Thirteen New Products boarded to the Slow Food USA Ark of Taste!

On August 27th, on the eve of the Slow Food USA National Congress and Slow Food Nation,  the Slow Food USA Ark Committee held its annual meeting in Mill Valley, CA to review, taste and “board” new foods to the Ark of Taste (you know, like the animals, two by two…).

The Ark of Taste—a catalog of foods threatened by industrial standardization, the regulations of large-scale distribution and environmental damage—is a tool that helps farmers, ranchers, fishers,
chefs, retail grocers, educators and consumers celebrate our country’s diverse biological, cultural and culinary heritage. In an effort to cultivate consumer demand—key to agricultural conservation—only the best tasting endangered foods make it onto the Ark.

Yesterday’s newly boarded foods include the Fuerte avocado, Reefnet salmon fishing method of Northern Puget Sound, New England Boiled cider and cider jelly, Piki bread, Randall cattle, Black Republican cherry, Kiawe honey, Gallberry honey, Sourwood honey, Datil pepper, Black Sphinx date, Cayuga duck and the Hatcher mango.

Now back to the Reefnet salmon fishing method…this one’s particularly interesting because it is not a food, per se, but rather an endangered method, one that’s sustainable and historically significant and, sadly, one that is all too rare. Says Riley Starks of Lummi Island Wild:

“It is wonderful that this endangered Northwest Native American fishing method is getting this recognition. It shows that truly sustainable fishing methods deserve to continue and they are valuable, not just to the fish stocks but to people who rely on the fish stocks.”

Profiles of the newly boarded products will be on the Slow Food USA website soon. Click here to learn more about the program and members of the Ark Committee.

We are a Slow Food Nation

Greetings from San Francisco, where Slow Food USA is holding its National Congress (a meeting of Slow Food chapter leaders from around the country).  We’re discussing our vision and mission, our strategic plan, our national statute, best practices, and the future of the movement and the organization.

Big Stuff.

Other big stuff?  Our new website, and….drumroll please….Slow Food Nation.

We hope to see many of you in San Francisco this weekend.

Host a National Labor Day Picnic

Participate locally in the largest celebration of food in America!

This Labor Day, join us in building a food system that is just, sustainable and delicious by holding picnics in your town or city. A day of generosity and action, we invite you to organize picnics with loved ones and new friends who together will break bread, share a meal and help transform the American food system. Starting August 20th, you will be able to post picnic plans, photos, testimonials, and video content at Slowfoodnation.org.

Held during the first ever Slow Food Nation event in San Francisco, CA (August 29-September 1) Slow Food Nation Labor Day Picnics are meant to build on the momentum created by communities of all kinds across the country eager to support and foster a good, clean and fair food system.

Join us for a day of action dedicated to sharing food and celebrating the realization of Slow Food Nation in dozens of different ways, in different communities across America. If you'd like help envisioning how to do this, and how to incorporate endangered foods into your menu, check out our American Traditions Picnics page.

Who Can Participate:
You, your friends, families, neighbors and community members.

Other Ways You Can Support a Slow Food Nation:
Host a Signing of the Petition Calling for a New Vision for a 21st Century Food, Farm & Agriculture Policy. A Downloadable PDF of the Petition will be available on August 28th, 2008 at fooddeclaration.org.

For more information on how to post your picnic online, and to find out how others are celebrating National Labor Day Picnics, visit slowfoodnation.org.

More Slaughterhouse Diaries

by Slow Food USA staffer Cecily Upton

As the Slow Food in Schools Coordinator, you can usually find me sitting at my desk in Brooklyn, writing emails and talking on the phone. I spend a lot of time thinking about where food comes from and how it gets from our farms to our plates. And while I feel pretty comfortable with my knowledge of the process, there's far more to it than that.

Recently, I was fortunate enough to experience the process, in a very real and visceral way. I was invited by my friends at Awesome Farm to help slaughter 104 pasture raised, organic chickens. As it says on their eggs, their chickens are "really, really free range."

Now, I think it's important to know a few things about me so you can understand my perspective on the whole slaughter thing.

1. I am more carnivorous than omnivorous. I like meat, and I eat a lot of it.
2. I'm not in the least grossed out by blood or guts. In fact, I think they are beautiful elements of organic life that we rarely appreciate as such.
3. I've spent time on farms, watching animals that I cared for be slaughtered and helping to butcher the vast quantities of meat that they gave us.

That said, I've never killed anything bigger than a very large cockroach with my own hands.

Last saturday, that changed. Before the actual kill day, I'd spent weeks telling any and every one within earshot that I was going to be slaughtering chickens. I was excited. Desk bound most of the time, I couldn't wait for the opportunity to be out on the farm. And, even though I know that slaughtering = killing and that there would be lots of death that morning, it wasn't until I was traipsing through the dewy, overgrown barnyard and hearing the first low coos of the 104 chickens just awakening from their last night of sleep, that I realized, truly, what I was about to do.

There were five of us: Owen and KayCee, the farmers; their friend Tracy, who works at neighboring Hearty Roots Community Farm; Amy, a fellow Brooklynite, and myself. We were solemn, but not in a mournful kind of way. I think we just all realized that we had a long morning ahead of us and that a lot of creatures who were now alive would soon be dead. And then we just began.

Ok, from here on out it gets a little graphic, so if you're not into blood and guts, you might want to stop reading.

The slaughtering set-up looks a little like this: there are two metal cones with the small end down nailed to the wall about face height. The bottom of those cones is cut off, kind of like a large pastry bag. The chickens go in here, head down. Below these are 5 gallon buckets to catch blood.

The first two chickens went, hesitatingly, upside-down into the cones and, without much ceremony, Tracy and Owen cut off their heads using small knives. The decapitated bodies slammed around against the metal chutes and in Owen and Tracy's hands the beaks kept opening and closing on the severed heads. Deep red blood splattered against the rough wooden barn walls and dripped into the buckets below. After a few minutes of bleeding, we took the bodies outside and scalded them to loosen the feathers. After defeathering them using a large machine with stiff rubber fingers, we cut off their feet and oil glands, eviscerated them–being careful not to pop the bile bag (bile is BRIGHT green!)–and plopped them into a pool of icy water to cool.

While I hadn't thought about it in the days leading up, at some point during the morning I knew that I wanted to kill one myself. After about an hour of chopping off feet and separating livers from bile bags, I turned to Owen and told him it was time. We went together into the holding pen and I grabbed the first chicken I could get my hands on. She was warm and dirty. She flapped around a bit as I carried her by the feet to the slaughtering station and put her into the cone. I reached in for her head and stretched it down through the hole in the bottom. Owen instructed me to pull back the feathers on her neck and to cut through her trachea right below the skull. "Don't hesitate," he said calmly.

The knife wasn't as sharp as it had been first thing in the morning, and I had some trouble breaking the skin. I was shaking a bit. It wasn't as clean a cut as I wanted it to be. It was difficult to saw through the tough neck. The chicken flinched and blood oozed down my hand. It felt like it took longer than it should, but before my mind could settle on one of the thousand thoughts going through my head it was over. And I had a chicken head in my hand and blood was dripping into the bucket.

Afterwards, I walked back out into the sunlight and over to the evisceration station. There was more work to do. Later, though, when things slowed down, I thought about what I'd done–killed something for food. For my food. Looking back, it's not something that I want to do again, but it's not something that I don't want to do again either. It is part of a process that I believe in and support and I'm proud of myself for participating. I feel good about the way those animals were raised, I feel good about they way they were killed, and I feel good about eating them and sharing that meal with others. If I'm going to savor the smells and tastes of freshly roasted chicken, I should also know the fell of that chickens neck in one hand and a knife in the other.

What’s to Eat?

It probably won't come as a surprise to any of you, but the Slow Food USA staff is rife with CSA-members, market devotees and home chefs. The results are bag lunches that any playground bully would pummel a classmate for.

Back in the spring, the staffed weighed in with asparagus ideas, today they answer the question:

It's August, what're you eating?

For most people, it's blueberries, tomatoes, corn, and peaches! (for some reason people always write peaches with an exclamation point).

Board member and blogger Chef Kurt Friese wrote up what he's eating on Grist, in "The Height of the Market."

Executive Director Erika Lesser spent last weekend doing a demo at her local farmers market and "made a delish salad of purslane, cucumber, radish and mustard vinaigrette."

(what's purslane, you might be asking…click here for Wildman Steve Brill's description)

Intern Katie Cohen has been making use of all of these incredible tomatoes: " I chop the nicest looking tomatoes I can find and put them in a bowl with some garlic, sea salt, olive oil, a little bit of vinegar. Have this sit out until the whole thing gets juicy. Toss with hot pasta and maybe some diced fresh mozzarella." She's also making panzanella: Grilled bread, tomatoes, peppers, cucumber, olive oil, and vinegar

And finally, this recipe comes from Development Assistant Patrick Keeler:

Patrick's Nutty Kale/Collards:

I've been making this from memory so long I don't even know where it came from.

• Take a bunch of kale or collards, cut out center stem, using only leaves
• With a proper veggie steamer, steam leaves for about about 3-5 minutes, or until half cooked and dark green
• In a sautee pan, gently heat 2-3 TBS olive oil and minced garlic to taste
• When garlic is soft (taking care not to burn), add 2 hefty TBS of any NATURAL NUT BUTTER (almond is excellent, cashew divine, and even peanut works well) being liberal with the luscious oil that settles on the top of the butter—why not?!
• Stir together until smooth. Add more oil if needed, as you'll want to ensure your greens are evenly coated
• Add your steamed greens and continue to sautee until preferred tenderness
• Add for the last minute, or while still hot, one fresh, medium diced tomato and a DASH or two of Bragg's Liquid Amino's, or Soy sauce, or Tamari
• Mangia

What belongs in a farmers market?

Stuff from farms, right? Ahhhh, if only it were so simple! Even within the most regulated, strict, and authentic farmers market, there are items that might not be quite what (or from where) they seem. How much of a problem this presents elicits different opinions from different folks. The New York Times reported two weeks ago about a livestock farmer in New York State who had been kicked out of the Union Square Greenmarket in NYC for not raising all of his own animals.

Much like we rely on labels such as "organic" or "fair trade" to assure us of how our food was produced, we often rely on the organizers of a farmers market to give us confidence about the provenance of the items there, especially if we're at a good one that is well-regulated and has integrity. But the above article and a follow-up one the next week bring up how the regulations of some markets can be a confusing–and some say non-sensical–web.

If you're curious about the rules and regulations of certain markets, check out the Farmers Market Coalition site.

And check out this article from USA Today from about a year ago, on Alice Waters' recommended Farmers Markets around the country.

Starmers

by Slow Food USA blog editor, Jerusha Klemperer

Last week, New York magazine–the augurer of trends in these five boroughs–declared the era of the "starmer," farmers worshipped by their city-dwelling consumers (that's co-producer to you), subject to fawning and drooling and whatever else people do when they spot a member of the cast of "Gossip Girl" walking down the sidewalk.

Is this a good thing or a bad thing? The sustainable food movement has been called a fad or trend by some, and does the farmer as celebrity just reinforce that fickle cultural shape-shifting? Although I may question the psychological health of worshiping any person or group of people, I say, BRING IT ON. I relish the idea of people treating farmers well, taking an interest in their work, and waiting outside their food co-op for deliveries like Jonas Brothers fans outside the stage door. Besides, many believe that the sustainable food movement has staying power. Click here for Daivd Bollier's piece saying just that.

Most interesting to me about this article, however, was farmer Amy Hepworth's discussion of why she enjoys her city-dwelling consumer base:

Hepworth's current crusade, energy savings, has kindled an appreciation for the environmental benefits of city life. She's proud to grow for a neighborhood whose residents live stacked in elevator buildings and dominoed in brownstones. "I'm dedicated to feeding you people because you don't have land yourself, but you're an efficient organism," she told us that night at the Coop.

The way that cities and farms interact is and will continue be an important part of the equation as we move forward. Consider the NY Times' recent coverage of MyFarm and urban farming. I think the words of Amy Hepworth and the work of businesses like MyFarm (and let's not forget the fact that Slow Food NYC is one of the biggest chapters of Slow Food USA) highlight the passion that city folk have for farms and for farming.

Everyone’s talking about Slow Food Nation!

As we ramp up for the big event, there's been lots of great coverage:

What to Do and Where to Eat: Check out this handy highlight guide from 7×7.com. The best part? The Greek-gods-of-good-and-plenty graphic featuring Carlo Petrini, Alice Waters, Gavin Newsome, Michael Pollan and Eric Schlosser.

Featured Products: Check out this article from the Fresno Bee that discusses products from the Central Valley that will be present at the event. How'd we get such a strong Valley presence? Why, Slow Food Regional Governor and local farmer Tom Willey, of course!

Victory Garden Ready to Pick: 1,500 pounds of food, all going to local shelters.

Bite-Size Bulletins: Lil' bits of background, interviews, updates, etc. from Chow.com

How to Cover the Event? The movement?: This article from the Columbia Journalism Review explores the journalist's perspective.

And what about you? If you won't be there, what will you be doing Labor Day weekend to celebrate your food heritage?

Culinate Youth Food Awareness Campaign

Wanna mold young minds? Simply by signing up for a newsletter, you could help send a youth delegate all the way to Italy to discuss sustainable foodways with 6,000 other people from around the world.

Culinate, the food website for those who care about eating better, is sponsoring as many as 10 travel scholarships for youth delegates to Terra Madre and supporting the youth programs held at Slow Food Nation. The number of scholarships awarded will be based on the number of people who join the campaign. For 3500 people who subscribe to Culinate's Youth Food Movement campaign on their website, Culinate will give two scholarships to Slow Food Nation and Terra Madre.

Culinate is footing the bill; all you have to do is sign up to receive Culinate's email newsletter.

Ever checked out Culinate before? As they describe themselves: "We like to think that Culinate is more than just a website; it's an ongoing conversation about learning to eat well. Our content — articles, cooking tips, interviews, recipes, podcasts, food news, blog posts — helps people put real food at the center of their lives."

Global Food Politics

2 interesting articles on the global food system caught our eye–would love to hear your thoughts on each.

The shipment of 450 pounds of California Strawberries to China, for the Olympians–what else will they slice up on top of their Wheaties?

A piece from Slate on an organic farmer in India. Although organic production is on the rise there, it right now makes up only about 1% of the total agricultural production. Says the farmer, Singh Grewal, "The very rich and the poor eat organic in India."