Fair?

The fact that undocumented workers are:

a) indispensible to several industries in this country, especially food and

b) working in horrible conditions

is becoming impossible to ignore, or at least one hopes.

Over here we've got agricultural workers dying of heatstroke out in the fields.

Over here the kosher meat supply is dwindling after an immigration raid, and the plant workers are being processed as criminals.

More supermarket politics?

The mainstream media likes to make a lot out of what our presidential frontrunners eat (usually beginning with "As Brillat-Savarin once wrote, "You are what you eat…" True, yes, but zzzzzzzzzzz).

We have shied away from this topic, because more interesting than the state fair corndogs they might eat (to seem down with the people) would be their stance on the food system, something that is usually much harder to ascertain, and less interesting a photo op.

This upcoming short piece in The New Republic is less about Barack Obama than it is about the neighborhood he hails from and its local supermarket culture, as well as the link between arugula and elitism.

Weekend Links

It's hot out there. Should you need to take a break from your gardening, farming, grilling, etc. this weekend, you can sit down at your computer with an ice cold lemonade and and check out the following:

1. Five Great Websites for Farmers, Wannabe Farmers, and Consumers

2. How to navigate the mysterious origins of those nuts you buy at the store.

3. Talk about rose colored glasses: Have you heard about this miracle berry that makes everything taste sweet?

Stay cool….

Delicious Revolution: a Conservative Cause?

by Slow Food USA staffer and blog editor, Jerusha Klemperer

Check out this thoughtful article from The American Conservative magazine. Its embrace of Slow Food may be surprising to some, but it's a welcome addition to the conversation.

It reminds me of a lunchtime visitor we had a few weeks ago, a farmer from South Carolina who noted that when it comes to Slow Food, conservatives and liberals may be on common ground. Everyone from homeschooling homesteaders to harvesting hippies can get behind good, clean food and the virtuous revival of sitting down together over a meal and appreciating its bounty.

Now some may flinch, like I did, when the author says that "life's inevitabilities don't warrant our shame," (when referring to Michael Pollan's shame that not everyone in this country has access to delicious food), and some may take issue, like I did, with his assertion that industrialized ag is just more productive than organic ag.* But it is interesting to see how true, traditional "conservatives" don't like the darn Farm Bill and its subsidies any more than the liberal democrats, and that they too would like to see a return to more mid-scale and regionally based food systems and economies.

Most delightful? The realization by an East Coaster like myself that in San Francisco, even the traditional conservatives have CSA shares, cook from The Art of Simple Food and quote Wendell Berry.

* Some may even want to share with him, say, Paul Roberts' The End of Food which explains quite clearly how those large yields end up producing diminishing returns after a few years.

PS: Also check out this interview from the same issue of American Conservative –Michael Pollan and Rod Dreher, the author of Crunchy Cons.

A Not-So-Secret Garden

To add to yesterday's post about planting an edible garden on the White House lawn:

Roger Doiron, over at Kitchen Gardeners International (whom we wrote about earlier this year) also has a petition for you to sign, as well as a fleshed out plan for getting our next President to roll up his sleeves and find his inner farmer.

Also, we heard that Alice (Waters) has gotten a verbal commitment from Obama to do just that…

Riding Coattails

The main civic garden on our minds these days is the Victory Garden being planted on the front lawn of City Hall in San Francisco, for Slow Food Nation. However, there's a group out there that has its eyes on a bigger prize: the White House Lawn.*

Most interesting might be their PR tactics–in an effort to ride the immense PR coattails of the new iPhone that debuts this Friday, they are linking their campaign for an organic garden on the White House lawn to Apple's big push. They call themselves "Waiting for Apples," and although this article paints them as a bit unclear on how these two things mesh beyond their Apple-ness, it provides an opportunity to think about how small grassroots campaigns can piggyback on big corporate ones.

To join the effort, you can, er, buy yourself a new iPhone, or sign a petition here.

To follow the progress of the Slow Food Nation Victory Garden, check out their blog.

* For a fun account of Alice Waters' efforts during the Clinton administration to have Bill plant a garden at the White House, read Alice Waters and Chez Panisse, by Thomas McNamee.

Sustainability Standards

Alas, we just found this call for applications to serve on the Standards Committee that will finalize a national standard for sustainable agriculture under the auspices of the American National Standards Institute (ANSI). The deadline is today.

This could be a fascinating process, and it will be very interesting to see the outcome–is "sustainable" something that can be quantified? Will it have the same flaws that many organic farmers feel the codifying of "organic" had?

Let's follow this…

Plant Salvage

by Slow Food USA Intern, Sara Hoffman

According to the American Farmland Trust, "America is losing 1.2 million acres of farmland annually, much of it the best and most productive farmland near where most Americans live." This is a problem not only because fewer farms mean less food productivity. Farmers can be excellent environmental stewards and the loss of farmland exacerbates the problem of unchecked developmental sprawl in the U.S.

Another problem? The loss of plant diversity that occurs when these lands are cleared. The National Plant Salvage Foundation, near Olympia, Washington, has found a wonderful way to rescue the native plants found on land set to be cleared for development. Though the areas to be bulldozed aren't always farmland, these rescues help to preserve biodiversity and restore the vegetation lost to industrial development, much of which does occur on farmland. Their Salvage Program rescues native plants and then rehabilitates them with the help of volunteers. The plants are then replanted on land where habitat and water sources have been damaged by human enterprise.

This replanted native vegetation helps to repair a site by collecting stormwater run-off and replenishing underwater aquifers, for example. The foundation also holds educational workshops and field trips to teach residents about how the native plants can reduce pesticide use and improve natural habitat.

If you are interested in biodiversity protection such as this, you can also check out Slow Food USA's RAFT Program (Renewing America's Food Traditions) which works to identify, protect, restore and celebrate North America's most endangered native seeds and breeds.

Slow Food Nation Blog

Happy July 4th to all of you and apologies for a slow week of postings here at the blog–the Slow Food USA offices have been closed this week.If you haven't already, please check out the new Slow Food Nation blog–postings from writers around the country (including Jerusha from our SFUSA offices), generating conversation in and around food as a lead up to our big big event in San Francisco over Labor Day. They're chronicling the planting of the victory garden (great pics), discussing Northern California cuisine, etc. And don't forget that tickets are already on sale–here.