New Amsterdam Market is a non-profit organization dedicated to reinventing the indoor public market as a civic institution, in the City of New York. To date, we have held three seasonal market events that have drawn thousands of supporters from all five boroughs and beyond. Beginning this summer, we will hold monthly markets at a public site, whereby the aim is to increase the visibility of and demand for regional food, thus making the case to the city and the public alike for a permanent site.

To kick-off this effort, we are holding our very first fundraiser in Manhattan this Saturday, February 21, from 5-8PM, Founded on Oyster Shells. Come for a night of oysters, cask conditioned local beers, chowders and stews, spent grain bread, and winter vegetable pickles. Or, if you would like to show your support but are outside the immediate NYC area, check out our online auction with dozens of unique experiential items to choose from. The auction runs through Tuesday, February 24th.

New Amsterdam Market will be a market of purveyors – independent, locally owned businesses such as butchers, grocers, mongers, provisioners, and other vendors who will commit to sourcing and selling food from the region extending in a radius of approximately 500 miles from the City of New York. This type of public market is nothing new. All American cities once had public markets filled with just such vendors; and these vendors were primarily concerned with selling food produced by farms they knew in person. These markets were considered civic institutions because they were held on common ground, and fulfilled a public agenda: providing urban populations with a reliable, affordable, and healthy source of food while supporting regional economies.

New Amsterdam Market is one of many projects taking place right now to revive regional food systems and provide alternatives to the type of agriculture and food production we know we would all be better off without. The challenge is very real: how do we produce and distribute food without damaging the environment, compromising biodiversity, mistreating workers and animals, or compromising public health – all hallmarks of our present food system?

We believe that meaningful change results when individual, incremental efforts are combined under one roof. What results is a new entity whose sum is larger than its many parts. In New York, we have identified a number of passionate, committed individuals who have started businesses to support local farms, especially those at the forefront of sustainable production. For example, Anne Saxelby, who has built a business supporting cheese producers from the northeast – primarily from farms too busy or distant to participate in New York’s excellent Greenmarket system. These cheesemakers have come to view Anne as their trusted representative; and the same can now be said of several Regional meat producers whose products are being sourced by another business much like Anne’s – Dickson’s Farmstand Meats, owned by Jacob Dickson, or a store like Marlow and Daughters, a new butcher shop in Williamsburg Brooklyn that sells only responsibly raised meat. Or like Sweet Deliverance – a catering company owned by Kelly Geary, who sources from farmers markets and makes home-cooked meals for professionals who don’t have time to cook themselves.