Farm-to-Table
The Farm-to-Table Movement
Tags: Alternative Agriculture; Organic Food; Local Food Production; Sustainable; 'Slow Food'; 'Four-Star' Restaurants; "Peak of the Season"; Wellness
Back in the early 1990's, when I was working with Seeds of Change and its pioneering ('Bioneering') publishing efforts to create and spread the biodiversity and organic/heirloom importance of seed saving/co-evolution/fresh, healthy and tasty food production, I often would use a phrase that captured what was, to me, the key to our alternative to 'Big Ag', with its industrial-size production methods, petrochemical fertilizer regime with pesticides/herbicides/miticides/fungicides and varied health-threatening inputs.
The phrase I felt was right was "peak of the season" and so I'm added it again to GreenPolicy360 -- the notion of "peak of the season" choice of what is best in the garden, in the fields, a choice that is made in a co-evolutionary sense between human and nature, a choice that often includes saving the best (healthiest, most undamaged-by-insects, flourishing varieties of crops), the seeds that you choose to carry forward to the next generation planting --- and to harvest the best of the rest. This 'natural' method is involved in market gardening/farmers markets/CSA/Alt Ag and/or "farm-to-table" production. What arrives at the kitchen of your favorite restaurant or via your own choice (not the industrial producers choice and the grocery chain or restaurant wholesaler distributor's choice) is fresh and, at best, is Peak of the season.
I'll give you one example of my love of the phrase "Peak of the Season."
The central Florida Strawberry festival season. Next comes the Blueberry season!
'Nuff said.
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Farm-to-Table/Resources
- Feb 2015 - LA Times / Op-Ed / The food movement has only just begun
The mission for everyone who cares about food — even if you raise chickens or garden tomatoes, can barrel-aged hot sauce, or brew pale ale — should be to buy local. And then buy some more, regularly, every week, month and year. With enough momentum and time, consumer demand may bring on the substantial infrastructure and policy changes that small family farms need to truly thrive...
Just the other day, I heard from the organic farmer that he'd pulled together enough money from his city relatives to make his February payment and fend off foreclosure. Why? Because farming good food has never been as valued in the greater culture as it is today, and it motivated them to preserve their family's tradition of working the land.
Herein lies the promise. But it's much too soon to declare farm-to-table “been there, done that.” Far from being cliche, the food movement — at least for the people who labor so we can all eat better — has only just begun.
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