous Porkchop, is honest, and indicates one of the book’s strengths—its exploration of the moral issues behind our broken food system. As a vegetarian rancher she is uniquely poised to be even more righteous than most. Not only has she abstained from eating meat herself since young adulthood, she spends her days sustainably raising cattle for others to eat. Who can top that? Read More

In June of 2008, the Sustainable Agriculture & Food Systems Funders (SAFSF) Annual Forum featured a closing plenary session: Cultivating Economic Sustainability. Almost every participant of this multi-day conference stayed after hours to continue the conversation sparked by this session, which explored the various economic tools — in addition to grant-making — that foundations can use to promote food systems healthy for people and the environment. Read More

In her new book, “Deeply Rooted: Unconventional Farmers in the Age of Agribusiness,” journalist and photographer Lisa M. Hamilton takes your hand and leads you down the life path of three unique characters who share one commonality: a passion for stewardship of the land. Hamilton spent two years profiling three families in rural America who are fighting against the groundswell swallowing up farms that are forced to get big, or get out. Her eye for detail of place and people at odds with industrial agriculture is astute and compelling, and she draws the reader into the quiet lives of Americans slowly changing the system. With advanced praise from the incomparable Wendell Berry, this is a must-read book for those who care about the future of farming in America. Read More

I’m going to be real honest with you, friends of Civil Eats, I was once one of those people who threw my used up old McDonalds wrappers and soda containers out the car window. I didn’t care. I ate my Filet o’Fish and fries then threw my trash into the world. That was back in Indianapolis, when I was an oblivious rebel against Keep It Clean campaigns. Sorry Mom and Dad, you taught me right; but my friends did it too – let’s blame it on peer pressure and the cult of fast food culture and call it a day. Steeped in it, I was. When hanging out at Noble Romans or in the McDonald’s parking lot is the fun thing to do after the basketball game, so be it. So, given the premise that this fast food lifestyle was part of the foundation of my youth, then how did I become a card caring Slow Food advocate and campaigner for good, clean and fair food for everyone? How did this polluting Hoosier with no sense for the environment or food quality get here? Read More

All around the country, classes are back in session this week and a lot of college kids are recovering from week-long hangovers. Fort Lauderdale, Cancún, or Cabo, spring break has earned its rowdy reputation for drunken, beach party debauchery.

The images of bikini-clad beer-bonging are a far cry from the original spring break tradition in America. Back in the day when most people grew up on farms, schools let out this time of the year so that kids could lend a hand with the spring planting. It was a time when farmers made up a sizeable chunk of the population – not the puny 2% of today – and when kids grew up with an inevitable, ingrained knowledge of growing food. Read More

Every year, Americans find a new diet or pill to help them lose weight. Popular examples abound. There’s the low-fat diet, the Atkins Diet, the South Beach Diet, the list continues. Fast food and quick service restaurants rush around to change their menus to offer low-fat dishes, more bread, less bread, 24 oz. burgers loaded with bacon, piles of cheese. And after a few months or years, the “it” diet fades from people’s minds until another one comes long and sweeps the country. These fad diets rarely lead to reducing obesity or making Americans healthier. Rather most lead to the over consumption of factory-farmed meat, cheese and “low-fat” or “low sugar” processed foods filled with high fructose corn syrup, fake sweeteners and partially hydrogenated oils. Well, I think its time we try another kind of diet: the low carbon diet. Except rather than getting you into that teeny, tiny yellow polka dot bikini, this diet helps reduce carbon emissions, fatten the slim wallet of small farmers and cut inches from big agriculture.  Read More

Around the state of Montana, people are taking action to make a sustainable, local food system a reality. From the legislative level to the grassroots level, volunteers and institutions are demanding Montana-produced food. Montana’s food system, like many others, is largely resource and energy dependent. However, the vision for a community-based food system, one where affordable and consistent access to local, nutritious food is available is coming into clearer focus. Read More

Last Friday, an op-ed hit the pages of the New York Times written by James McWilliams (“Free Range Trichinosis”) purporting that free-range pork was more likely to be contaminated with the deadly parasite trichonosis than its industrially sardined and antibiotic-overdosed cousin. The writer chose to take this information from a single study funded by the National Pork Board, a lobbying group for industrial pork operations, and neglected to mention that the the two free-range pigs (out of 600) had tested positive for antibodies of trichinosis, not specifically the disease itself. Read More

Part 1 of my interview with conservationist Gary Nabhan, we talked about impacts of modern farming, the implications of biological complexity, and the current direction of the sustainable food movement.  In this second installment of our conversation, Nabhan talks about his childhood on the shores of Lake Michigan, about how his Arab-American heritage has influenced the direction his career has gone, and about how a modern chef is like a jazz musician. Read More

In response to some of the worst economic times since the Great Depression, I’m excited to present my “Grow. Cook. Grub.” series.  With unemployment climbing, diet-related illnesses increasing, and health care costs sky-rocketing, more and more people are looking to feed themselves healthfully, simply, and cheaply.  Using my family and community as an example, I will show readers how easy it is to cook health-promoting, delicious, and inexpensive meals year round using food from my home garden, CSA, and local farmer’s markets. Read More

A recent Mercy for Animals (MFA) investigation at New England’s largest egg producer revealed a list of cruelties few people would ever want to witness. Dead hens left to rot in cages with live hens. Birds, wildly flapping, kicked like footballs into manure pits. Cages upon cages of birds crammed so tight they can’t even spread their wings. The list of horrors goes on.

You’d think this would be the kind of obvious animal abuse few people would hesitate to condemn. But what was the agribusiness industry’s response? Unfortunately, more of the same defensive posturing that’s become as predictable as the results of a major league baseball player’s steroid test. Read More

The short flight from Los Angeles to San Francisco is prime viewing time to grasp the enormity of the state’s agricultural land across the Central Valley. But the last time I made the trip the predictable green and brown patchwork of farmland was interspersed with glittering squares: solar panels. I thought to myself, could there really be, in the middle of rural California? As if solar panels had been planted alongside the bounty of alfalfa and almonds, no more or less than any other crop. I grinned from my window seat. But then I started thinking: can solar panels be treated like just another agricultural crop? What is the significance of incorporating them into an agricultural landscape, particularly as one as lucratively productive as California’s Central Valley? Read More

The Berkeley Farmers’ Markets, a program of the Ecology Center, are eliminating all plastic bags and packaging from their three weekly markets, making them the first in the nation to do so. The goal of the markets’ “Zero Waste” campaign is to remove, reduce, and recycle plastic and to recycle and compost all materials generated at the markets. Read More

It is necessary to question our movement. Without a cold, hard look at the snags in implementing a sustainable food system, someone ill-informed will crawl out of the woodwork clinging to their credentials and poke holes in our arguments, whether with valid points or not, possibly shilling for Big Ag or just looking to market themselves as a contrarian.

Today, a free-range dissenter ended up in the op-ed pages of the New York Times, seemingly to defend factory farmed pork. Read More

There are those of us who may have the best of intentions, but wish we had a little more knowledge under our belt as the growing season kicks off. The number of urban garden neophytes seems to be off the charts this year, with the National Gardening Association reporting a 20% increase in first-time household food gardens.

Here in New York City, signs of spring are fast approaching, and with them a slew of workshops catering to the most challenged (space-wise) of growers—that of the rooftop, fire escape, and street tree bed-planting variety. Here is the round up of free classes in April and May to get you growing: Read More

Matt McCue is a new farmer. He is also a returned Iraq war veteran and former Peace Corps Volunteer. Matt got involved in farming in California after meeting Michael O’Gorman, founder and Executive Director of the Farmer-Veteran Coalition. Now, he is starting Shooting Star CSA Farm in Solano County, having secured a lease on some beautiful and productive property. “What is your life going to be defined by?” he asks. “In the military, if you get into an altercation, your life is defined by tragedy. My life is defined by growing and harvesting things, and there’s a lot to be said for that.” Read More

Today a broad array of 29 farmers, consumer groups, businesses and other organizations sent a letter to Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius, President Obama’s pick to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, urging her to veto HR 2121, a bill passed by the Kansas State Legislature last week which would require an additional disclaimer on labels for dairy products produced from cows not treated with recombinant bovine growth hormone (rbGH or rbST), a genetically engineered, artificial hormone that induces cows to produce more milk. (To read more about the problem with rbGH, check out this earlier Civil Eats post.) The bill was sent yesterday to Governor Sebelius, who has ten days to veto it. Read More

One of the complex questions I have been living is the question of education. This is a question that has grown within me from my own education in the public school system and now ripens as I have the stewardship of nurturing my own four daughters. For their sakes, I have waded through the war-zone of educational philosophies with the cross-fire so thick that I could not clearly see who was wrong or who was right. At last I came upon a place of peace, where Dewey, Montessori, Steiner, Mason, Rousseau and Froebel all seem to call a truce. I have found a place where public schoolers, home-schoolers, and private-schoolers can amicably co-exist. This higher-ground is in the garden. Read More