the GoodEater Collaborative

Author: Jacqueline Church (3 Articles)

Jacqueline Church is a contributing writer for Nourish Network, writes the Gourmet Food column for Suite101.com and created Teach a Man to Fish/Teach a Chef to Fish Sustainable Seafood events. She’s at work on a book Pig Tales: a Love Story about heritage breed pigs and the farmers, chefs and artisans bringing them from farm to table. She has a JD from Northeastern and lives in Boston with her husband. Links to her work and blogs are found at JacquelineChurch.com

Today, urban agriculture, “urban ag”, is not simply about delicious, local food, it’s about creating new food production and delivery systems, it’s about public health and food justice. Boston chefs, community advocates and entrepreneurs are broadening the dialog and shortening the distance between farm and table. Never mind the 100 mile diet, how about 100 blocks, or 100 steps?

Meet a few new urban farmers, giving us a window into the promises and the challenges of urban agriculture in its many forms.

Since 1992 The Food Project has been bringing young people and adults together to learn about creating new food systems through urban agriculture. Today they farm 4 acres in 7 urban communities and 36 additional suburban acres. Most recent harvests included over 200,000 pounds of produce, with nearly 50,000 pounds donated to various hunger relief organizations. The rest is primarily sold via 492 CSAs and 4 farmers’ markets in low-income neighborhoods including some located in what were previously food deserts. The documentary Planting for Peace: Bury Seeds, Not Bodies (“P4P”) shows the impact of urban agriculture and support from organizations like The Food Project.

I met the film maker, Mike Cermak at a youth growers event prior to the screening of Fresh, the award-winning film by Ana Sofia Joanes. Cermak’s documentary tells the story of urban ag’s power to change young lives, documenting La Nuestra Huerta (supported by Neighborhood of Affordable Housing in East Boston and ReVision Farm in Dorchester. P4P shows how gardens and farming are used to teach valuable skills to youth against the backdrop of urban violence. Young gardeners named the two raised beds “Hope” and “Faith” – hope that they can bring change to urban food systems and enhance lives. And faith, that they can grow, sell, reinvest and replenish the food desert and work for food justice.

One of the challenges highlighted by the experience of youth gardeners is the inflexibility in school lunch systems. The gardens, often located near schools, grow more than food. They grow life skills. And yet, the young growers are unable to sell their produce into their own schools.

On the Menu

Chefs like Steve Johnson at Rendezvous in Central Square and Marco Suarez of Ledge Kitchen & Drinks in Dorchester know that fresh is better. And local – really local – is as fresh as it gets. When produce comes to the kitchen from atop your own roof, you’re making significantly less environmental impact – no trucking, packaging, refrigeration. You’re also getting produce at its peak of ripeness, something that makes chefs swoon.

On a recent visit with Johnson, I got to see how he’s capturing water from rooftop air conditioning units to water his herb garden. Through capillary action the crates of herbs and vegetables take up the water as needed. Only rarely has he had to supplement the self-watering with additional H20. Johnson’s eyes light up when he speaks of the potential to recapture water that would otherwise be wasted. “This is one small building, imagine how much water could be captured from any one of these surrounding us?” One unit alone on his roof produces 15 gallons of water per day, it’s clean water, simply condensation from the air conditioning systems.

His Sunday menu features rooftop radishes and herbs. Rosemary is used in many ways including infusing the olive oil for the crackers served with each meal. Chiles show up in ceviche. Purslane, lovage, lavender, chervil, mint, even potatoes are grown in crates and he’s built a winter box of reclaimed cedar and windows to shelter the plants which winter-over on the roof. Johnson is not seeking to fully supply his kitchen from his garden. But, like other chefs, he gets enormous personal satisfaction from the garden and from sharing the experience with his kitchen staff, many of whom are new to the experience. They find inspiration in working with produce grown steps away from the kitchen. Look for mint to show up in Rendezvous’ inventive summer libations, too.

Johnson is humble about his “little garden” but it serves as a potent, and fragrant, reminder that even small steps can be inspiring.

From Empty Lots to Full Larders

Glynn Lloyd, City Fresh Foods’ CEO and co-founder of City Growers is committed to providing local, sustainable food for the urban community. He is also focusing his company on implementing a whole new model of food production and delivery systems. Both Lloyd and City Growers co-founder Margaret Connors know very well the challenges of growing and changing infrastructure, capturing funders’ attention, and managing a base of support.

City Growers was founded on the premise that unused space in urban areas could be developed for the purpose of renewing neighbors’ connection to their food sources. Reclaiming, remediating sites that are fallow or may have become environmental “brown fields”. City Growers successfully turns them into raised bed, organic gardens producing healthy food from space that was once wasted.

In a 1/4 acre plot behind the Sportsman’s Club in Dorchester, and on two acres in Milton, City Growers is building a model of a new food system. First, land is reclaimed, improved with raised beds of clean fresh soil before healthy gardens can be planted. Sometimes this involves negotiations with the city, or landlords, or both. Can they grow a model that provides green jobs? Can economic sustainability be built into the model? So far, one talented grower, “Farmer Tim” is sustained and other farm managers, workers and volunteers are being recruited and trained from local neighborhoods.

Delivering Change

Then, there’s the delivery models. Not only the actual physical delivery (much is done by pedal power!) of the produce, but also the management of the CSA and restaurant deliveries. Can the vagaries of Mother Nature be coaxed into meeting chefs’ regular need for inventory, and on what scale? So far several local restaurants have found delicious reasons to work with City Growers for at least some of their regular produce needs.

Big goals inspire and big challenges persist, but they remain optimistic about the value of the good agricultural practices and the promise of a new urban economy. New acreage is constantly being reviewed and added, zoning meetings go on, plantings are rotated and food — good, organic, local food — is grown by and sold to locals, finding its way into neighborhood restaurants and onto the tables of families, schools, child care and senior centers who once lived in food deserts. Standing among the newly replanted beds, with the sound of children playing nearby, you feel they are growing more than beets, arugula and lettuces. They are growing hope and a future for those kids that includes healthy, local food. They are growing a new food economy.

For further info:
The Food Project: “The Food Project’s mission is to create a thoughtful and productive community of youth and adults from diverse backgrounds who work together to build a sustainable food system.”

Fresh: a film by Ana Sofia Joanes. Look for local screenings and follow news on the Fresh blog, including the series “Women Who Nourish Us.”