viva verde

First thing in the morning-the Slow Food Nation Market in Civic Center. Slow Food altered the grounds of Civic Center into a thriving and energetic happening for all things slow and beautiful.
(the SFN 08’ membership booth & the parking area for the cyclists, they had the best parking by far!)

One side of the event was Slow on the Go a number of local food preparers creating some serious eats from locally raised, grass-fed animals, organic produce, fresh fruit drinks, fair coffee and fresh from the oven breads, everything we tried was incredible (special note to the Muffuleta!).
(a sign for the sausage and pepper sandwich)

(the fair trade coffee booth was lined with these awesome bags)

The center row of the event was dedicated to an organic Victory Garden that was literally bursting with so many different kinds of veggies, fruits, herbs and flowers that I could spend all day taking pictures of this one area alone. At one end you had a composting area and the other was dedicated to informal lectures at the Soap Box
(the bounty of the Victory Garden & black gold)

(growing corn in front of City Hall)

The last alley was a showcase of local and artisan cheese makers, beekeepers, mushroom growers, jam makers, bread bakers, berry/bean/tomato/stone fruit/etc…growers…EVERYTHING in this area was fit for a magazine spread….i have never seen so many color nor smelled so many smells that where so clean, yet powerful. I was so overwhelmed that I forgot to take pictures with the camera that I use for the blog ☹- but I will have some available in about a month from my other camera.

(PS the following posts are from over the Labor Day weekend)

Super excited!!

On our way to San Francisco for Slow Food Nation 2008!

We have a jam-packed weekend (or rather 48 hours) ahead of us, the following posts will cover what took place at the first ever celebration of American food.

(snacks for the road: a variety of cheese, breads and asian pears from Donna’s farm)

(trying to find the Obama speech after the Tejon Pass & goodies already gone!)

A few months ago at my friend Paige’s b-day party, i happened to meet one of the publishers of the new Edible LA publication that is coming out soon.

This is part of a number of regional publications from The Edible Communities Publications which:

“ creates editorially rich, community-based, local-foods publications in distinct culinary regions throughout the United States, Canada, and Europe. Through our publications, supporting websites, and events, we connect consumers with family farmers, growers, chefs, and food artisans of all kinds. ”

I was pretty excited about this, i have had a year-old copy of the Edible Brooklyn in the store’s bathroom…keep reading it over and over and love the photography.

  Well, guess what?  Just got the LA version here a few days ago.  This is a quarterly publication, but i think we will be selling it…already have had a ton of compliments.

(yes!)

OMG  big-time!!!

Just got the word that we are going to the first US convention for Slow Food-Slow Food Nation 2008!!!

In case you don’t know: Slow Food is a way of living and a world-wide organization committed to celebrating, preserving and education of food.  Basically the opposite of Fast Food-something Good, Clean and Fair!

Already signed up for the Food Pavilion and lectures by awesome food types like, Alice Waters, Eric Schlosser and so many others that have contributed to the “eat fair-eat local-eat organic” movement…and all of them in one place with tasty olive oils, wines and the BEST in eating…..if you can go, PLEASE GO!

if not, i will be posting about the activities through this blog.

spent my Tuesday night traveling (carpool!) to LA where the great people who created Sustainable Works hosted a lecture on the Low Carbon Diet.

Held in the Southern CA version of San Fran, Santa Monica we decided to beat the crazy traffic by going up a few hours early and visit some of the places that reflect the topic of the evening.

First up: Urth Cafe, where you can get organic elixirs and locally raised delights in a wonderful patio, this place is a local fave and a hot spot for the eco-celebs.

(me having a organic, local salad of feta, roma tomatoes, fresh bread and fruits)

after the meal, we decided to venture across the street to their local community garden, a small patch of land in the middle of a busy area.

(a sunflower up-close and the gardens bounty!)

This 2 hour lecture was presented by Helen York of Bon Appetit (no not the mag), a consulting, education and food service company transforming American eating institutions in sustainable and responsible business and food practices. York in this SUPER informative presentation discussed “food miles” way beyond the 1,500 from farm to table speech that i think we have heard a number of times (and according to them, that figure that only consisted of strawberries, milk and sugar..basically yogurt).

(parts of the presentation)

I have been preparing for a presentation next week at Fullerton’s Belly Sprout and this was a perfect time to gain some added knowledge. Some of the things i learned:

• Maine lobster is the worst thing for us in So Cal to eat (carbon-wise)
• 1/3 of all greenhouse gases are from the agriculture industry
• beef, lamb (like we know!), cheese (yikes!) and rice are also big carbon emitters
• a ton of the contributions to Global Warming come from the methane as a result of food waste (up to 30% is wasted!) this in addition to bioplastics are turned into methane in the landfill…therefore, eat all of you food!!
• local may not mean local: they should be growing in season in a method that that uses the least amount of energy.

if you are interested in hearing more from that presentation, you will have to see my version of it at Belly Sprout.

I guess there is a new channel out now put on but those at the Discovery Channel called “Planet Green“. You would think that i would be watching this thing the moment that it was live, but i was still in my heavy Bravo/HGTV coma and have only in the past couple of days had the strength to change the channel.

Planet Green seems to be in its infancy, i noticed lots of the same programs repeated, but hey at least there is something! One thing however made my face do one of those contortions similar to eating wilted lettuce when i thought it was fresh:

GREEN EMERIL

Is it just me or does this seem lame? I watched a few segments of this show featuring the Food Network celeb as he cooks items from Whole Foods. What’s funny is that if you didn’t know you were watching Planet Green, you would have thought that you were on Food Network-there is NOTHING different or “green” about this show. It is just Emeril cooking except you get to see him at the WF before he gets in the kitchen.

Don’t call me pessimistic, I honestly was giving this show a chance, i mean they must believe in it somehow because it is on virtually all the time. But i must admit I had my fill of this “green cooking show” & Emeril yesterday when I saw a advert for it. This is how it went:

(background voice) “Let’s ask Emeril, from Green Emeril what organic means.”

(Emeril) “organic means fresh and natural!”

You are better off reading Slow Food Nation or one of the great cookbooks from Alice Waters.

Today, June 5th (or is it 6th??) we finally got our new shipment of Yummy Earth Organic Lollypops. More importantly, we got some of the new flavors they have been introducing! Of course i ripped through one bag before even putting them on the shelves…I amnot a sugar-freak, but more of a sour-freak and Yummy just came out with Sour Pops- score!!

These things are like crack- i always have a jar filled with them on the counter for people to grab. It’s funny too because people always say, “i can have one for free??” with a surprised face. Little do they know that they are going to be a YE-junkie in no time.

PS: did you see the bag on the lower right-Chili Pops for us spicy chicas! LOVE IT!

start your Yummy Earth addiction now~!