Fun Food Videos

originally posted on http://jeffersonfoodweb.ning.com on 4 Dec 09

I’ve been watching a lot of videos lately, and I’ve posted a couple that talk about the benefits of organic and local food and how knowing where your food comes from is that beginning of making meaningful change.

Here the folks at Earthbound Farm put together a video about the reasons for choosing organic as a safe food choice. Earthbound is the largest organic grower in the U.S. – farming on 33,000 acres in southeastern California, southern Arizona, and northern Mexico.


This second film is about the People’s Grocery in west Oakland, where director Brahm Ahmadi describes food as being both intimate and universal to everyone as he talks about food justice. Ahmadi isn’t just talking about food here, he’s talking about the injustice and food insecurity of poor urban communities. It brings way more to the table than the question of where your food comes from (although People’s Grocery addresses that too). There are other videos with Ahmadi, so if he gets you excited, be sure to watch the rest of them. This video comes from the Global Oneness website, a remarkable website about changes happening in the world regarding food, economic, social justice and the changing face of communities.

The Season of Giving: Christmas without the shopping

originally posted on http://jeffersonfoodweb.ning.com on 9 Nov 09

Treats from the Tasty-Q in YrekaAfter reading The Center for the Advancement of the Steady State Economy (CASSE) website and its recommendation to seek fulfillment from something either than shopping, Vinnie and I talked about Christmas. Christmas is the pinnacle of American shopping; it even has its own unofficial holiday – Black Friday. No positive connotation there, but despite that, the day after Thanksgiving is one of the busiest shopping days of the year. Even as a non-TV watcher, I understand that Christmas gets heavy hype: movies, commercials, TV shows that all promote the season of spending (oops, I meant giving).

So what about the season of giving? How is this tied to a Steady State economy website? Well, Vinnie and I started asking ourselves questions: what would Christmas be like if it weren’t about the spending and resultant gift giving? What if gift giving were a very minor part of the holiday ritual? What would we replace shopping and gift giving with? How could we “give” to each other, our family and friends without buying a lot of stuff? And what do we want our holiday traditions to be?

First, we started talking about how we’d like to spend our time: a traditional dinner with family (actually, probably a few of these); less traditional, sillier gatherings with friends (beverages will be served); a really nice dinner out together with a multi-course dinner, a decadent dessert, and a reason to dress up; driving around to look at Christmas light; skiing in the woods. I’m planning a hand-made Christmas card making day with friends, and I think more of that kind of thing needs to be thought up: maybe making cookies and pies with girlfriends.

We talked about gift giving too, because we couldn’t just drop it entirely. We’re thinking of things from second hand stores, like old board games (we just got a 1967 edition of Battleship!), unique finds, and even things we may not end up keeping (like a puzzle). Vinnie suggested that throughout the year we squirrel away things we already have that are packed away, and regift them to each other. An interesting idea: how many things are in the closets and garage that I have completely forgotten about? And since we’re not going on a shopping spree, will we still have a tree? I’m thinking yeah. We both like the soft glow of a Christmas tree in the house, and Vinnie has strong childhood memories of the tree with the model train underneath – that’s something we can build on. (Plus we scored a plastic tree at a second hand store last year!)

What does all of this mean beyond the scope of our personal lives? Well, Juliet Schor, co-chairwoman of the board of the Center for a New American Dream, told the New York Times that Americans can’t be expected to save the global economy by shopping. Much of our purchases are rung up on credit cards, and we’re starting to learn that the magic plastic isn’t so good for us after all, she says. “Many [consumers] are articulating that they’ve changed for good, rejecting the happy-go-lucky spending of the boom for a more cautious, grounded and sustainable consumer attitude,” Schor told the Times in an op-ed piece. She goes on to say that the big reason that we can’t continue to rely on consumption-based economic growth is that the planet can’t support our ravenous shopping habits. Then she talks about climate change, dirty energy, and a frightening timeline. I’m not going to go there, because, after all, I’m talking about Christmas.

For us, this idealist discussion is based on the absolute truth that we don’t have a lot of money to spend, and the money we do have we want to hold on to for other, more important things. So we’re looking at a Christmas with way more friends and family time, far less shopping, and an experience of valuing and enjoying our time together. That sounds so much more pleasant than wading through crowds on Black Friday.

Cattle ranching and conservation meet in Siskiyou County

originally posted on http://jeffersonfoodweb.ning.com on 31 Oct 09

Once again, our Sustainable Communities class took a wonderful field trip, this time to the Nelson and Shasta Big Springs ranches that were recently purchased by The Nature Conservancy. The 4,500-acre Shasta Big Springs Ranch, purchased this spring, has miles of the Shasta River and Big Springs Creek on it, and TNC has been taking steps to fence off the river to keep cattle from destroying the river banks. At the same time, continuing to operate a successful cattle ranch is a priority of the conservation organization, Chris Babcock, a TNC field scientist working on the ranch told our class. While there has been a focus to keep cattle out of the waterways, TNC’s ranch manager has been working to restore old irrigation systems so that the ranch can operate effectively. Keeping cattle out of the river allows the stream side plant life to thrive, creating shade that will help keep water temps low and stabilizing stream banks, which will help the river channel remain or return to a narrow channel.

While we were visiting, standing on a bridge over Big Springs Creek in the cold wind, we saw a handful of Chinook salmon – a welcome sight for the scientists who have been monitoring activity. Along the banks we saw dozens of yellow flags that indicate fish redds (nests) in the river. The restoration of Big Springs Creek and the Shasta River is an ongoing project, and while it was fun for us to see big Chinooks with their fins cutting the surface of the water, the TNC staff will be taking careful count to see how many Chinook return.

The Nature Conservancy has called the Shasta River ranches “linchpin” properties in the effort to restore California’s salmon fishery. The Shasta is a tributary to the Klamath River, another big salmon habitat river (the 2nd largest in the state), and provides ideal spawning habitat (at least under ideal conditions). In the past, when riparian vegetation was prominent, the Shasta remained a cool 52 to 54 degrees F – just what salmon are adapted to. With the loss of stream side vegetation and the widening of river banks, which makes the river waters shallower, the river hasn’t been able to maintain those cool temps. Hopefully, the work on the Nelson and Shasta Big Springs Ranches will restore that important habitat, and create a haven for spawning salmon species.

Where’s the beef? Learning about local beef at Prather Ranch

originally posted at http://jeffersonfoodweb.ning.com Sept 16, 2009

Jim and Mary Rickert at Prather RanchYesterday College of the Siskiyou’s new Sustainable Communities class took a field trip to Prather Ranch, an organic and natural cattle ranch in eastern Siskiyou County. We went to the USDA-inspected slaughter house on the ranch outside of Macdoel to tour the facility (this was after the regular Tuesday slaughter). Ranch managers Jim and Mary Rickert gave us a tour, talking about the steps they take to make sure that the animals are treated well and not stressed out when they are harvested. Their abattoir is modeled after the work of Temple Grandin, a designer of livestock handling facilities and a Professor of Animal Science at Colorado State University. Reducing the stress an animal is under before slaughter is so much more humane, something Prather prides its self on, and greatly improves the quality of the meat.

Mary explains packaging process and tracking capabilitiesThe transparency of the operation at Prather Ranch is really comforting: anyone can take a tour on the regular Tuesday harvest. School groups, church groups, authors, reporters, and community organizations have all take tours at the facility. There is a real sense of commitment to the animals at Prather and the development of a program that puts the animals first.

The operation that has developed over the last 30 years at Prather Ranch is wide ranging: locals know about Prather Ranch beef, and restaurants boast that they use it. But a big part of the operation is providing skins, bones, blood and other parts of the cow to biomedical device and pharmaceutical companies that use these products in a variety of ways. As the demand for Prather Ranch products and beef has grown, so has the ranch, which now has 44,000 acres of ranch land in 5 Northern California counties that house 4000 cows.

If you’re a beef eater and a supporter of clean, healthy, local food, you should go see the folks at Prather Ranch. You’ll find their phone number on their website and find that they will be more than happy to have you join the Tuesday slaughter house tour.

Howdy

I’m Renee Casterline, a wannabe farmer currently living in Mt. Shasta, Ca with my eyes on farming at my folks’ place outside of Gazelle (the town I grew up in). I’m also a student at Prescott College, where I’ve created a very customized program called Sustainable, Local Food Systems. Other students have pursued similar programs; what makes mine unique is that I’m looking at food systems models – farmers markets, CSAs (Community Supported Agriculture), buyers’ clubs, herd shares, community gardens, food sharing, and more – and how they could be applied to our foodshed here in far Northern California. Even though we live in an area with a fairly short growing season, we are blessed to have a handful of dedicated growers and easy access to the bounty of the Redding/Chico and coastal growers and the variety of fruits so plentiful in Southern Oregon. Through my coursework for Prescott I’ve been looking at our local growers with the intention of surveying regional programs and food system models to see how we can better strengthen and grow our local food network and economy here in the State of Jefferson. This blog will serve as a community bulletin board where I’ll share my findings.