Those Three Little Words

“Author’s Clean Copy”

Are those not the three most beautiful words an author can hear?! 

OK, “I Love You” is right up there. I grant you that.

But when you think about it, love is inextricably linked to writing and producing a book.

There is the passion and respect for the subject matter itself, for the featured protagonists – in my case the master chefs – along with their gardeners and/or farmers; the love of their culinary craft, the love of the art of the garden, the love of the Long Island landscape and sea-scape, the love of the project itself: the photography by Jennifer Calais Smith and my garden art renderings that both help tell this amazing story. 
And of course there is love for the editors and publishers who helped bring all this passion to the printed page. I love my Quayside, Voyageur Press editors: Kari and Michael.

I just received, via email attachment, the Author’s Clean Copy manuscript. All text and photo and art selection must be completed to go to the printer by February 1^st deadline I was told.

It is nothing short of thrilling. 

As anyone who has ever had a book published, it’s common knowledge that the gestation process is very slow.

Glacial, in fact.

But not when you are in the thick of it: working on the book is almost an all-consuming effort.  There is the research, the interviewing, the writing…

The book is a lover that steals your heart – and your time…

But for now, just for a sweet, sweet interlude, I want to embrace this moment.

This manuscript.

I want to celebrate!

And to celebrate the addition of two men who have brought great joy to my life J

First, I honor the good fortune of having secured my number-one candidate to write the Foreword for the book.  I had solicited knowledgeable people for suggestions, but I knew I only had eyes for Brian Halweil.

My research and following of Brian’s work whispered to me he was the perfect fit to introduce you, the reader, to the special world of Long Island’s culinary artists and master chefs and to the farmers and fishermen and food artisans and to the astonishing LI landscape.  He is talented, smart, dedicated and is an advocate for food and hunger causes. I am in simpatico.

Brian is the Editor of Edible East End Magazine.

http://www.edibleeastend.com/

He is also a senior researcher and Co-Project Director for  “State of the World 2011: Innovations that Nourish the Planet” a seminal work from the Worldwatch Institute, Vision for a Sustainable World that reports on global hunger and agricultural issues.

To say it’s a must-read is an understatement.  This is real journalism, not repeat Tweets. 

It is a most important book. You will be enlightened – and moved… that “a child dies every six seconds” is an unbearable tragedy….

Please help support Brian and his colleague’s great work, including Danielle Nierenberg, 

Anna Lappé, Small Planet Institute and Stephanie Hanson, One Acre Fund.

Do attend this most important book launch for “Nurturing the Planet” Wednesday, January 12^th at 10:00 AM in New York City at the WNYC Greene Space at 44 Charlton Street. 

http://www.worldwatch.org/node/6557

I will be there, along with some guests.

Worldwatch is offering a sneak preview online, with a link to Chapter 1. 

But buy the book!  

The other man that came into my life recently is the photo editor and publisher from Voyageur Press, Michael Dregni. 

Michael is a New York Times best-selling author too. He’s written a number of acclaimed books including Harley and the chart-topping, “Gypsy Jazz: In Search of Django Reinhardt and The Soul of Gypsy Swing”

While Michael was a lucky strike extra for me, having been assigned by the publishing company, I couldn’t help feel a connection.

That is because there are a number of threads in my life that, taken together, make quite a nice cloth --or bridge to Michael’s work.

When I went to school in Switzerland, I spent the better part of one summer with my Danish boyfriend in Copenhagen where I worked in the Huset where a large part of the entertainment was American Jazz. I always felt Europeans are much more appreciative of our only – along with the Blues – truly American musical art form.  I helped the director there to write letter to many of the aging, black jazz musicians to get them to perform and to secure interviews for a book he hoped to publish about American Jazz. Michael was his name too, I recall, and he told me that due to the Red Scare and racism, too many of these talented musicians never got a chance to tell their story – and he knew they had a lot to contribute to the art world and to culture.

The next thread is my brother is a musician and plays a lot of terrific jazz.  Further, he arranged for the family to go and see Django Reinhardt when the famous musician performed at New York City’s iconic Tavern on the Green.  My beloved father, George, who died too soon on August 29^th in 2008, thoroughly enjoyed the music and the talent of Django and frequently recalled the event with joy.  

And anything that made my father happy, was a bonded seal of approval for me…

And the last thread is that my husband owns and does love his Harley motorcycle. So the This Old Harley book Michael wrote and produced was the cherry on top of personal links…

You can see a full listing of Michael’s books and purchase here:

http://www.biblio.com/michael-dregni~473182~author

I am very superstitious. The fact that Brian and Michael had some pre-existing meaning to me, confirmed it was destiny.  A good sign that would bring good things.

Author’s Edit

I asked my husband to print out the manuscript.  Even though I will do the Author’s Edits in the Word document, I thought it would be kinda’ cool, somewhat easier and I daresay, decadent, to have the actual manuscript to hold and hug and work from. 

It is indeed. 

The only thing was, when I learned the clean copy is 176 pages, I told him to forget the paper copy.  “Too late,” he replied.

So now I have my jewel of a manuscript to touch and tote around and edit.

In front of the fire with the snow blowin’ like a snow globe outside, I can fantasize about the magical world of what I always thought a writer’s world could be like.

Even if it’s just for a few nights.  Even if it’s illusionary.  We all need our dreams…

Back in the world of kitchen, I did begin the cooking the book’s recipes provided by the chefs. 

I don’t know if I mentioned it previously, but the guidelines I gave to the chefs as to what kind of recipes to offer for the book were a Signature dish  - something they are known for – the menu item that customers will ask for time and again. That they will leave home for to eat. That they will introduce family and friends to, as in “You MUST have Chef’s ___!  Fill in the dish here…

The other guidelines were a family or cultural heritage recipe.  I was thinking perhaps the chef grew up with a grandmother or father’s stuffed cabbage or peach cobbler or stuffed ziti or…

Then there was a request for a seasonal recipe – and I emphasized it didn’t or shouldn’t be the default summer recipe.  It’s much more challenging to find a best of breed winter or early spring recipe.

And finally, if the chef could create a new, never-before recipe creation just for the book – that would be very special.

But ultimately, I told the chefs the recipes they were providing was their choice. 

I was so grateful and honored they were taking the time to do this..

I know I am already behind my planned schedule to prepare and cook a recipe from the book every week.  Maybe it was the holiday’s that set me back.

I’m trying.

For no real reason, except I so love their food – and the two of them --I started with the recipes from 18 Bay Restaurant’s Elizabeth Ronzetti and Adam Kopels. 

They are exciting and dedicated and curious chefs – always pushing the boundaries for taste, purity and fresh, local ingredients.

Their fabulous recipe entries for the book:

Signature: BBQ striped bass fin

Seasonal: Black bow tie pasta with local squid and guy lok

Family Heritage: Immaculata’s stuffed peppers  (How cute is this?!)

New: Roasted razor clams with Chinese long beans and fresh chilies

Last week I make the BBQ striped bass fin.  We have a formidable BrevilleÒ panini cooker we got from Williams-Sonoma last year and it BBQ’s too! 

It’s a great cooking tool and I should use it more often. 

It’s like the front line of Notre Dame’s “Fighting Irish”: solid and consistent.

The striped bass was delicious. By the time it got to the table. 

Both Maria – my garden design client who is a fabulous cook – and who graciously agreed to be a cooking partner in this culinary trial adventure, had some real fun with the fish….

The striped bass fin was by turns an exotic yet simple dish to prepare.  I love the juxtaposition. 

The culinary crossroads were never tastier…

Stay tuned for next entry.

I made Immaculata’s stuffed peppers tonight.

Cheers and bon appetit!

The Start of the Prequel

It was just about this time last year that I had not quite recovered (!) from the change in locale for my book, ” Homegrown.” 

I had already had the penultimate honor of interviewing the top New York City chefs who were – and remain – keystone leaders of the locavore, farm to table, in-season menu.  They are also game-changers for bringing attention to upgrading school menus and edible school gardens and inaugurating cooking lessons for our children…  

And not so curiously, many are now pretty much known by their first names: Dan, Michael, Peter, Mario…

In what seems like a New York minute, we now know chefs are rock stars, right? J

I had carefully researched each and every potential chef for the book.

It was not good enough that they were great chefs. 

After all, I can say with no undo humility, that Gotham has more amazing chefs per square block than anywhere else in the galaxy. 

No, what I was in search of, were the leaders – those who denied the phone ordering from the purveyor for – well, frankly; for the unknown. 

To those who weren’t with me when I first started the book in early ’02, “my” chefs were those revolutionaries who inspired a sea change in how we think about food, cooking, local farmers and fishermen, and artisanal food makers. 

Predominately, the chefs I researched and selected were from New York City and two from the Garden State.

Later, my publisher asked me to add in the Hamptons. 
Whey not? J  I found five chefs and their restaurants right off the bat there that would add to the New York Homegrown book.

You see, I started with the concept that gardens and farms are so beautiful and magical that they inspire artists – all artists – but especially the culinary artist.   It seems obvious but maybe not. I felt this is a compelling story that needed to be told.  Unlike musicians or painters or fashion designers, culinary artists use the bounty of the garden in their own artistic endeavors.

I promise that when I say or write ‘My” chefs I will stop using the quote marks. 

But I must admit I’ve used the “designation” as a way to distinguish “my” selected/chosen chefs in the local/sustainable/food/culinary cuisine arena vs. other good /great chefs. 

See how exhausting and challenging it is to label a food movement with more monikers and descriptors than a Greek diner’s menu offerings?!

And I am ever mindful not to suggest possession or too much familiarity.

But truth be told; I love my chefs.  Like children.

Each and every chef is extraordinarily special to me. 

Chefs are loving and sharing artists.  They want to give what they have created to others. (Food just won’t keep like that Picasso!) 

So you might better understand when I say ”my” chefs, these are the chefs I selected for the book.

But in fact, the chefs belong to all their adoring customers, foodies, and frankly, to history -- because they have and are forever changing how we define food and cooking and, by no small means, how we manage our national and international agriculture, healthcare and nutrition.

Whew! 

These inter-related issues are consuming.  To say the least.

And my chefs are passionate about using what is now their bully pulpit to change the world and make us all healthier and happier to enjoy delicious, tasty food that is good for us and the environment.

Oh, and they love to entertain.  They have successful restaurants. 

While they were busy changing the world, they needed to have legions of loyal dining customers who just cannot live without their culinary creations.

I am forever blessed to live in a part of the extended culinary “world” (there are those quotes marks again that serve to suggest something more.)

In this case my culinary world includes more than local geography or locale.  It includes a commitment to the concept of Slow Food, international sustainable food production and caring for our environment.  To maintaining a garden filled with a variety of vegetables, herbs, bees, flowers and love.

And delicious, amazing seasonal food!

Therefore -- I wanted - and needed -- the chefs in my book to be the best of the best in the local farm to table and sustainable food movement (see above!)

For some, their names were already familiar to me. I had eaten at their world-class restaurants. 

For others, I had read about their work, researched their commitment and dedication to the locavore/sustainable food initiative and only then, approached them to ask if they would agree to be part of the book. 

I have already written of the list of New York City chefs that will be included in that book.  (see earlier blog post)

I am thrilled my editor recently asked for an expanded list of New York City chefs and that we're back up in the queue. 

But last year, the change in locale to focus this first book exclusively on Long Island, as opposed to including The Hamptons in the New York City book was a directive from my publisher.

The first Homegrown book from me was to be from Long Island. New York City would be the second book from me.

The magnitude of this was extraordinary to me. 

Not only did I have many of the profiles text written for the New York City chefs but we had completed almost all the photography of the chefs in their inspired gardens or farms, and cooking their recipes in the kitchen restaurants.

My Homegrown book features a profile for each chef – their story of how they got to be a leader who is passionate about seasonal, local ingredients, Four recipes from each chef, a garden art rendering I do of their inspired garden or farm, and the corresponding plant list.

My dream is that readers will in turn be inspired by the master chefs and their gardens and farms and be able to grow a garden based on the garden designs and plant lists and then cook and bake the recipes gifted by the chefs.

Furthermore, I was privileged to have been able to spend special time with these extraordinary chefs interviewing them to garner their unique stories of how they got to be successful and then, along with my photographer and food stylist, photographed the chefs in their inspired gardens and with their farmers and gardeners.

It is a very personal, intimate relationship. 

Not so different from my garden design clients.  Meaning you are in their homes– and in their head…

I respect all they do with their craft. 

I start from that perspective.

You see, the process of getting to a list I could be proud of required me to establish critical criteria in order to get to a book-worthy chef.

Every chef had to have demonstrated pioneering leadership in developing relationships and infrastructure for a food community of farmers, fishermen and artisans.

In starting the research for the Long Island roster of chefs, I turned the spotlight on key geographic spots that would not only fulfill my publishers desire to represent the entire Island, but would tell the best story about the culinary culture of this area nick named Pleasure Island. (For good reason.)

I found Long Island’s historical, agricultural, immigration, fine arts heritage including literature, painting, cinema and the arts, along with its unmistakable fabric of wealth and money - a fertile, fascinating exploration.

I identified my local Long Island area into the North Shore often called the Gold Coast, separated from Connecticut by the Long Island Sound and the South Shore.   Out on the East End of the Island and its two fingers jutting out to the Atlantic is the North Fork and its vineyards and the South Fork or the Hamptons and the Hampton Bays.

There is unmitigated beauty found here.  The bays and inlets, the shorelines, farms and dunes are indeed the stuff of dreams.

Nature blessed this region with caressing microclimates to allow its farmers to grow a bushel basket full of many varieties of world-class vegetables and herbs.  The rows and rows of fragrant lavender will make your grab your heart with joy.

Today, chefs are helping others to discover the native plants like foraged sea rocket and purslane!

Early on, hunters found game plentiful.

Flocks of duck soon became a brand for Long Island. 

And the herds of smiling goats produce happy, world-class cheese. 

The waters that hug Long Island give both the sports and commercial fishermen seasonal fresh fish that help define the culinary culture with its razor clams, oysters, sea bass, porgies and tuna.

Its garden history is the stuff of legend: from the estate gardens in Westbury and Bridgehampton to the vineyards of the North Fork to the cottage gardens in Sag Harbor.

From the early Dutch and English settlers to the Italians, the bouillabaisse of homegrown cuisine makes for a food tradition that, coupled with the proximity of a sophisticated New York City influence and clientele, the area’s artistic inspiration fuses an extraordinary culinary oeuvre.

It’s a vacation mecca. It’s an artistic muse.

It’s an enigma.  It’s a story I couldn’t wait to tell…

For about two months, I read restaurant reviews, travel pieces, real estate overviews, historical literature, Edible East End magazine and talked to food experts in Manhattan and Long Island in order to secure outstanding chef recommendations to add to the list of five chefs I already had secured as part of the New York City Homegrown book.

The original five are Chef Joe Realmuto, Nick & Toni’s; Chef Michael Rozzi, Della Femina; Chef Eberhard Mueller, Satur Farms; Ted Conklin’s American Hotel and Anna Pump from Loaves & Fishes and Bridgehampton Inn and cookbooks and …. (THE best orange marmalade anywhere. I promise.) 

By February and March, I had narrowed the search to produce a very solid list of about 16 to 18 possible chefs I was proud to call “my chefs!”

Here is the original list, below. 

The asterisked names are those who didn’t make it to the final manuscript.  The reasons for almost all were due to either bad scheduling or lack of or non-communication. Couldn’t confirm in time or to meet deadlines.

In the case of Ina, she initially agreed, as part of the first book and then… pouf.

“No.” 

Perhaps she got too famous … I thought she’d be noticed by her absence or omission from a book about master chefs and cooks from Long Island…

Believe me, I tried.  I sent congratulations peonies (her favorite flower) when she was awarded the Matrix Award from Women in Communication.  I asked her florist to put in a good word for me.  I asked Chef Joe from Nick & Toni’s to put in a good word for me when he appeared on her show last year. I promised to work with her schedule, and against my better judgment to use a standard bio she already has for the profile (dull, I know but I thought I’d make the exception.)  But despite the most wonderful assistant in the world, the PR folks went silent. Nada. Sorry.

But really, who cares?!

With only a few modifications, the list was an enduring one straight through to final manuscript.

But it’s another story about how we got to that point. J

List of Long Island Homegrown Chefs for the book:

North Shore

Bistro M, Chef Mitchell SuDock Glen Head

18 Bay, Chefs Elizabeth Ronzetti and Adam Kopels, Oyster Bay/Bayville

South Shore

The Lake House, Chef Matt Connors, Bayshore

The Grey Horse Tavern, Chef Meredith Machemer, Bayport

North Fork

North Fork Table & Inn, Chefs Claudia Fleming and Gerry Hayden, Southold 

Jedediah Hawkins Inn, Chef Keith Luce, Jamesport

Satur Farms, Chef Eberhard Mueller, Cutchogue

* David Intonato, Jamesport Manor Inn

* Hank Tomashevski, The Frisky Oyster

South Fork

Nick & Toni’s, Chef Joe Realmuto, East Hampton

Della Femina, Chef Michael Rozzi, East Hampton

Loaves & Fishes, Chef Anna Pump, Sagaponick

The American Hotel, Chef Jonathan Parker, Sag Harbor

Almond, Chef Jason Weiner, Bridgehampton

Foody’s, Chef Bryan Futerman, Water Mill

* Kevin Penner, 1770 House

* Ina Garten, Barefoot Contessa

Hampton Bays

Starr Boggs, Chef Starr Boggs, West Hampton

OSO Restaurant, South Hampton Inn, South Hampton

* Christian Mir, Stone Creek Inn

Now I had to start talking to the master chefs to learn the details of their amazing culinary stories…

How Did Your Kitchen Design Get That Way? Psst - Find Out at MoMa

You’d think with all the kitchen photography for the Homegrown book, not to mention my own obsession with cooking, that I’d be less than eager to visit the New York Museum of Modern Art - MoMa’s “Frankfurt Kitchen.”

But nothing could be further than the truth.

The description in the Arts’ section of The New York Times noted the exhibit is “a point of reference,” and explained the show “explores the 20^th –century kitchen and its relationship to food, labor, consumerism and female identify.”

I couldn’t wait to see what was cookin' at the museum about this unique topic.  

So right after it opened in September, I eagerly made it an afternoon at MoMa and a respite in the musuem's unparalleled sculpture garden.

By today’s McMansion uber designs, the kitchen dynamic curated in this exhibit might seem puny.

Long before the kitchen became the center of many homes with “aspirational” kitchen technology that rivals industrial kitchens, there was the kitchen that was buried down below for the kitchen staff to maneuver, or tucked away where women toiled. 

(I say aspirational for today’s kitchens because so many homes are outfitted with amazing culinary gadgets only to sit idle.  People too often eat out or order in or use processed food.)

That phenomena is changing, right?!

I learned that standardization after World War II was a defining feature of modern kitchens. 

There was a hopefulness about the promise of technology.

Adjustable stools allowed women to sit and peel vegetables without standing. 

Progress is glacial J 

The kitchen was also moved closer to the living quarters to Mom could keep her eye on the children while working in the kitchen.

Architects aimed to show the admiration for scientific reason and the desire for a more utopian society as well as transform daily life.

Generally, government and society looked to improve the collective social well-being.

I observed so many of the exhibit-goers pointing out kitchen items and images on the scrims that reminded them of their childhoods spent in the kitchen.

Squealing, some were elbowing others in their group, saying, “I should’ve saved Mom’s ___, fill in the blank; whether it was the blender, Tupperware or Melmac.

I got a mixed message reading the goal at that time was that “every available piece of land must be cultivated.”   That's good. (And I loved the show's posters.)

But I couldn't help think this also led to the Levitt-towning of America with all those cookie-cutter tract houses along with ripping the heart out of our small, local farms...

I recommend visiting the exhibit. It explores food culture – it helps explain a lot of what one of my book’s Homegrown chefs described as a food generation lost to Betty Crocker!

In many ways, the mid century kitchen did indeed become the heart of the home.

It did accomplish the goal of transforming society. 

With the benefit of hindsight, not all that change made life better though.

I could see the timeline of processed foods, diabetes, and fast food, just, well, fast-forward before my eyes. 

But for the time it takes to view the exhibit, you can’t help feel the happy promise that the new kitchen and “liberated” Moms and food technology would not only fuel prosperity but also imbue the “Kitchen Debates” of Nixon and Khrushchev and the entire culture.

MoMa curator Juliet Kinchin and Davin Stowell, founder and CEO of the design consultancy Smart Design were both on the Leonard Lopate, WNYC radio show discussing the exhibit.

Kinchin’s curated a show that produced a combination of a heretofore-unexplored issue fusing history, feminism, architecture, and food.

MoMa’s description of the exhibit is as follows:

Counter Space explores the twentieth-century transformation of the kitchen and highlights MoMA’s recent acquisition of an unusually complete example of the iconic “Frankfurt Kitchen,” designed in 1926–27 by the architect Grete Schütte-Lihotzky. In the aftermath of World War I, thousands of these kitchens were manufactured for public-housing estates being built around the city of Frankfurt-am-Main in Germany. Schütte-Lihotzky’s compact and ergonomic design, with its integrated approach to storage, appliances, and work surfaces, reflected a commitment to transforming the lives of ordinary people on an ambitious scale. Previously hidden from view in a basement or annex, the kitchen became a bridgehead of modern thinking in the domestic sphere—a testing ground for new materials, technologies, and power sources, and a spring board for the rational reorganization of space and domestic labor within the home. Since the innovations of Schütte-Lihotzky and her contemporaries in the 1920s, kitchens have continued to articulate, and at times actively challenge, our relationship to the food we eat, popular attitudes toward the domestic role of women, family life, consumerism, and even political ideology in the case of the celebrated 1959 “Kitchen Debate” that took place between Richard Nixon and Nikita Khrushchev in Moscow at the height of the Cold War. 

Featured alongside the Frankfurt Kitchen is a 1968 mobile fold-out unit manufactured by the Italian company Snaidero. These two complete kitchens are complemented by a wide variety of design objects, architectural plans, posters, archival photographs, and selected artworks, all drawn from MoMA’s collection. Prominence is given to the contribution of women throughout the exhibition, not only as the primary consumers and users of the domestic kitchen, but also as reformers, architects, designers, and as artists who have critically addressed kitchen culture and myths.

The MoMa kitchen exhibit runs through March14th.  212-708-9400

http://moma.org/interactives/exhibitions/2010/counter_space/credits

After touring the exhibit, I visited the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller sculpture garden, naturally. 

It is a quintessential urban garden, punctuated by all those sensual Picasso and Giacometti.

Designed by Philip Johnson in 1953 on the same site as Ms. Rockefeller’s town house, it is an outdoor room. 

(As an aside, recently I read, "Angeology," a thriller of a story where Abby Rockefeller's guiding help and the garden at MoMa play a critical role.  A great read.)

In 2004   architect, Yoshio Tanaguchi redesigned the garden, expanding it yet again.

The garden area is sunken with water reflecting pool or ‘canals” as Johnson called them, weeping birch and beech trees.

It is a peaceful place.  A contemplative garden where one can think about and reflect upon the fine art exhibit one has just experienced.

On this day, I saw that Yoko Ono had placed her Wish Tree where visitors could write their wish and place it on a tree branch; with the “promise” the wish would come true.

That was too irresistible and I made a wish for my father…

 

Next up “must see” at the MoMa is Paula Hayes, Nocturne of the Limax maximus now through February 28, 2011.  It features incredible work of landscape designer artist Hayes.  Curious and gorgeous living gardens in glass!

According to MoMa:

Since the 1990s, New York–based artist and landscape designer Paula Hayes (b. 1958) has produced botanical sculptures—organically shaped vessels made from blown glass, silicone, or acrylic and filled with a rich variety of plant life—that expand upon the classic terrarium, both through their imaginative containers and the microcosmic universes within. Hayes has conceived an installation for the Museum lobby that includes a fifteen-foot-long, wall-mounted horizontal sculpture for the west wall, and a free-standing, egg-shaped, floor-to-ceiling structure nearby. Organic in form and containing a variety of living plants, the vessels will add a joyful vitality to the lobby, enlivening the space during the winter season.

And Garden Design magazine just wrote about the exhibit too.  Kudos for spreading the good word about beautiful gardens.

http://www.gardendesign.com

Great Grain Lecture at The New School

Great Grains 

I was excited to see the invitation to The New School lecture in New York City for three reasons:  it featured Gramercy Tavern restaurant Executive Chef Michael Anthony, who is a featured master chef in my book, New York City Homegrown that celebrates Gotham’s culinary revolutionaries and leaders of the farm to table movement. 

Second, the topic was “The Educated Eater: Regionally Grown Grain.”

Now, a grain may be just a tiny thing, but, hey, size is not everything.

The fact is grains are Big news. They are important.

I can’t make my breads without them, after all. 

I have written about Cayuga Pure Organics, a local grain grower in upstate New York.  (http://celebritychefsandtheirgardens.blogspot.com

 -- February 4, 2010)

The Cayuga Pure Organics miller was on the panel for the evening. So that was another plus. 

My curiosity to learn more about grains is unabated. I wanted to learn more.

And lastly, the New School is a mere half a block from the apartment.

Perhaps that is four reasons…

In any event, as Eloise would say, I “skibbled” down the street on a lovely late autumn evening, past the movie-set Gothic beauty of the First Presbyterian church across the street and on the way down the block.

There was lots going on at the New School.  I found I had to cross back over the courtyard and up to the top floor

Signing in, I could see the panel discussion drew a fairly good-sized audience.  

And the session was being videotaped.  www.youtube.com/thenewschoolnyc

It was disappointing Chef Michael was not able to make it, according to the New School registration.  

The good food news though was Registration provided flyers announcing Food Studies at The New School: A Cutting Edge Discipline.  Citing "Food as a subject of study is becoming increasingly popular... from TV to blogs :) to food-related issues from safety scares to environmental concerns, to Mrs. Obama's campaign about obesity, Food Studies at The New School will include courses on food history, food policy and politics, the environment, sustainable food systems and media...

For more information visit: 

http://www.newschool.edu/ce/foodstudies/

The panel was composed of inspired experts, moderated by June Russell. 

June’s bio on the handout says she joined Greenmarket in 2004 and learned the market system through managing neighborhood-based markets across the City. For the last four years she has been the organizations Farm Inspections Manager and has traveled extensively within the region, visitor producer farms and production facilities.  These experiences have given her background and insight to think strategically on behalf of growers and about steps to rebuild or local food system. Her recent work on facilitating the production of grains and processing in the region highlights Greenmarket’s capacity to be a progressive force in driving farm viability in the Northeast.

She demonstrated her acumen and passion for the subject – and for the panelists’ participation and devotion to their craft.

The discussion was a high point – part of Greenmarket’s Grains Week, November 14-21, 2010.

The moderator, June, provided an overview of grains; how we got to where we are today with pretty much a monoculture of grains used for food production. 

Soon, she introduced the three panelists, 

starting with Alston Earnhardt, Grower, Lightning Tree Farm, Dutchess County, NY.

After raising bee, pork, lamb and chickens and growing the grain to feed his animals, Alston “realized there was more interest in the organic feed he was producing than the livestock.” He was soon “committed to growing organic grains for animal feed.” 

Seems Alston was consumed with grains. 

So it wasn’t too much of a stretch when he started “growing food grade grains for his own consumption!

In 2003 he started he started working with Don Lewis of Wild Hive Farm Bakery to scale up this production.” 

2010 is the first year the sales of food grade grains have surpassed the sales of grains for livestock, according to The New School material.

Alston pointed out the most common grains used are oats, wheat, barley, and rye. 

He saved seeds to grow and clean. He replanted the seeds himself.

Describing his first challenge, Alston said he was told,  ‘You can’t grow hard wheat in the east,’

“But that’s what I wanted to do!” he chortled

“For home baked bread, most seed varieties are still for arid Midwest, whereas the east is humid.”

He learned he had to get seeds to work with the climate here in the Northeast. 

Now, the varieties of hard and soft wheat he grows are most likely what would have been what was grown here in the 1700’s.

Next up was Greg Moll, the head Miller for Farmed Ground Flower, the “local business that mills grain grown by Cayuga Pure Organics. 

Greg told the rapt listeners what grains he’s been milling.  “It’s a challenge with spelt, rye, buckwheat, saffron, and hard wheat.  I’m still figuring out oats,” he said.  Greg went on to explain that oats need to steam and, presently, they don’t have the money to invest in the equipment to be able to do that. He doesn’t have any infrastructure to remove the hulls.  “The cost is to truck and have work done, so consequently many growers and millers don’t explore ancient varieties. 

The good news is he reports demand is up for greater/more grain varieties.  “People feel passionate about new, rediscovered grains.  So he is bullish the infrastructure will come.

Moll described how moisture makes modern milling tough to do.

He said milling wheat is most complicated.  “Rye and buckwheat are so easy to mill- and they are sustainable. “Eat more buckwheat!” the panelists admonished.

I found it interesting when Greg pointed out that grain growing involves multiple constituencies, including farming and agriculture, millers, and the baking sciences. 

“Whatever bakers ask us for, we’ll work with them,” he said, with what sounded like a lot of respect and artisanal pride.

Moll pointed out that the Greenmarket has been “totally instrumental” in making it possible to expand and provide the flours that bakers and chefs and the public are now asking for.  Plus, he was able to migrate from part time to full time Miller!  He now has the tools at his disposal to offer a greater variety of milled grains and flours. 

http://www.cporganics.com/live/

Panelist Nathan Leamy, Baker and Grains Specialist, provided the International perspective. 

He looks at how people study food. He works for Slow Food USA, teaches bread-baking classes and has traveled the world studying and reporting on food science and agriculture policy.

He first got interested in grains while in college. 

At that time he was keen to learn how alfalfa and Ag policy were changing what we eat in the States.

He was also focused on food consumption and production around the world. 

Eventually he transitioned to home baking. 

And he’s been spreading the word on grains and bread ever since

According to the literature, Leamy studied politics and managed 152 acres of organically grown alfalfa.

He then attended Oberlin College where he worked with the student cooperative association to develop a housing and dining coop, which focused on educating students to eat well.  Upon graduation, Nathan completed a Watson Fellowship studying how global changes in agricultural and economic policy have altered the consumption of traditional breads in Mexico, India, France, Italy and Egypt. 

He currently works as the Associate Director of Operations and Human Resources for Slow Food USA. 

Leamy emphasized how unique grains are. Using an apple as an example, he said all apples basically have the same genetic makeup, whereas grains change a lot with soil, moisture, etc.

On top of that, grains have to be turned into powder stuff then take to another expert.

There were expert bakers and chefs in attendance :) 

“You eat what you have locally. Eat what’s local” were statements echoed by all the panelists.

And now that there is more of a variety of grains being grown locally, there is a choice.  

We don’t have to settle for just more white flour. .

And as growers, these leaders know they can set themselves apart in a crowded, overused white-flour world.

So many variables. 

Bread today is very different from 100 years ago, the panelists pointed out.

Most notable, they commented that breads today are not heavy breads.

Except for my bread.