Moving, Graduating, and Traveling
Posted: May 13, 2011 Filed under: Finger Foods | Tags: craft, graduation, NYU, women farmers 1 Comment »
{This is going to be a quick little post as I’m in the midst of writing, packing, moving, graduating, job hunting, etc. But Legume Loyalist will back in full swing soon!}
The cool thing about having friends who graduated from baking and pastry school is that they always feed you delicious things. Another cool thing is that, if they’re kind enough, they let you barrel through their extended collection of niche cookbooks, like the Pie and Pastry Bible, which I borrowed in order to make a peach pie for Easter.
Reflecting on that silly pie, I realize that I would have never baked it had I not met some of the most wonderful people here at NYU. This semester has been choc-ful-of community and connection: pit-stopping by a friend’s apartment to pick up a homemade pound cake, nerding-out over food systems paper topics, sharing embroidery tips.
It’s amazing that a few of the most fulfilling friendships I’ve made started with a single comment: “Did you knit that hat?” “Can you send me this recipe?” “I’m really interested in American farm women.”
Today I submit the last undergraduate paper I will ever write. I honestly have no idea what it’s going to feel like to hit send and then to not have to think about the next paper or reading. (Although, I know what Noah will feel: immensely relieved. He’s been a saint to my constant buzzing and tight-roping the line between sanity and breakdown.) I’ve formed my identity around being a student. Now, I’ll have to face what it means to be a human being. It feels…unreal; like I’ve been sitting in a cozy coffee shop window for the past four years, my nose tucked into a book, or my gaze directed at my computer screen, with only the occasional glance upward to catch a few people walking past.
So what are my plans? Well, I’m not sure. I’ve been interviewing non-stop for the past week, attempting to mold my post-undergraduate life. Noah and I spent all day Wednesday painting our apartment Benjamin Moore paint number 520, Spring Bud (for any of you interested desgin-os), and we’ll be officially moving-in on Saturday.
A week and a half after graduation, we’ll be jumping across the pond, as they say, to France and England for three weeks (eee!). The only other thing I have lined up for the summer is still in the works, but all I can say is keep an eye out for the July course listing at the Brooklyn Brainery! (The Brainery folks got a sweet write-up in the New York Times today.) As I head into the jam-packed weekend, which is looking to be a rainy one, all I can say is “keep calm, carry on.”
{isn’t this just the prettiest print? you can check out the rest of the Keep Calm collection here.}
Farmarazzi! Action Alert: Take Photos of Farms While You Still Can
Posted: May 5, 2011 Filed under: Agriculture, Art & Craft | Tags: agriculture, CAFO, ethical eats, food justice, food policy, industrial food system, news, Slow Food USA, women farmers Leave a comment »
{photo taken by moi as part of my senior project at Cross Island Farms}
“A well managed farm has nothing to hide.” – Josh Viertel, President of Slow Food USA. But if Daniel Imhoff’s book CAFO: The Tragedy of Industrial Animal Factories tells us anything, it’s that most farms do have something to hide.
{image courtesy of www.cafothebook.com}
So it’s no wonder that certain states are now considering a law that would make taking pictures of farms a criminal act. Yup, you read correctly: Legislators in Iowa, Florida, and Minnesota have proposed laws that claim unapproved photos of farms (i.e. the images in whistle-blowing outlets such as CAFO) misrepresent the industry and prove detrimental to the public’s perception of food production.
This is just plain horse manure. As Mark Bittman pointed out in an opinion piece for the Times, if farms were well-managed and humane in the first place, there wouldn’t be a need for such a reactive piece of legislation, “Videotaping at factory farms wouldn’t be necessary if the industry were properly regulated. But it isn’t.” The sad fact is that many of the farms that supply our supermarkets participate in the horrific abuses seen in CAFO.
On a wholesome farm, farmers revel in photographs of their healthy, happy animals and crops. Such were the reactions of the women farmers I interviewed and photographed last semester for my senior project. All the women happily agreed to not only having me and Noah snoop around their farms, but also allowing us to take photos. You can check out all my farm photos here.
In order to fight back against the pending legislation, Slow Food USA has started the tongue-in-cheek campaign “Farmarazzi.” They’re encouraging individuals to get out to a farm, take a photo and then submit the photos to the Slow Food USA facebook page. From their blog:
Step 1: Sign the petition. Even if you’re you don’t live in Florida, Minnesota, or Iowa, your voice matters. These state laws would set a dangerous precedent that other states may choose to follow.
2. Join the farmarazzi! Head out to a farm, take a photo, and if the farmer is available, spend a few minutes getting her perspective on the impact this legislation would have if passed. Then upload your picture to our Facebook wall (or email it to campaigns@slowfoodusa.org) and take a look at what other people have posted there. You can also encourage your friends to “like” your photo—we’re working on a prize for the most popular shots.
So sign the petition, and get out and take some photos of farms!
TBECC Round-Up: Recipes, Crafts, and Books, Oh My!
Posted: April 28, 2011 Filed under: Art & Craft, Farm Women Fancy, Recipes | Tags: coffee, craft, domesticity, farmers market, feminism, food culture, industrial food system, local food, NYC, self-sufficiency, tea, women, women farmers Leave a comment »
“Mrs. Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself.” This is hands down my favorite quote from a novel ever. I’m a huge Virginia Woolf fan; there’s something about female, high-society writers that I can’t get enough of. (Edith Wharton, anyone?) I’m definitely no literary buff, not even by a long-shot, but I’ve always identified that simple sentence with my own notions of feminism and femininity (beyond the larger context of the book of course, I’m not married to a politician, nor do I have servants). So in preparation for TBECC, a celebration of domesticity and feminism of sorts, I just had to buy flowers…myself.
TBECC was more than just flowers and aesthetics, of course, and it lived up to its name: friends, women, eating, talking about food issues, sharing knowledge and just enjoying each other’s company. We had SO MUCH food. Meg baked a banana cake with chocolate sea salt caramel ganache (which she baked in a toaster oven!); Marlie brought salad (thankfully, some lighter fare) and bread from Hawthorne Valley Farm where she’s a market worker; Julia brought buttermilk pie and honey and jam; and I baked some honey whole wheat pound cake and mini cinnamon rolls. (More recipes to follow!) To drink, I sorted my out-of-control collection of Harney and Sons tea, and pulled out my bag of Counter Culture Jagong coffee (arguably my new favorite, although Crop To Cup’s Burundi is still up there).
Dani Walsh, the wonderful woman behind www.WomenEatNYC.com (and Grub Street intern!!), a bee-yoo-ti-ful blog that includes recipes and pictures of women enjoying food, stopped by and helped out with some necessary lighting in my living room (no natural light, boo!). She also shared some really cute recipe cards (Dani, let me know where you found those little guys!). We discussed our favorite baking books including, The Pie and Pastry Bible by Rose Levy Beranbaum (who also wrote the Cake Bible!) and The Bread Bakers Apprentice by Peter Reinhart.
Eventually (it was inevitable) the knitting needles came out and Meg, knitter extraordinaire, shared her go-to book for knitting: The Complete Guide to Needlework edited by Readers Digest. Meg’s copy is ancient, but it’s a gem of a reference book. The pictures are painfully 80s, but the instruction is invaluable, with pictures and clear descriptions of a bajillion patterns and stitches for all kinds of stitching crafts from knitting to quilting to needlepoint to embroidery.
We’re hoping to host another TBECC before the school-year lets out. My hope is that TBECC will encourage more women (men too!) to get together, share domestic knowledge and take back our food system!
Happy Earth Day! NYC Updates PlaNYC to Include Food
Posted: April 22, 2011 Filed under: Finger Foods | Tags: Earth Day, ecofeminism, environment, environmentalism, ethical eats, local food, NYC, NYU, slow food nyu, urban agriculture, vegetarianism, women farmers Leave a comment »
Happy Earth Day! Today is a busy day over at Legume Loyalist: Slow Food NYU is tabling the NYU Earth Day Street Fair from 11-3 on Washington Place between Greene Street and Washington Square East. Stop by for food, fun, music, and more food!!
In other Earth Day news, New York City unveiled an updated version of PlaNYC, the 2030 projection for the city. The newest edition includes a (small, but still a step in the right direction) section on food systems. To sum up:
“Our food systems intersect with several areas addressed by PlaNYC. Improving the distribution and disposal of food within New York City and increasing access to healthy food will not only benefit the environment, it can also have positive public health and economic impacts.
We are developing a multi-faceted strategy to increase access to affordable and healthy foods and reduce the environmental and climate impacts of food production, distribution, consumption, and disposal.”
You can read the whole PlaNYC proposal here, and the food section here. It’s pretty exciting to see the city acknowledging the need for more accessible and affordable healthy foods. New York City is becoming an increasingly active member in the sustainable food issues conversation, and it’s awesome to be right in the middle of the transition. In fact, just this past November, the New York City Council unveiled a plan specifically targeting the sustainability of the New York City food system. The comprehensive, 82-page paper is called FoodWorks, and covers agricultural production, processing, distribution, consumption and post-consumption. The paper focuses on ways to combat hunger and obesity while simultaneously preserving regional farming and local food manufacturing, and decreasing waste and energy usage. Suggestions include potential legislation and funding opportunities. It’s all around an important document for sustainable food issues in New York City.
Also, check out Grist’s 15 Ways to Celebrate Agriculture on Earth Day.
So celebrate Earth Day! Get outside, visit a farmers market, and enjoy some delicious food.
TBECC: Reclaiming the Domestic, in Action!
Posted: April 15, 2011 Filed under: Art & Craft, Farm Women Fancy, Finger Foods, Recipes | Tags: craft, domesticity, feminism, NYC, women, women farmers 2 Comments »
I couldn’t be more excited for the weekend coming up! On Saturday, Slow Food NYC is having their first volunteer workday. They’re gearing up for their summer program at Ujima Community Garden in Brownsville, Brooklyn, and they need volunteers to help plant and build in the garden, and to prep the classroom. This year they’re adding chickens to their repertoire of urban farming, so naturally we have to build a chicken coop. The coop building is scheduled for the second workday, April 30th. I’m most excited to help build the coop as Noah and I are beginning to think about the potential of our own Brooklyn chicken coop! But more on that some other time…
This Sunday, I’m hosting a wee-little event called TBECC: talk, bake, eat, cook, and craft (not the best acronym, but whatever, it serves its purpose for now). What is TBECC? Well, this semester, I’ve made great connections with some amazing girls at NYU. We’ve exchanged recipes, cooking/baking tips, crafting tips, and in general just had really empowering conversations. I found myself making promises to hang out with everybody in getting together to cook, bake, eat, talk, drink tea/coffee/mircrobrews, knit, craft, etc. all on different occasions. But then I realized, in these different conversations with different girls, that we all had the same ideas in mind: eating locally, sustainability, feminism, crafting, enjoying food, baking/cooking, and all that jazz.
Obviously it would be wonderful to hang out with everyone individually, but I figured, in light of some recent ideas I’ve had about communality and the sharing of domestic knowledge, why don’t I get all these great, intellectual, feminine minds together in one place and just talk, bake, eat, craft and cook? So, we have TBECC this Sunday at my humble apartment! My yarn has been collecting dust under a folding table in my bedroom so I’m especially excited to dust-off my knitting needles and put them to work. And, since we will be cooking, eating, and baking, I have two recipes in mind: Cinnamon Swirl Buns and Grapefruit Honey Yogurt Scones. Reclaiming the domestic, in action!
{image courtesy of Boston Public Library flickr}
