News, Views and Features
The Cooperative Extension Service in the News!
EXTENSION'S NEW FOCUS: Teaching local residents about where food comes from and encouraging them to support local growers.
It has begun the “10 Percent Campaign,” which supports a
cooperative initiative to build the state’s local food economy from farm to fork. “The more local the purchase, the better to keep the dollars rolling here in Guilford County,” Wickliffe says. “The only way to have local food is by keeping farms in business.”
A related article: The Cooperate Extension establishes deep roots in Guilford about its history!
Published in Greensboro New & Record, Dec. 10, 2010
(Details... pdf)
Updates/News from the Chapter Leader,
Margaret Norfleet Neff, September 22, 2010
The 36-Hour Dinner Party
Article by By MICHAEL POLLAN in the New York Times,
October 6, 2010 "HERE'S THE CONCEIT: Build a single wood fire and, over the course of 30-plus hours, use it to roast, braise, bake, simmer and grill as many different dishes as possible — for lunch, dinner, breakfast and lunch again. The main ingredients: one whole goat from the McCormack Ranch in Rio Vista, Calif.; several crates of seasonal produce (and a case of olive oil) from Hudson Ranch in Napa; a basket of morels and porcini gathered near Mount Shasta; an assortment of spices from Boulettes Larder in San Francisco; and a couple of cases of wine from Kermit Lynch in Berkeley. The setting: a shady backyard in Napa (but picture suburban subdivision, not vineyard estate), where a big country table stretches out beneath the canopy of a mulberry tree. The cast: three accomplished Bay Area chefs (Mike and Jenny Emanuel — whose kitchen and backyard we've commandeered for the weekend — and Melissa Fernandez), one gifted baker (Chad Robertson), one jack of all culinary trades (Anthony Tassinello) and two amateurs (me and my 17-year-old son, Isaac) ..."
(Full story...)
| The Center for Environmental Farming Systems (CEFS) launched a new statewide effort to build North Carolina's local food economy.
The 10% Campaign encourages consumers to spend 10 percent of their existing food dollars on foods produced in North Carolina. The campaign will create jobs, boost the viability of North Carolina farms and fisheries and promote healthy communities statewide. To join the 10% Campaign, register online and pledge to spend 10 percent of your food budget on foods produced/grown locally.
Meatless Monday Campaign
A 2008 Carnegie Mellon study showed that eating no meat or dairy products one day per week achieves more greenhouse gas reduction than eating a week's worth of locally sourced food. We hope that folks will consider this, and perhaps Greensboro can become one of many communities around the globe promoting Meatless Mondays, see http://www.meatlessmonday.com
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| Films on Food and Thinking about What We're Eating |
Locavore: Local Diet, Healthy Planet
A documentary on the local food movement.
No blood, guts or gore…just the real facts in real environments with real stories from real people… |
Food, Inc.
"In Food, Inc. , filmmaker Robert Kenner lifts the veil on our nation's food industry, exposing the highly mechanized underbelly that has been hidden from the American consumer with the consent of our government's regulatory agencies, USDA and FDA."
(Film Review from London Times...) |
What's On Your Plate
A documentary about kids and food politics |
FRESH
New thinking about how we are eating |
The Greenhorns
A documentary film about young farmers
This flm is a film in the making - well worth following |
THE GARDEN
The fourteen-acre community garden at 41st and Alameda in South Central Los Angeles is the largest of its kind in the United States. Started as a form of healing after the devastating L.A. riots in 1992, the South Central Farmers have since created a miracle in one of the country's most blighted neighborhoods. Growing their own food. Feeding their families. Creating a community. But now, bulldozers are poised to level their 14-acre oasis... |
PRESSURE COOKER
Three seniors at Philadelphia's Frankford High School find an unlikely champion in the kitchen of Wilma Stephenson. A legend in the school system, Mrs. Stephenson's hilariously blunt boot-camp method of teaching Culinary Arts is validated by years of scholarship success. Against the backdrop of the row homes of working-class Philadelphia, she has helped countless students reach the top culinary schools in the country. And under her fierce direction, the usual distractions of high school are swept aside as Erica, Dudley and Fatoumata prepare to achieve beyond what anyone else expects from them... |
Strawberry Fields Forever: Ken Vanhoy's quest for pesticide-free strawberries
May 12, 2010
Written by Katie Arcieri, a Winston-Salem freelance writer. www.katiearcieri.com Kneeling in the strawberry patch he planted last September, Ken Vanhoy holds in his hand a year's worth of tireless labor.
Between the farmer's fingers is a brilliant red strawberry grown at his family's sprawling 40-acre Rail Fence Farm in Belews Creek.
This berry is the outcome of a carefully orchestrated experiment: growing
strawberries without harmful pesticides that have been blamed in part for the
deterioration of the nation's food chain.
Vanhoy's success has not gone unnoticed. Nearly a year after he planted 2,250 strawberry plants, Vanhoy sold his first harvest of the season in less than an hour last week at the Krankies Farmers Market in Winston-Salem. ...
(Full story...) 
The story features the enormous changes in the last 10 or so years and those who made it happen! (Full story...)
Neal's Deli in Carrboro
Featured in the New York Times article "Can the Jewish Deli Be Reformed?"
April 13, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/14/dining/14deli.html?8dpc
"...places like the three-month-old Mile End in Brooklyn; Caplansky's in Toronto; Kenny & Zuke's in Portland, Ore.; and Neal's Deli in Carrboro, N.C., have responded to the low standard of most deli food — huge sandwiches of indifferent meat, watery chicken soup and menus thick with shtick — by moving toward delicious handmade food with good ingredients served with respect for past and present.."
Neal's Deli
100 East Main Street
Carrboro, NC 27510-2389
(919) 967-2185
http://www.nealsdeli.com/
Review: http://raleighdurham.about.com/od/diningandnightlife/gr/neals-deli.htm
High Country Grassfed - a New Buying Club
High Country Grassfed is a co-op of four sustainable farms located in the western North Carolina mountains. They offer grassfed beef, poultry, lamb, pork and goat meat, eggs from free range hens, goat cheese and goat milk, soaps and lotions . They deliver their farm fresh products to Greensboro, Charlotte, Raleigh, Winston-Salem, Hickory, Boone and West Jefferson every 6 weeks.
Thei animals are raised humanely on pasture and are never given antibiotics or hormones. To learn more about their farms or to order, go to www.highcountrygrassfed.com.
The Greensboro Children's Museum has been selected to be the first children's museum in the country to be affiliated with the Edible Schoolyard in Berkeley, California.
Alice Walters, the renowned Slow Food activist, chef, author and founder of the Chez Panisse Foundation served as the special guest at the Museum's Edible Schoolyard groundbreaking ceremony on September 24 th.
(Press release and details...)
Alice Walker's Visit to Greensboro
Alice Waters brings crusade to Greensboro
News & Record, Wednesday, September 23, 2009
By Morgan Josey Glover
Staff Writer
(Full story...)
Alice Waters attended and sign books at the ground breaking of an Edible Schoolyard at the Greensboro Children's Museum at 4 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 23.
Listen to parts of the interview:
- Waters shares her thoughts on the school gardening movement;
- She talks about defining local foods and the role of supermarkets and distributors; and
- She talks about changing her mind on grass-fed beef and counters misperceptions about the local food movement.
Check Greensboro's Childrens Museum for Updates on the Edible Schoolyard!
The Summer issue of UNCG's alumni magazine features several articles on gardening and slow food. They include:
- Where does your garden grow? Nurturing a love for produce fresh from the earth (with Charlie Headington)
- Garden Fresh: Helping elementary-school-age students value gardening and healthy foods, one crop at a time.
- Cultivating culture: More than food flourishes on Touger Vang's farm
- “Slow” starters: Want to venture into a Slow Food way of approaching meals? You can start gradually. Dr. Anne-Marie Scott offers a few ways to start...
(Details...)
On August 6, 2009, The Winston-Salem Journal posted
Tasty Tomatoes: Journal's annual tasting featured varieties tart and sweet, and a new treat
Michael Hastings was just one of more than 80 people who tasted tomatoes during the Winston-Salem Journal 's annual tomato tasting at the Dixie Classic Fairgrounds' farmers market. His log includes his experience as a tomato taster, characteristics of the winners and a recipe for Tomato Basil Soup and one for a Green Tomato Carpaccio and Heirloom Tomato Salad.
(Details...)
Greensboro New and Record, August 2, 2009
The strip of manicured lawn adjoining Drexel Road is a token to Bobbe Wright's neighbors.
Three years ago, Wright started rescuing his front and backyards from what he considered a dull and useless grassy existence.
In its place he planted myriad fruits, vegetables and herbs: pear, peach and cherry trees; rosemary and lemon balm; cold-hardy kiwi, grapes and blackberries; sweet potatoes and bitter creasy greens...
“It's just a waste to grow all this grass when you can grow food,” said Wright, a graphic artist living with his wife, Gratia , in northeast Greensboro.
(Full story...)
Also check these links:
- GoGreenTriad
- Following a Bull's-Eye Diet
- Visit the community garden in Aycock
Urban Farming, a Bit Closer to the Sun
One-third of Public School 6's rooftop on New York's Upper East Side will be planted with vegetables and herbs next spring for the cafeteria. That's just one example.
"A survey by Green Roofs for Healthy Cities, which represents companies that create green roofs, found the number of projects its members had worked on in the United States grew by more than 35 percent last year. In total, the green roofs installed last year cover 6 million to 10 million square feet, the group said."
Some cities offer tax subsidies for planting rooftops.
(Check the NYTimes story... registration required, free)
Chemeketa Community College from Salem, Oregon came to visit Bettini Farm
On Saturday, April 18, 2009, members of the Agribusiness Management Program at Chemeketa Community College from Salem, Oregon, came to visit Bettini Farm, and other farmers in North Carolina.
The Oregon group was made up of farm owners and their spouses, who were looking to share ideas, see new technology, view marketing practices, kick some tractor tires and just visit farmers around the world. The group was lead by Philip J. La Vine, Department of Natural Resources, Chemeketa Community College.
The Oregon group selected the State of North Carolina to visit, and this was their 33rd Annual Ag Educational Tour to someplace in the world. Past tours have included international stops in Holland, Spain, Portugal, New Zealand, Austrailia, Chile, Ireland, England and Italy. Domestic tours have included Texas, New Mexico, South Carolina, Florida, Washington D.C. and Hawaii.
This year's 24 participants included grape, blackberry, strawberry, blueberry, hazelnut, Christmas tree, grass seed and nursery crop producers.
The group arrived at Bettini Farm in a big tour bus. Randy Bettini conducted a mushroom culivation workshop, which was a main focus for the Oregon group. This workshop covered all aspects of edible mushroom crop production, including a demonstration of mushroom log innoculation, hardwood log selection, mushroom spawn procurement, ideal mushroom fruiting environments, sustainabilty techniques including best practices and pest management.
Additionally, the group viewed other sustainable farm workings, such as heirloom leaf lettuce grown in a passive solar hoophouse, beehives for polination and honey products, a roadside farm market that uses the "honor system", and a sustainably grown vineyard in the season of new grapevine planting and trellesing.
It was a great day of information exchange and fellowship for everyone. Bettini Farm was very honored to have the Oregon group come to visit us, and other farms in North Carolina.
Recap of the Board Meeting, Sunday 26 at Bettini Farm
After days of rain, the sun perked up just in time for Slow Food members to plant grape vines at the Bettini Farm. With the help of Phillip Gillespie of Thunder Horse, Randy Bettini led SFP volunteers who dug holes and positioned the grape vines along the rolling hills, reminiscent of a Tuscan landscape. This was followed by the always delicious SFP potluck lunch.
During the potluck, we brainstormed upcoming events such as Earth Day Tables in Greensboro and Winston-Salem coming up, the progress of the Snail of Approval, and a guerrilla gardening workshop on May 17th.
Please check the website for all the news! We hope that all of you are on board for this year and we welcome any ideas that you have for future events for Slow Food to host or to advertise.
SFP looks forward to spreading the word about our growing community of local food producers and slow food enthusiasts.
Groundbreaking for the community garden of “One Durham Everybody Eats”Organic Restaurant/Community Center in Durham.
This Community Gardening, organic cooking and Sustainable Living event took place on March 7, 2009. Here's what it's about:
One Durham Everybody Eats Foundation is an outgrowth of One World Cafe in Salt Lake City , Utah . We will serve organic food, let people choose their own portions and let them price those portions themselves. Founder, Denise Cerreta has gained local, national and world-wide notoriety for her pay as you go prices, seasonal no menu organic cuisine, living wages, minimal food waste and healthy meals that are within everyone's reach.
Check http://www.onedurhameverybodyeats.org/ for updates and visits!
At the Slow Food's Southern Regional Leaders Meeting in Atlanta in March, esteemed food activist, Dan Imhoff, author of "Food Fight: A Citizen's Guide to a Food and Farm Bill," was the keynote speaker at the meeting.
Check various youtube pieces by Dan Imhoff and his campaign against the Farm Bill in order to shape your opinion on this bill. (In google, search for "Dan Imhoff" and you find several videos.
An overview of "Food Fight: A Citizen's Guide to a Food and Farm Bill" in Watershed Media.org includes
- Why the Farm Bill Matters
- What Is the Farm Bill?
- Who Gets the Money?
- What about the Food Pyramid?
- A Food and Farm Bill for the 21 st Century
(Details at Watershed Media...)
The website also offers Excerpts, Best Practices, and Resources |
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