The San Diego Fermentation Festival is a family-friendly outdoor festival featuring:
Fermented Food & Beverage workshops from Local Experts
Beverage Garden featuring local mead, beer, & wine
Keynote speech by Dr. Rob Knight, UCSD & American Gut Project
Sample Food & Beverages from 30+ Local Artisan Makers
Do-It-Yourself pickle jars at the Fermentation Station
Live Music & Entertainment
Wholeness Pavilion- Give your Whole Self a break!
Yoga classes, sound healing, other relaxation and rejuvenation activities
Sunday, January 31| 10AM - 5PM General Admission w/Jar $20.00 ($21.69 w/service fee) *$35.00 with Beverage garden...
Includes General Admission to all the workshops, music, and marketplace, plus a take-home jar of fermented veggies *Beverage garden additional tariff: Includes "General Admission" plus tTen tasters of beer, wine and mead in the "Ambrosia Garden" (21+ Only)
In this July 2, 2015 photo, delivery man Michael Luminau puts greens in automat boxes in Paris, France. Joseph Petit employs no staff at his two Paris stores. Both called Au Bout du Champ - "at the end of the field" - the small spaces are stacked with metal lockers containing just-picked strawberries, hours-old eggs, and neat bunches of carrots or spring onions, depending on the season. Customers simply choose the box that contains the produce they want to buy, then pay at the console to open the automat's bin door.
AP Photo/Michel Eule
PARIS – Diners in Paris are flashing back — and forward — to the era of the automat, but this time with a nod to organic farming.
Joseph Petit employs no staff at his two Paris stores. Both called Au Bout du Champ — “at the end of the field” — the small spaces are stacked with metal cubbies containing just-picked strawberries, hours-old eggs, and neat bunches of carrots or spring onions, depending on the season. Customers simply choose the box that contains the food they want to buy, then pay at a console which then opens the appropriate door.
A precursor to the era of fast food, automat eateries served hundreds of thousands of customers a day throughout the mid-20th century, allowing on-the-go diners to pick hot dishes from coin-operated metal lockers.
Today, entrepreneurs in France and Scotland are appropriating the concept that once symbolized modernity to help customers get back to the land. Their automats offer not burgers and fries, but fresh and local produce and other ingredients.
It’s a system, Petit said, that brings fresh food to urban areas where few other options exist, while also supporting local, small-scale agriculture.
“We have some of the best farmers in the world,” the 31-year old Parisian said outside one of his two shops. “But unfortunately, we consume many of our products from abroad. They aren’t necessarily the best, they aren’t necessarily fresh, and we don’t really know who cultivated them.”
Petit maintains direct relationships with the half-dozen or so producers he buys from; the suppliers vary according to the season. The farmers cultivate a variety of vegetables, fruits, mushrooms and herbs, in addition to eggs and juice. All of them work within 100 kilometres of Paris, and Petit and his colleagues go to collect the fresh harvest every day for delivery.
To the north, Peter Grewar is embracing a similar strategy. A third-generation farmer, he developed a similar concept after people driving by his 1,300-acre potato farm in Perthshire, Scotland, would stop and ask if they could buy directly from him.
His metal boxes come from Germany, logical considering the first automat opened in Berlin in 1897. His colleague down the road originally imported the boxes to keep his eggs fresh. The two began selling their products from the boxes, soon bringing in neighbouring farmers who offered products, including broccoli, cauliflower and berries.
The only rule? “It has to be Scottish produce and it has to be seasonal,” Grewar said.
For Grewar, the model allows him to build closer relationships with his customers and better gauge product demand. That useful connection, he said, is “really powerful, and it may well lead our business down a different path. We’re already producing 5 to 6 acres of different vegetables we didn’t think we’d be growing even six months ago. One or two of them may take off.”
So far, he said, the boxes are turning a profit. They’ve now installed sets in four locations, including one in a shopping centre in Dundee. The farm is now dedicating about six acres to crops it plans to sell in the boxes.
Back in Paris, Petit said he maintains competitive prices by employing no staff, instead relying on customers to operate the automats themselves. The 31-year-old Parisian said it also allows him to keep his shops open seven days a week from 8 a.m. until 10 p.m., a novelty in a city where commerce generally closes down before sunset.
“We’re trying to adapt to the new lifestyle of people — who might get up early, might stay up late — but don’t necessarily have the time to go to the market,” Petit said. “We need this to stay accessible to everybody.”
Petit opened his first store in the northwest Paris suburb Levallois in July 2013, unveiling the second in the city’s Clichy neighbourhood one year later. The stores each serve approximately 100 customers a day, and perhaps double on weekends, Petit estimates.
Marine Clappier, 28, counts among them, frequenting the store since she moved to the neighbourhood nearly a year ago. She said it’s certainly not a one-stop shop, but she likes the convenience factor.
“The advantage for me is I always pass by,” she said. “If I’m missing something in my fridge, instead of buying a pizza or a burger, I prefer to come by and buy something to make a soup.”
Clappier said she especially appreciates that the store stocks only what’s seasonal and fresh, which remains one of Petit’s core goals. “You have to get people again used to the fact that we don’t have salad from October until April, and that’s normal,” he said. Petit said he makes deliveries every day to ensure flavour. “They rediscover taste,” he said of his patrons. “Our strawberries are picked in the morning and put in the locker in the afternoon, so people find the strawberries the same way the farmer gave them to us.”
Though ecological principles ground his business, Petit said he wants to avoid taking on a heavy activist role. He fears that would alienate people who enjoy access to fresh groceries, but don’t have time for or interest in the politics surrounding the food industry.
By the end of this year Petit hopes to open two or three more stores in Paris, and add an additional five in 2016. “It’s a model that really makes sense to me,” he said. “It’s honest.” au bout du champ.com
Watermelon salad! {With cilantro, ginger and chili} Dig in!
Adding fresh herbs, ginger and chilies to this juicy fruit creates a delectable balance of spicy sweetness.
Recipe:
Ingredients
½ medium seedless watermelon (about 2 ¼ pounds or 1 kilogram)1 lemon
3 Tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
1 small fresh red chili, such as cherry bomb or red jalapeño, seeded and minced
1 Tsp fresh ginger, grated
Salt and freshly ground pepper
1 handful fresh cilantro or mint leaves, coarsely chopped
Method:
Peel the watermelon, cut into large cubes and put in a large bowl.
Add the finely grated lemon zest and juice, olive oil, chili, ginger, a big pinch of salt and several grinds of pepper. Mix gently to coat the watermelon in the marinade. Set aside for at least 20 minutes to marinate before serving (the salad can be refrigerated for up to 4 hours before serving).
Strain off some of the marinade, taste and adjust the seasoning. Serve the watermelon in a large shallow bowl topped with the cilantro or mint.
Ingredients:
3 cups fresh red or yellow watermelon cubes, chilled
2 Tbsps honey or agave
¼ cup freshly squeezed lime juice
1 large Jalapeño pepper, halved and seeded
2 Tsp grated lime rind
(optional: 1 Tbsp liquid pectin)
Method:
1. Combine the first 6 ingredients in a blender, and process until pureed.
2. Stir in lime rind.
3. Pour into 8 (3-ounce) ice pop molds.
4. Freeze 6 hours or until firm.
5. Enjoy! ...Oh yeah! Yummmmm!
San Diego Peeps| What is a People's Assembly and how does it relate to food? With special guests via skype: Gustavo Esteva (Universidad de la Tierra en Oaxaca) Roberto Flores (East LA Cafe)
Should I buy local foods or stick to organic? It depends on what you value most. If keeping pesticides out of your food is your highest value, then buy organic. If you care most about freshness and quality or keeping local farms in business and circulating money in your community, buy local. But very often you can do both. Some local farmers are organic in everything but name, so before you decide to pass them up, ask them not "Are you organic" - to which the answer must be no if they haven't been certified - but rather, how do you deal with fertility and pests? That starts a more nuanced conversation that may convince you to buy their produce. We can't afford to buy all our produce organic, so where should we direct our money to get the most benefit? On produce, some items, when grown conventionally, have more pesticide residue than others, so when buying these, it pays to buy organic. According to the Environmental Working Group, the "dirty dozen" most pesticide-laden fruits and vegetablesare: apples, celery, strawberries, peaches, spinach, imported nectarines, imported grapes, sweet bell peppers, potatoes, blueberries, lettuce and kale/collards. The "clean 15" are onions, sweet corn, pineapples, avocado, asparagus, sweet peas, mangoes, eggplant, cantaloupe, kiwi, cabbage, watermelon, sweet potatoes, grapefruit and mushrooms. So if you've only got a little money to devote to organic, buy the organic apples and skip the organic onions. But do keep in mind that it's important to eat a wide variety of fruits and vegetables regardless of how they're grown. Why are vegetables and meat labeled "organic" so much more expensive than similar items without the "organic" label? There are several reasons organic food costs more than conventional food. First, the demand for it exceeds the supply, and presumably, as more farmers transition to organic, the price will fall, though it will never match conventional prices. For one thing, organic farmers receive virtually no subsidies from the government. (European governments significantly subsidize the transition to organic; ours doesn't.) But even on a level playing field, farming organically would probably remain more expensive. Farming without chemicals is inherently more labor-intensive, especially when it comes to weeding. In animal agriculture, raising animals less intensively is always going to cost more. Think about it this way: The "high" price of organic food comes a lot closer to the true price of producing that food - a price we seldom pay at the checkout. It's important to remember that when you buy conventional food, many costs have been shifted - to the taxpayer in the form of crop subsidies, to the farmworker in the form of health problems and to the environment in the form of water and air pollution. O.K., apart from a clearer conscience, what does the premium paid for organic food get you as a consumer? Organic food has little or no pesticide residues, and especially for parents of young children, this is a big deal. There is also a body of evidence that produce grown in organic soils often has higher levels of various nutrients. (But whether these are enough to justify the higher price is questionable.) Probably for the same reason, organic produceoften tastes better than conventional (though a cross-country truck ride can obviate this edge). So it's possible to make a case to the consumer for the superiority of organic food - but the stronger case is to the citizen? Farming without synthetic pesticides is better for the soil, for the water and for the air - which is to say, for the commons. It is also better for the people who grow and harvest our food, who would much rather not breathe pesticides. Producing meat without antibiotics will also help stave off antibiotic- resistance. If you care about these things, then the premium paid for organic food is money well spent. Are there real opportunities for consumers to make an impact on factory farming, unsustainable agriculture and animal cruelty? Absolutely. As the market for humanely raised meat grew in recent years, the industry responded. The egg industry recently committed to an effort to phase out tightly confining cages for laying hens; some pork producers are phasing out gestation crates; McDonald's has taken steps to ensure that the meat it buys is slaughtered more humanely; Chipotle now buys only humanely raised pork. There is no question that agribusiness responds to the "votes" of consumers on these issues. The food industry is terrified of you. And PETA! Related DVDs
Food Matters Food Matters is a feature length documentary film informing you on the best choices you can make for you and your family's health. In a collection of interviews with leading Nutritionists, Naturopaths, Scientists, M.D.'s and Medical Journalists you will discover... Format: DVD - Region Free Running Time: 80 minutes Price: $24.95
