Gardening brings peace to many people, so why not use it to aid those returning from war? A gardening program in New Jersey is having great success helping veterans overcome issues such as post-traumatic stress disorder through growing food. The New York Times reports.

If you think diabetes is a problem now, wait until 2034. Diabetes rates are expected to double, and with higher rates come increasing cost for treatment – up to $171 billion. Get the details at Natural News.

“Food Insecurity” has become a buzzword of late, but I agree with the authors of this article in the Rural Intelligence that it takes away from its true meaning – hunger. In the land of plenty, millions still suffer lack of food and nutrition; let’s not blur the lines with confusing terms.

Another mouth-watering article from the ever-supportive New York Times profiles Soul Food Farm, that provides eggs and chickens from Chez Panisse and many others.

In the food world, Iowa is known for vast fields of mono-crops and a heavy dose of factory farming, but could this all be changing? With a suffering local economy, Iowa may be the next state to jump on the organic/sustainable bandwagon. Read the full article on the Mother Nature Network.

You think beef is bad? Watch out for chicken! A recent Consumer Reports study found that over 60% of chicken is contaminated with salmonella or campylobacter bacteria, two leading causes of food-related illness. Read more here.

The new “Smart Choices” labeling campaign is aimed to help consumers more easily identify healthy foods – good luck with that one. The program is backed by Kellogg’s, Kraft Foods, ConAgra Foods, Unilever, General Mills, PepsiCo and Tyson Foods who each pay $100,000 a year to participate. Some of the healthy foods include Cocoa Crispies and Fruit Loops, which are 41% sugar. See coverage at the New York Times, Fooducate and Food Politics.

Think Lay’s is the only company to localwash lately? It turns out Starbucks, Walmart, Barnes & Noble and more have all jumped on the bandwagon. Check out these photos on Grist.

Michael Pollan does it again with a new op-ed in the New York Times. In “Big Food vs. Big Insurance”, Pollan draws the line between what we eat and our skyrocketing health costs. As the Center for Disease Control pointed out not long ago, America spends $140 billion on obesity related health costs every year. Food and health go hand in hand, and it is impossible to discuss health care reform without discussing food and nutrition!

Never heard of the World Pork Conference? Well me neither, but apparently it’s being held in Qingdao, China and humane slaughter is the hot topic. China is not exactly known for its terrific track record on animal rights, but steps in the right direction are being taken, and for that, I commend them. See the article at China View.

The Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production recently came out with a report capping off a 2½ year study stating the dangers of constant antibiotic use on Factory Farms. The American Veterinary Medical Association then somewhat surprisingly came out with a response in disagreement. Ralph Loglisci of the John Hopkins Center for a Livable Future does a great recap of the whole debacle which you can read here.

Senator Blanche Lincoln has just been named the new Chair of the Senate Ag Committee. A little nerve racking, as she supports subsidies for Big Ag and makes common bedfellows out of rice, cotton, and poultry farmers – Obama Foodorama and Grist report.

Welcome to the July Kid-Friendly Issue of the Pasture Post, Sustainable Table’s newsletter! If you have ideas or questions about this issue or upcoming issues, please contact us at info@sustainabletable.org. Read on!

Summer can be one of the most memorable and enjoyable times for kids, with time spent outdoors, in the pool, mountains, backyard, or at the beach. Ideally, there is time to spend with friends, play games, or just relax and do a whole lot of nothing. For parents, summer can be a little more taxing – especially for those who are employed. How does one keep a child amused for weeks on end? Camp for a couple weeks, perhaps a summer vacation, but at some point the kids may get antsy. One way to keep the kids happy and healthy this summer is by cooking and gardening with them whenever possible. Kids love to be part of the food process, and it is important to start teaching them early about where their food comes from. Sustainable Table’s July newsletter is full of ideas to get the ball rolling (or the pot boiling).

• Feature Article – Little Green Thumbs from Mindful Mama
• Harvest Highlight – Zucchini, A Farmer’s Friend
• Cooking With Kids – Petit Appetit: Eat, Drink and Be Merry
• Kid-Friendly Recipe of the Month – Long-Life Noodles
• Slow Food’s National Time for Lunch Campaign
• Book Review – Cool Cuisine: Taking the Bite Out of Global Warming
• Fun Food Happenings – Eat Real Festival in Oakland, CA
• The Daily Table Blog – Keeping Up with Food
• Join Sustainable Table on Facebook, Myspace and Twitter
• Spread the Word about Sustainable Food: forward this email to 5 people!
• More Ways to Stay in Touch with Sustainable Table and The Meatrix!

Feature Article – Little Green Thumbs

By Melissa B. Williams, www.mindful-mama.com

Confession: When I was a little girl, I used to sneak into the garden and eat all the carrots-and I mean all of them. It was no secret who did it: I was only about four, and I’d leave the telltale carrot tops lying around as evidence of my consumption. My mother would lecture me about sharing, but I now know-as a mother myself-that she was really glowing with satisfaction. What mama wouldn’t want her child to “sneak”  carrots instead of a Twinkie or cupcake?

In this age of iPods, cell phones, and the Wii, many parents feel it’s nearly impossible to get their children excited about the outdoors-and we won’t even talk about their lack of enthusiasm for veggies. But kids are interested in nature-they (and we parents, too) just might be too over-stimulated to notice.

Younger kids are naturally drawn to the dirt, essentially creating mud baths whenever the opportunity arises. Older children might not be as into getting dirty, but they definitely are interested in receiving rewards for their work (um, allowance anyone?), and nothing is quite as rewarding as growing your own food.

Read the whole article here.

A little about Mindful Mama: The Mindful Mama^TM community is a place to connect with parents and birth professionals from the comfort of your own home. Mindful Mama is a cutting-edge social media platform for natural parenting. They integrate the depth and inspiration of a favorite magazine into a collaborative and nurturing online space, connecting parents with birth and health care practitioners who share the common goal of building healthy and happy families.

Subscribe to Mindful Mama’s free e-newsletter!

Harvest Highlight – Zucchini, a Farmer’s Friend

Zucchini, also known as courgette to the French and British, is a gardener’s friend. Renowned for its abundant production, many gardeners even pick away the flowers before the fruit has formed so as not to be overwhelmed by the tasty green squash. It comes in various shapes and sizes, and can be yellow, green or both. Most people pick them when they are around 8-inches long, but Italians tend to pick them smaller when the taste is more delicate. Left to its own devices, a Zucchini will grow up to several feet, but it becomes quite watery in the process.

Zucchini belongs to an extensive family of plants known as cucurbits. Cucurbits all have vine-like qualities and most produce edible fruits, whether eaten as fruits or vegetables. Relatives to the zucchini in the cucurbit family include the watermelon, the cucumber and the elusive chayote and cassabanana. Like all cucurbits, zucchini started its development in Latin America. Remains of the zucchini’s ancestors have been found in Mexico dating back to 7000 BC. During the period of European colonization, a form of squash was taken over to Italy where, through mutation, it morphed into the common zucchini that we know today. Zucca is the Italian word for squash, with zucchini meaning “little squash.”

Zucchini is low in calories and high in healthy goodness. According to nutritiondata.com, one cup of cooked zucchini contains 10% of the recommended daily value of magnesium, 40% of Vitamin A and 10% of Vitamin C. It is also an excellent source of dietary fiber, is touted as a digestion aid and, if summer’s got you feeling hot, apparently it will help cool you down.

Zucchini is prepared in a plethora of ways all over the world. In Mexico, the flowers are extremely popular and they are stuffed and fried or incorporated into quesadillas. In Italy, zucchini is often breaded and fried or sautéed in olive oil. In France, it is slowly sautéed along with tomato and onion to make ratatouille, or made into a gratin. Zucchini is incorporated into Thai and Vietnamese cuisine through quick stir-fried, and wrapped into light summer rolls. In Lebanon, it is stuffed with minced meat, rice and herbs, and baked, and in Greece the flowers are filled with Feta – obviously a very versatile veggie. To see Sustainable Table’s zucchini recipes, click here!

Cooking With Kids – Petit Appetit – Eat Drink and Be Merry

Lisa Barnes’ new book, “Petit Appetit: Eat Drink and Be Merry” is packed with recipes that kids will love to make and eat. With ideas for snacks, drinks, everyday dinners and special celebrations, there is a dish for every occasion. The book also contains useful information on buying organic, how to eat healthy at home and away, and useful symbols by each recipe identify which recipes are gluten free, vegetarian, milk free and no-cook.

Since the book emphasizes cooing with kids, Lisa emphasizes that even a toddler can help out in the kitchen, with this advice, “Keep in mind, even adults make a mess when they are creating in the kitchen, so expect children to have even more mishaps and build in enough time for mistakes and cleanup. Remember to remain calm and have a sense of adventure and humor!” Take a look at the list below to see what tasks your child can accomplish.

Age Appropriate Cooking Skills:

2 to 3 Year-Olds Can:

• Rinse vegetables or fruits
• Tear large pieces of lettuce
• Stir
• Pour with assistance
• Select ingredients they want to taste or use
• Recognize changes to ingredients during the cooking process
• Sort Ingredients
• Help identify ingredients in the grocery store
• Group utensils when setting the table

4 to 6 Year-Olds Can:

• Pour
• Mix
• Count and do simple measurements
• Cut with a plastic or butter knife
• Crack eggs
• Start to follow recipe cards and symbols
• Create their own recipes, and draw them on cards
• Identify images or diagrams of ingredients on your grocery list
• Set the table
• Do task listed previously

7 to 12 Year-Olds Can:

• Write your shopping list and read it to you at the store
• Help select which recipes the family will share at mealtime.
• Read and follow recipes
• Work with a heat source (supervised)
• Cut with a sharper knife (with instruction)
• Create their own recipes and write the steps
• Help wash dishes
• Do tasks listed previously

For more information on cooking with kids, check out Lisa’s “Petit Appetit” website!

Kid-Friendly Recipe of the Month – “Long-Life Noodles” from “Petit Appetit – Eat Drink and Be Merry” by Lisa Barnes

Celebrate summer with these Long-Life Noodles using seasonal ingredients!

Makes 8 to 10 (1-Cup) Servings

8 ounces rice noodles

2 teaspoons expeller-pressed canola oil

1 teaspoon minced garlic

1 teaspoon minced fresh ginger or ½ teaspoon ground ginger

1 cup julienned organic carrot (1 large)

1 cup julienned organic red bell pepper (1 large or 4 mini)

½ cup chopped scallions

2 tablespoons gluten-free tamari

1 tablespoon peanut butter

½ cup organic vegetable broth

1 teaspoon freshly squeezed lime juice

Prepare the noodles according to package directions. Drain and set aside.

Heat 1 teaspoon of the oil on a medium, pot over medium heat. Add the garlic and ginger and cook until fragrant and soft, about 1 minute. Add the carrot and bell pepper and cover. Cook until vegetables are tender but not soft, 5 to 7 minutes.

Add remained 1 teaspoon oil, scallions, tamari, peanut butter, broth and lime juice and bring to boil. Add the noodles and heat until hot, stirring to combine the vegetables and sauce.

Got too many tomatoes in the garden? Try making this super easy Tot’s Tomato Sauce.

If you’re tired of serving up regular soda or tired of your kids pleading for it, try this homemade Ginger Soda sweetened with agave nectar.

Slow Food’s National Time for Lunch Campaign

The Time for Lunch Campaign is a project of Slow Food USA, an educational non-profit with the goal of creating a world in which everyone can enjoy food that is good, clean and fair.

Time for Lunch is asking parents, teachers and every responsible citizen to speak up and tell our nation’s leaders that change can’t wait: It’s time to provide our children with REAL FOOD at school. The focus of the campaign is the federal Child Nutrition Act which governs the National School Lunch Program, and sets the standard for the food that more than 30 million children eat every school day. This federal Act is up for reauthorization by Congress in September and the Time for Lunch Campaign is designed to raise awareness and increase lobbying by Americans to demand improvements in the program.

The Time for Lunch campaign is asking people to organize Eat-Ins – potlucks that take place in public and gather people to support the cause. Many of these potlucks are to take place on Labor Day, Sept. 7, 2009, when people in communities all over the country will sit down to share a meal with their neighbors and kids. This National Eat-In will send a clear message: It’s time to provide America’s children with real food at school.

Find out more about the campaign and how to organize your own Eat-In at Time for Lunch!

Book Review- Cool Cuisine: Taking the Bite Out of Global Warming

This review was written by Sustainable Table consultant, Laura Edwards-Orr.

Cool Cuisine: Taking the Bite Out of Global Warming, by Laura Stec with Eugene Cordero, is a treasure trove of facts and tidbits about what we eat and how it affects the health of our planet. Part cook book, part text book, part righteous party planning manual, this 2008 addition to the “good food” cannon takes a very different approach to coaching readers through the details of a carbon-friendly diet. Each chapter starts with several pages of discussion about the food industry and its connection to climate change.  The authors’ perspectives are augmented with sidebars demystifying the science behind each chapter’s and “Book n’ Cook Club” pages that list recipes (full recipes follow), suggested videos and books, field trips or activities, and a menu of small steps readers can take to spice up their shopping and eating in a climate-friendly style.

Read the whole review here.

Fun Food Happenings – Eat Real Festival

The Eat Real Festival will be happening in Oakland, California on August 28-30^th! Follow it on Twitter to find out more about the event, or become a fan on Facebook.

The Eat Real Festival is a social venture created to inspire eaters to choose tasty, healthy, good food. Through a vibrant, local festival in Oakland, CA, and a focus on delicious and sustainable “street food,” Eat Real puts eaters in contact with the real people – the farmers, chefs, and producers – who make our food. The festival will donate a percentage of its profit to several California organizations that promote access to healthy and affordable food, entrepreneurship and economic development.

The Daily Table Blog – Sustainable Food Updates

July 14^th, Adventures in Fermentation – Sauerkraut

July 10^th, Where are the Conservatives in Local Foods?

July 8^th,  Unraveling Organic

July 3^rd, In the Kitchen – Healthy Cooking, Healthy Cleaning

Read updates like these and more on our blog, The Daily Table.

Join Sustainable Table on Facebook, Myspace and Twitter

We are spreading the news about sustainable food and you can join us on Facebook, Myspace (Moopheus and Sustainable Table), and Twitter. Write on our wall, share your events, reply to our tweets! Maybe one of your comments will make it into our Daily Table blog!

Share Sustainable Table with your Friends

Help us get the word out about sustainable food and what we’re doing here at Sustainable Table and The Meatrix.  Please forward this newsletter to your friends and encourage them to get involved in the sustainable food movement. The only way we’re going to save family farms and be able to provide local, sustainable food for everyone is if we all join in and work together.

More Ways to Stay in Touch with Sustainable Table and The Meatrix!

Keep up-to-date on our blog, The Daily Table!

Ask questions and share your ideas in our forum, The Parlour

Listen to our podcasts on Gabcast

See great sustainable food and farming pictures on our Flickr account!

We’ll be back next month with even more information on sustainable food and what we’ve been doing.

If you would like to sign up for The Pasture Post newsletter please go to our sign-up page or if you would like to share the Sustainable Table site with a friend, go to our “Tell a Friend” page.

Thanks for supporting us and for helping to save small family farms!

Soda with vitamins, McDonald’s salad, and anti-oxidant spiked cheese doodles. Do these foods have any health benefits, or is more “nutritionism”?  Dr. Mark Hyman says “heck no” on HuffPo.

How has the organic certification changed since its birth in 2002? Does it still hold the same value and integrity? Kimberly Kindy and Lyndsey Layton share their thoughts in a much talked about Washington Post article. You can read my thoughts on it here as well.

Is your kid’s favorite school meal the cheese-filled bread stick with marinara dipping sauce? Apparently that’s one of the top-sellers. Read more in this school lunch breakdown by Jennifer Smith Richards from the Columbus Dispatch.

President Obama’s Food Safety Working Group just announced some comprehensive new plans to deal with the dire state of food safety in our country. Maybe the FDA will finally be allowed to recall E. coli contaminated food! (It’s optional now.) Read Obama Foodorama’s analysis here and NPR’s here.

Here at Sustainable Table, we’re not such big fans of genetically modified crops. We think they’re creepy, along with other issues, and they don’t solve the world’s hunger problems. A new interview from the Ethicurian with genetic engineering expert Doug Gurian-Sherman gives us even more reason to dislike GM products.

Tom Philpott at Grist reports that Michael Taylor, a former Monsanto employee, was appointed special assistant to the FDA Commissioner for food safety by the current administration. Food politics expert Marion Nestle thinks it’s a good choice. Other food activists such as Jill Richardson are not so happy that the revolving door continues to turn.

We just can’t get enough of Food, Inc! So far, the movie is going strong and we urge everyone to go out and see it. Here’s a fun interview from the Young and Hungry with director Robert Kenner.

Check out this amazing video from The Onion about Taco Bell’s new “natural” line. It hits very close to home.

“Champagne wishes and caviar dreams…” Robin Leach’s signature phrase at the end of the show “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous,” gone, but not forgotten (not by all of us – the show was on from 1984-95). I like to think of the now defunct idea of “rich and famous” being replaced with the new improved version – Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability!

Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability or LOHAS is a conference that Sustainable Table is attending this week. It is business-to-business and focused on health and fitness, the environment, personal development, sustainable living, and social justice. We hope to meet up with people from like-minded organizations to share our wealth of sustainable knowledge and to brainstorm about getting the sustainability message out to more and more people.

If you are going to be there, stop by our booth and say HI – we will be showing The Meatrix and giving away DVD copies too! If you aren’t going to be there, I’ll be updating you (check out www.twitter.com/eatsustainable) about the more exciting parts of the conference… I do see that Coca Cola and WalMart will be there, in addition to Facebook Causes, eBay, Free Range Studios, Gaia, and many, many more – it will be interesting.

Rising cost of food
According to the USDA Economic Research Service, the Consumer Price Index (CPI) for all food increased 5.4 percent in 2007. Food-at-home prices (food bought in stores and other retailers to eat at home) increased 5.7 percent, while food-away-from-home prices (restaurants and other eating establishments) rose 4.1 percent in 2007. (In 2008, the CPI for food increased 5.5 percent – the largest increase since 1990; food-at-home rose 6.4 percent while food-away-from-home increased 4.4 percent.)

In 2007, the following products increased in price:

Butter up 31%
Cheddar cheese up 65%
Nonfat dry milk up 117%
Broiler chickens up 17.5%
Beef, select, up 12.8%
Corn up 70%
*Wheat up 60%

Reasons for the increase in food prices include:

Ethanol. Corn prices rose 70 percent in 2007 due to demand for ethanol (a fuel made from corn). And because of the demand for corn, more was planted, meaning that less acreage was used for soybeans, wheat, oats and barley, so their prices increased between 5 and 35 percent

World demand. As countries like China and India develop more of a middle class, demand for food increases, driving up the cost.

Oil. As oil prices increase, the cost of producing and transporting food increases.

Other factors that contribute to rising food prices include poor harvests, bad weather and a weak U.S. dollar.

(From Market Watch, * from U.S. News & World Report)

This means that the food you regularly purchase costs more without you changing any purchasing or eating habits. For someone on a budget, this can have a big impact. The Financial Times reported in March that farmers will plant fewer acres of major crops in 2009 because of lower prices and higher costs for inputs like fertilizers, which will likely further increase food prices.

• Make Every Day Earth Day
• New Video from Meatless Monday
• Sustainable Table’s Guide to Good Food
• Recipe of the Month – Spoon Strawberry Jam
• The Daily Table Blog – A Conscious Lunch
• Get a subscription to Yes!
• Welcome to our new Program Assistant – Sophy Bishop
• New “Eat Local, Buy Local, Be Local” Section on the ST website
• Follow Sustainable Table on Facebook, Myspace and Twitter
• Share Sustainable Table with your Friends
• More Ways to Stay in Touch with Sustainable Table and The Meatrix!

Make Every Day Earth Day

Nobody doesn’t like Earth Day.

Devoting one day each year to collectively demonstrate our concern about environmental issues; to address our common search for answers to the diverse but interconnected questions regarding sustainability, the food and water supply, our health, energy sources, pollution and global warming; and to build on the positive spirit of millions of people working together to advance the cause of safeguarding the very future of our planet…what’s not to like? Folks will be attending gatherings, participating in letter writing campaigns, taking time off to get out there and do something about it….

Time off? You have time off? Of course you want to participate, but you just don’t have the time to engage in any activities beyond your already hectic day. Without some extra hours, you think you can’t make a difference. Well, to paraphrase our chief executive, “Yes, you can.” The trick is to do something about it during the time you’re already spending on something else. No, not quite multitasking. You have to eat, right? So make your statement by supporting the sustainable, local food movement, certainly a fundamental component of Earth Day.

On April 22, instead of going out (or ordering in), prepare a sustainable lunch in advance and bring it work. Our entire website is devoted to spreading the word about sustainable, local food; you’ll find ideas galore for fixing a quick and easy lunch so we won’t belabor the point here, other than to remind you that you can make any recipe sustainable by using local, fresh, sustainably-raised ingredients.

And if the kitchen is uncharted territory for you, don’t despair. Try heading to your local farmers market instead of a restaurant. A recent visit to our nearby greenmarket revealed a huge assortment of organic bread, locally produced cheese, and a wide ranging selection of pesticide-free fruit, the ingredients for a lunch that’s delectable and righteous to boot.

So now there’s no excuse. Follow that course and you’ll be making a meaningful contribution to this singular day. You’ll make your tummy happy and you’ll feel good about yourself too. Come to think of it, there’s no reason why this has to happen only on April 22. You’ve taken the first step, now keep going. Maybe we can make every day Earth Day.

New Video from Meatless Monday

With World Health Day and Earth Day both in April, health and environmental advocates are calling on President Obama to take a page from history and proclaim national “meatless” days, as three of his predecessors in office have done.

Our sister program, Meatless Monday, has created this video to enlighten the public about the impact that meat has on climate change, health and the environment.

Watch the Meatless Monday video here.

Sustainable Table’s Guide to Good Food

Our new series, “Sustainable Table’s Guide to Good Food,” will make celebrating Earth Day every day a piece of cake!  We will explain simple ways to shop smarter, eat healthier and make the best food choices for you and your family. It is posted weekly on the Daily Table blog; this week, we are at #4 – Sustainable vs. Industrial. Come back each Friday for more.

1. Guide to Good Food
2. What are Sustainable and Organic
3. Factory Farming and Industrial Agriculture
4. Sustainable vs. Industrial

Read them all here!

Recipe of the Month – Strawberry Jam from Spoon NYC

Preserving fruits and vegetables at home, whether it be jam or canning tomatoes in the height of the season allows you to eat local all year round. Learning how seems intimidating, but once you figure it out, strawberry jam all year round will be a wonderful reward!

This recipe comes to us from Melissa Chmelar of Spoon Catering and Tbsp Restaurant (now serving a yummy sustainable brunch with organic coffee too!).

Tbsp is the newest addition to the Spoon family. Tbsp was founded on the idea that fresh, local ingredients and quality recipes make for culinary success. Melissa peppers her kitchen with hand picked, seasonal organic produce grown in upstate New York at Mountain Dell Farms. Delivered daily, all produce, meats and fish are fresh, local, and organic when available. All tbsp ingredients are sourced from local purveyors and organic when available. Chmelar believes in supporting local businesses and lowers her carbon footprint by not flying in organic ingredients from across the world.

Spoon Strawberry Jam

Ingredients:

• 4 pounds of local farm fresh (organic if possible) seasonal strawberries, washed, hulled and quartered
• 3 pounds of organic cane sugar
• 1 tablespoon of fresh squeezed lemon juice

Equipment:

• 6 quart copper kettle or 6 quart stainless steel thick bottom pan
• Candy thermometer
• 10 sterilized 8oz jam jars with lids and bands

Directions:

1. Wash, hull and quarter the berries.
2. Boil the jars or run through the dishwasher.
3. Put the berries and lemon juice in a copper kettle on high heat.
4. Stir berries until they start to release liquid.
5. Add the sugar and stir well to incorporate.
6. Boil the jam until it reaches 220 degrees, skimming the foam from the top.
7. When it reaches 220 degrees immediately scoop the jam into the jars with a sterilized ladle. The jam must be hot when it is ladled into the jars.
8. Put on the lids and the screw bands, invert jars and cool (6 hours).
9. Test seal by pushing the top of the lid, if the seal is broken it will make a popping sound. When the jar is opened and the seal is broken keep the jam in the fridge.

* Keeps 1 year sealed if canned properly and 1 month in the fridge after opening.

The Daily Table Blog – A Conscious Lunch

How did your food get to your plate? Earth Day is a good day to think about this, but better yet, let’s start thinking about it every time we shop, eat out, or cook. In this blog post, guest blogger Marjorie Taylor has us use our lunch as a starting place.

This post comes from our guest blogger, Marjorie Taylor, the proprietor of The Cook’s Atelier. She cooks and writes about food from her tiny home in Burgundy, France. See more of her writing on her blog, www.thecooksatelier.com.

We read something almost everyday about the potential risks associated with our industrial food system and the animal abuse that takes place on factory farms. However, I don’t think that the average consumer makes the connection of how his food choices are connected to this growing problem. Something as simple as lunch can be a perfect opportunity to stand up for what you believe in.

Almost everyone is aware that egg-laying hens on large corporate farms do not have the best lives. But many might not realize just how horrible it is. About 95% of egg-laying chickens in the United States are confined to small cages that are stacked 10 high in huge barns and have no access to the outside. Factory farms are all about cheap food and big profits and give no regard to the well being of the animals or the surrounding community. To make it even more confusing for the consumer, the labeling on the egg cartons makes you feel like you are purchasing eggs that have come from “happy hens.” Don’t be fooled by the marketing gimmicks.

Subscription to Yes! Magazine for Earth Day!

Imagine a food system that delivers fresh, organic food to everybody. Can’t be done? YES! Magazine says it can, and it must, especially in a time of economic and climatic peril. Their Spring issue (Food for Everyone) brings together the best ideas for a new food system, and tells the inspiring stories of people who are bringing that system to life. YES! Magazine is an ad-free, quarterly, national magazine that provides positive solutions for creating a more just and sustainable world. We’re delighted to offer readers of The Pasture Post the chance to get this Food issue as part of a special introductory offer: Subscribe to YES! right now and get four beautiful, ad-free issues-for just $10 (regular price $24).

Find out more.

Welcome to our new Program Assistant – Sophy Bishop

We are very excited to have Sophy Bishop, our new program assistant, join us here at Sustainable Table. Sophy has been a lover of all things culinary since her first eggplant parm at age one, and has been a follower of the Sustainable Food movement since she first read Fast Food Nation at seventeen. She majored in Anthropology and International Affairs at Skidmore College and studied abroad in Aix-en-Provence, France where she frequented the farmers market daily. After graduating, Sophy lived abroad and traveled in Argentina, Chile and Peru where she decided to dedicate her life to her love of food. Upon return, Sophy interned at Fine Cooking magazine where she got to go to tastings everyday and participate in photo shoots where food was the star. She is thrilled to be working at Sustainable Table, where she can put her epicurean interests to good use.

The New and Expanded “Eat Local, Buy Local, Be Local” Section on the ST website

Eating local, buying local, and being local are so important these days, we’ve actually created a whole section on the website to help you understand it all. You can find information on:

What is Local?
Why Buy Local?
Grow Your Own!
Local Food Systems
Local Heroes

We’ve included links to many other groups working on these same issues – Food Routes, No Impact Man, Backyard Gardener, and more. Together we can make a big impact!

Follow Sustainable Table on Facebook, Myspace and Twitter

We are spreading the news about sustainable food and you can join us on Facebook, Myspace (Moopheus and Sustainable Table, and Twitter. Write on our wall, share your events, reply to our tweets! Maybe one of your comments will make it into our Daily Table blog!

Share Sustainable Table with your Friends

Help us get the word out about sustainable food and what we’re doing here at Sustainable Table and The Meatrix.  Please forward this newsletter to your friends and encourage them to get involved on our site. The only way we’re going to save family farms and be able to provide local, sustainable food for everyone is if we all join in and work together.

More Ways to Stay in Touch with Sustainable Table and The Meatrix!

Keep up-to-date on our blog, The Daily Table!
Ask questions and share your ideas on our forum, The Parlour
Listen to our podcasts on Gabcast
See great sustainable food and farming pictures on our Flickr account!

We’ll be back next month with even more information on sustainable food and what we’ve been doing.

If you would like to sign up for The Pasture Post newsletter please go to our sign-up page or if you would like to share the Sustainable Table site with a friend, go to our “Tell a Friend” page.

Thanks for supporting us and for helping to save small family farms!

This issue is stuffed with recipes and cooking ideas, an important focus in our current economy and an excellent way to increase your sustainable food intake! We are featuring a delicious recipe from the new cookbook, Vegan Soul Kitchen, and two articles to inspire your cooking process and “beef” up your kitchen larder. If you have ideas or questions about this issue of our newsletter or upcoming issues, please contact us at bob@sustainabletable.org. Read on!

1. Our New and Improved Recipe Section!
2. Vegan Soul Kitchen – a New Cookbook from Bryant Terry
3. Recipe of the Month – Uncle Don’s Double Mustard Greens & Roasted Yam Soup
4. A Cook’s Larder – by our Guest Blogger, Marjorie Taylor
5. God Bless the Cook: Remembering the Pleasure of Cooking – from Civil Eats
6. Join a CSA Now
7. Time to Plan a Garden or Find a Garden – Hyperlocavore.com
8. Eat Well Everywhere Spring Break 09 Challenge
9. Join Sustainable Table on Facebook, Myspace and Twitter
10. Share Sustainable Table with your Friends
11. More Ways to Stay in Touch with Sustainable Table and The Meatrix!

Our New and Improved Recipe Section!
We are so excited about our new, easy-to-use recipe section. It is searchable, categorized, specialized, and full of great sustainable recipes for you to use. Every month we will highlight a “Recipe of the Month” featuring delicious sustainable ingredients. Check it out now and if you feel like sharing, please send us recipes for your favorite sustainable dishes!

Vegan Soul Kitchen – a New Cookbook from Bryant Terry
We just received a copy of this inspiring new cookbook – it’s healthy, tasty, and full of interesting stories and music. Here is a little about the book:

Vegan Soul Kitchen recipes use fresh, whole, best-quality, healthy ingredients and cooking techniques with an eye on local, seasonal, sustainably grown food. Reinterpreting popular dishes from African and Caribbean countries as well as his favorite childhood dishes, Terry reinvents African American and Southern cuisine-capitalizing on the complex flavors of the tradition, without the animal products.

About Bryant:
Bryant Terry is an Oakland-based eco chef, Food and Society Policy Fellow, and author of Vegan Soul Kitchen: Fresh, Healthy, and Creative African American Cuisine (Da Capo/Perseus). His work has been featured in Gourmet, Food and Wine, The San Francisco Chronicle, Domino, and many other publications. Called “ingenious” by The New York Times Magazine, Bryant’s first book, Grub: Ideas for an Urban Organic Kitchen (Tarcher/Penguin), is a winner of a 2007 Nautilus Book Award.

Recipe of the Month – Uncle Don’s Double Mustard Greens & Roasted Yam Soup – From Vegan Soul Kitchen
Soundtrack suggestion from Bryant Terry: “I Can’t Stand the Rain” by Ann Peebles from Brand New Classics

Every time I sit down for a meal I express gratitude for all the forces that helped bring the food to my plate: the natural elements, farmers, farmhands, transporters, chefs, kitchen assistants, and servers in many cases. Because I want to encourage others to do so as well, I asked my Uncle Don Bryant (my first name is my mother’s maiden name) if he would compose an original prayer-song to contribute. As you saw at the beginning of the book, he said yes!

Uncle Don was a well-known songwriter-singer in the 1970s. He was the staff songwriter at Hi Records, and he penned a slew of hits for that label’s artists (i.e., Al Green, Willie Mitchell, and Ann Peebles). His most celebrated songs were written for his wife, Ann Peebles. You know that song “I Can’t Stand the Rain”-which was covered by over 30 artists (including Cassandra Wilson, Michael Bolton, Tina Turner) and sampled by Missy Elliot for her first big hit? Well Uncle Don wrote it.

To show my gratitude, I created this soup in his honor.

1 large garnet yam (about 1 pound) peeled and cut into 1/2-inch chunks
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
Coarse sea salt
4 cups Simple Stock (from VSK)
1 large bunch mustard greens (about 1 pound), tough stems removed, chopped into bite-size piece, washed, and drained
1 teaspoon mustard seeds
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 teaspoons apple cider vinegar
White pepper

• Preheat the oven to 425°F.
• In a large bowl, toss the yams with 1 tablespoon of the oil and 1/4 teaspoon of the salt. Transfer the yams to a parchment-lined baking dish and roast for 1 hour, stirring every 15 minutes, until they are starting to crisp on the edges.
• While the yams are roasting, bring the vegetable stock to a boil in a medium saucepan over high heat. Add the mustard greens and cook, uncovered for 4 to 6 minutes, until softened and the sulfur has been released from them. Remove the greens from the heat, drain the stock into a bowl, and set it aside.
• Over medium heat in the saucepan just used, warm 1 tablespoon of the olive oil. Add the mustard seeds and cook, stirring occasionally, until they start to pop, 2-3 minutes. Next add the garlic and sauté until fragrant, about 1 1/2 minute. Then add the greens and 1/4 teaspoon salt. Sauté the greens, stirring occasionally, until most of the liquid has evaporated, about 3 minutes. Add the vegetable stock back to the saucepan and set aside.
• When the yams are done, transfer them to the saucepan. Bring to a boil, then lower the heat to medium and simmer for about 25 minutes, until the yams are fork tender. Add the apple cider vinegar and white pepper and additional salt to taste.

A Cook’s Larder – by our Guest Blogger, Marjorie Taylor
Marjorie Taylor is the proprietor of The Cook’s Atelier. She cooks and writes about food from her tiny home in Burgundy, France. You can see more of her writing on her blog, www.thecooksatelier.com.

What is a larder? A place where cooks go to find the staple ingredients for a meal, such as last season’s preserved items from the garden, dried beans, lentils, rice, assorted pastas, garlands of dried aromatics, and staples such as extra-virgin olive oil, vinegars, salts and baking supplies. In addition to my dry storage, I always keep a supply of homemade chicken stock and real butter in the freezer and a large hunk of Parmesan in the refrigerator.

A larder doesn’t have to be a separate room, as long as the area you choose is a relatively cool, dry place, that’s all you need. Simple solutions could include a vintage armoire that you find at a flea market, an extra closet or designated spot in your basement. The idea really is to keep staples on hand that allow you to prepare a meal without the need to run to the grocery store every time you cook. If you stock your larder with the basic staples that your family enjoys, you can easily prepare a meal using the ingredients from your larder along with the fresh, seasonal ingredients from your local farmers’ market or garden.

Read her full post on our blog.

God Bless the Cook: Remembering the Pleasure of Cooking – By Andrea King Collier
I had been feeling a certain sense of resentment that I had become a utilitarian cook. After 30 years of preparing meals for my family almost every day, I was feeling a bit like a short order meal machine. The people in my house had no idea how close they were to total anarchy, every time they asked “what are we eating.” What used to be a total joy and an artistic release for me, had become a chore, like cleaning grout or waxing floors. I was experiencing a cooking meltdown that would bring me to tears many days. Then one day I saw a plaque at a gift shop that said simply, “love to cook; cook to love.”

I bought it. It reminded me, like God was whispering in my ear, that my love of pulling together ingredients was a gift, and a legacy. Gifts should never be taken lightly. It made me smile instantly.

Read the whole article here.

This article comes from Civil Eats blog. Civil Eats promotes critical thought about sustainable agriculture and food systems as part of building economically and socially just communities.

Join a CSA Now
What is a CSA? Community Supported Agriculture, and now is the time to get in. CSA provides a direct link between local farmers and you. When you become a member, you purchase a share of a farmer’s crop before it’s planted. This allows the farmer to pay for seed, water, equipment, etc, upfront, so s/he is less reliant on banks and loans. Each week, usually from June through October, the farmer delivers great tasting, healthy food to pre-determined spots. Look for a CSA near you (www.eatwellguide.org or www.localharvest.org) and try to sign up soon. There are limited shares and they go quickly!

Time to Plan a Garden or Find a Garden – Hyperlocavore.com
Spring is almost here and it’s time to plan your garden. While some of us have the perfect spot for a garden in a back or front yard, others of us look longingly to the yards of our neighbors. But now is the time to change that. Log on to Hyperlocavore to find out about “yardsharing!”

Yardsharing is a way to connect people who love to garden, people who love healthy fresh food and people who have yards! Often people who have yards have little time for a vegetable garden. And sometimes gardeners have trouble finding soil to garden in! Yardshares are a win for everyone. They allow you to grow food as locally as possible (which would explain the term, Hyperlocavore). The group can be friends, family or neighbors (or any combination!).

Eat Well Everywhere Spring Break 09 Challenge

The Eat Well Guide is challenging you to find good food on the road, wherever your travels take you this spring break! We’re offering PRIZES to spring breakers who plan the most creative, local food oriented trips. First place gets your group a $100 gift certificate to the Eat Well Guide location of your choice!

As you’re plotting your adventure – be it road tripping, beach bumming or backpacking – use our handy, FREE, Eat Well Everywhere (EWE) mapping tool. With EWE, you can map out your trip and find over 15,000 listings of farms, markets, restaurants and other places offering locally grown, sustainably produced foods throughout the US and Canada. Then create a customized downloadable travel guide of the places you’ve found, complete with directions and a seasonal food guide to the region. For more information or to take on the Challenge, visit www.eatwellguide.org, or join our facebook event, “Eat Well Everywhere: Spring Break ‘09 Contest”.

Join Sustainable Table on Facebook, Myspace and Twitter
We are spreading the news about sustainable food and you can join us on Facebook, Myspace (Moopheus and Sustainable Table, and Twitter. Write on our wall, share your events, reply to our tweets! Maybe one of your comments will make it into our Daily Table blog!

Share Sustainable Table with your Friends
Help us get the word out about sustainable food and what we’re doing here at Sustainable Table and The Meatrix. Please forward this newsletter to your friends and encourage them to get involved on our site. The only way we’re going to save family farms and be able to provide local, sustainable food for everyone is if we all join in and work together.

More Ways to Stay in Touch with Sustainable Table and The Meatrix!

1. Keep up-to-date on our blog, The Daily Table!
2. Ask questions and share your ideas on our forum, The Parlour
3. Listen to our podcasts on Gabcast
4. See great sustainable food and farming pictures on our Flickr account!

We’ll be back next month with even more information on sustainable food and what we’ve been doing.

If you would like to sign up for The Pasture Post newsletter please go to our sign-up page or if you would like to share the Sustainable Table site with a friend, go to our “Tell a Friend” page.

Thanks for supporting us and for helping to save small family farms!

www.twitter.com/eatsustainable

Click “Read the rest of this entry” below to see the whole newsletter.

• Some Thoughts from the New Director of Sustainable Table – Not Another Editorial About New Year’s Resolutions
• At the Table – A Salute to Change
• Recipe of the Month – (Anybody Can Make) Soup
• New Folding Handout – Glossary of Meat Production Methods
• Update to Last Month’s Feature Article, Eggnog – Recipe from a Reader
• Become a Sustainable Table Facebook Fan
• Send Sustainability to Friends
• Stay in Touch with Sustainable Table

Not Another Editorial About New Year’s Resolutions

Rich Sanders, the new director of Sustainable Table, dishes out some thoughts about New Year’s Resolutions and sustainable home cooking in this editorial.

Yes, that time of year is upon us again: during the December holidays we were especially good to each other, and on January 1, we resolve to be especially good to ourselves. We’ll eat healthier, we’ll make our lifestyles more sustainable, we’ll be more frugal (the current economic climate leaves us little choice), we’ll turn over that new leaf that pops up every year around this time….

Enough already with the resolutions! You’ve been there, done that, got the bumper sticker, bought the tee-shirt, misplaced the button, and chipped the coffee mug. In two places. Fear not – you can relax, because I’m not going to exact a single pledge from you. After all, you’re slogging through the vicissitudes of winter and you’ve got enough to deal with. Of course, if you try the strategy that I’m about to present and it just happens to be good for you, and supports naturally raised and locally grown foods, and can save you money, and is warm and comforting and tastes delicious to boot, well, that just can’t be helped, can it?

So what’s the strategy I’m talking about? Sustainable home cooking.

Read the rest of Rich’s editorial here.

Diane Hatz, founder of Sustainable Table, shares her thoughts with us in her column on The Daily Table blog, “At the Table.” Here is a blurb from Diane’s posting this last Friday:

I must admit, I’m not a political person. Oh, don’t get me wrong, I vote and do my civic duty, but I don’t follow politics (well, except for the Daily Show) or call my Congress-people or get involved on a political level. I’m one of those people who believe change first comes from the ground up, from individuals and groups of people – it’s the public who make the difference. Politicians are supposed to simply represent us, so I focus on reaching people.

But, this week, as the world stopped to celebrate one of the most historical moments in our lives, I was right there with everyone. To me, the inauguration of President Barack Obama isn’t about politics – it’s about hope. It’s about possibility and change. It’s about the old guard finally being retired. And that is certainly a reason for celebration.

Read Diane’s full post, A Salute to Change, and find all of her “At the Table” postings here.

Are you planning to attend the TED conference in Long Beach next week?  If so, Sustainable Table founder Diane Hatz will be there and would love to say hello!  Just drop us a line if you’re one of the attendees.

I’d like to share an idea I cooked up some time ago: the Conceptual Recipe. It’s not just a recipe for soup; it’s a recipe for how to make soup. And it’s called:

(Anybody Can Make) Soup

All it takes is time. Remember, all the ingredients are flexible and everything is optional. Except the water. If you’d like to use any dried ingredients (like dried mushrooms), start soaking them in warm water now. Put a small amount of neutral oil (like canola oil) in a large soup pot. Over medium heat, brown some meaty bones (beef or lamb for example, and a couple of pounds perhaps) in batches. Arrange them so there’s only a single layer and each piece has room around it, otherwise they’ll steam and not brown. When one side is browned, turn them over. (Don’t move them until they’re really browned though.) When they’re all browned, set them aside.

Next, add lots (a few cups perhaps) of coarsely chopped vegetables and cook until tender letting them pick up all the fond (the brown bits) left behind by the bones and meat in the pot. Which vegetables should you use? Well, what did you find at the farmers market today? How about onion, carrots, parsnips, turnips, celery (or celery leaves), parsley (including the stalk)–you get the idea. When the vegetables are softened, add back the meat bones and enough water to cover well (and then some), scraping up the brown bits. Bring to a boil, lower the heat, and simmer until meat is tender–this could take hours depending upon how much stuff you’ve started with. Alternately cover and uncover–the idea is that you want it to keep simmering (covered) and to reduce a bit (uncovered), but not down to nothing. Remember to skim off and discard the protein scum that forms. When meat is tender, remove bones from the pot, break up the meat and reserve. Discard the bones and fish out the vegetables–they’ve given their all to the soup. (Alternately, you can strain the veggies out, but remember, you’re keeping the liquid, not the veggies!) Congratulations, you’ve just made stock.

Now you’re going to turn the stock into soup. Add some vegetables like onion, carrots, parsnips, turnips (no leaves or stems this time) cut into bite-sized chunks and any soaked softened drained vegetables you might have started with. You can also add a handful of some kind of dry starch like barley, pasta, or rice. Continue to cook over medium heat stirring occasionally. Covering the pot will prevent any further reduction. When the starch and veggies are cooked, add back the reserved meat.

Notice that you haven’t added any salt to the soup yet. If you did, as the stock reduced, it would be much too salty. Since you’re not reducing any more, now is the time to season. Here’s one of my secrets: instead of using salt, I like to use a little soup/bouillon base. You’ve probably seen it in the soup aisle of your local supermarket. I like the product that comes in a small jar; it has a thick consistency and is, in my opinion, superior to regular bouillon cubes. And as a bonus, they have an organic line and a vegetarian line as well! It’s salty stuff, but adds another layer of flavor that salt doesn’t match. If you can’t find it, regular bouillon cubes will do just fine. Use about the same amount that you would use if it were salt (in other words, to taste). If you’d like to, you can add a little heavy cream at the end, again, to taste. Serve with hot crusty bread (something we’ll never be able to make from a Conceptual Recipe).

So give it a whirl. And give us an account of your story in The Parlor, Sustainable Table’s forum on the Sustainable Home Cooking board. Did you try a recipe for the first time? Did you try the conceptual (Anybody Can Make) Soup recipe? Let us know what you made–and how you made it sustainable–and tell us how it turned out.”

I know we sent this out earlier, but just in case anyone missed it – check out our newest handout, the Glossary of Meat Production Methods! We turned this easy reference of sustainable farming practices and their definitions into a folding handout that will fit into your wallet. Keep the guide with you to help decipher confusing meat labeling terms at the store when you shop. Terms include pasture-raised, organic, cage-free, non-confined, no added hormones, no antibiotics, and more.

Print a copy of the Glossary of Meat Production Methods now!

Peggy Dyson-Cobb of Lexington, VA contacted us last month after we sent out our newsletter. She was wondering why we didn’t include an eggnog recipe (Why didn’t we?).  Peggy said, “Making eggnog is not rocket science and is much easier in many areas than finding decent organic eggnog. Sustainably produced eggs and milk products are often available locally – once you have those, a good recipe and the spirits of your choice (delight and anticipation, if not rum, brandy, or bourbon!) are all that is required for a luscious holiday treat – you may not be able to turn out the lights and get to bed until your guests are clear that all the eggnog has been consumed.”

Peggy gets her cream through participating in a cowshare program. She owns a share of a Jersey cow on a local farm, and pays boarding fees for her portion of the cow’s care costs, while getting weekly installments of her portion of what her cow produces. Peggy says, “The milk, cream, butter, buttermilk, yogurt, and soon cheese, that I can make from this excellent milk are delicious and much appreciated at our house!”

Peggy’s Eggnog Recipe (Thank you Peggy!):

Makes 2-3 quarts eggnog, depending on how fresh the cream and egg whites are!

Try it – you’ll never want ‘boughten’ eggnog again!

Ingredients:
4 eggs, separated
1/2 cup sugar
1/3 cup dark rum
1/3 cup bourbon
1/4 tsp. salt
1 pint whipping cream

Directions:
Beat egg yolks and sugar until smooth and thick. S-l-o-w-l-y add liquor while continuing to beat. Chill, covered, for 2-3 hours. Then beat egg whites and salt to soft peaks. Beat cream to soft peak, and fold yolk mixture gently into cream. Fold beaten egg whites in, sprinkle with nutmeg, and chill if you can stand waiting.

We are spreading the news about sustainable food and you can join us on Facebook!  Write on our wall to let us know what sustainable efforts you are making or to tell others about sustainable events in your area. Maybe one of your comments will make it into our Daily Table blog!

Help us get the word out about sustainable food and what we’re doing here at Sustainable Table and The Meatrix.  Please pass this newsletter to your friends and encourage them to get involved on our site.  The only way we’re going to save family farms and be able to provide local, sustainable food for everyone is if we all join in and work together.

Keep up-to-date on our blog, The Daily Table!

Ask questions and share your ideas on our forum, The Parlour
Listen to our podcasts on Gabcast
MySpace – Moopheus and Sustainable Table
Sustainable Table fan page on Facebook
See great sustainable food and farming pictures on our Flickr account!

Watch videos on our YouTube account!

If you would like to sign up for The Pasture Post newsletter please go to our sign-up page or if you would like to share the Sustainable Table site with a friend, go to our “Tell a Friend” page.

Thanks for supporting us and for helping to save small family farms!