Category Archives: Food

TEDxManhattan Streaming Party

Posted on by Paul Heft
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Slow Food South Bay presents:

TEDxManhattan Streaming Party

Changing the Way We Eat

Saturday, February 12, 2011,  7:30 AM – 3:00 PM

World Centric Community Space,
2121 Staunton Ct, Palo Alto, CA

On February 12, The Glynwood Institute for Sustainable Food and Farming will host TEDxManhattan: Changing the Way We Eat, a one-day TEDx event on sustainable food and farming. It will explore our food system — from what happened, to where we are, to what we are doing to shift to a more sustainable way of eating and farming. In an effort to have as many people as possible participate, the event will be webcast live.

For those of you unfamiliar with TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design), it is a small non-profit devoted to Ideas Worth Spreading, using talks and performances. Thought leaders from around the world are invited to give presentations up to 18-minutes long that explore important topics to society. All of the talks are recorded and available in an archive at TED’s web-site. Some memorable talks include, Dan Barber’s How I Fell in Love With a Fish and Jamie Oliver’s TED Prize Wish: Teach Every Child About Food. Check them out and get hooked.

Then plan to join us at World Centric on the 12th. The line-up is impressive, including Ian Cheney and Curt Ellis, makers of King Corn, Brian Halweil of the Worldwatch Institute, Josh Viertel, president of Slow Food USA and many more. You can get the full list at the TEDxManhattan web-site. There is no schedule for individual speakers, but the event will be broken into sessions:

    7:30 AM – 9:15 AM : Session 1 – What Happened?
    9:15 AM – 10:30 AM : Break
    10:30 AM – 12:15 PM : Session 2 – Where are we?
    12:15 PM – 1:00 PM : Potluck Lunch Break
    1:00 PM – 3:00 PM : Session 3 – Where are we going?

Come for one session or stay all day. Those of us staying over lunch time will plan to share a potluck lunch together. Bring something simple, seasonal, local – something sustainable – to share with your neighbors.

(This event is brought to you by a number of partners: Collective Roots, Slow Food South Bay, Transition Palo Alto, Transition Silicon Valley, and World Centric.)

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Holiday garden, cookie and craft exchange – Dec 11

Posted on by bart
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Saturday December 11th 2:00 – 3:30pm FREE !
World Centric Community Space
2121 Staunton Court, Palo Alto

Join us for the holiday community free exchange of garden bounty & Holiday creations. Bring Holiday cookies and decorations to swap & your homegrown fruit, vegetables, eggs, herbs, honey, flowers, and holiday greenery to trade!
 
Throughout the Bay Area, neighbors are coming together for swapping and sharing locally grown, fresh produce. Our first Garden Swap was held August 21, with people coming together to share produce, chat and get to know one another. Four other events followed where home gardeners met for a free exchange of garden bounty. Here is one guest’s rave review: 

“What a great event, like a free farmers’ market – grapes and raspberries and oranges and two types of apples, sage and oregano and rosemary and thyme, sorrel and a plethora of tomatoes, seeds to save and plant, and some beautiful flowers. Thank you!” – Rani

Saturday, December 11, we will expand the concept to exchange homemade holiday creations, as well as all great late fall produce, such as persimmons, lemons, and oranges.  Bring cookies and other sweets, crafts, decorations, & greenery to exchange for the handmade goodies of your neighbors.  Expecting that some of the cookies will be eaten on site, we will provide apple cider to quench your thirst.

Come for the food, come for the community.  Hope to see you there.

Our Palo Alto exchange is supported by a coalition of community ecological organizations and neighborhood groups including: Acterra, Barron Park Green Team, Barron Park Garden Network, Barron Park Assn, Common Ground, Palo Alto Community Gardens, Slow Food South Bay, Transition Palo Alto & World Centric.

You can print out this PDF of the event announcement to hand out to friends and co-workers.

(Information courtesy of Jan Butts)

Garden Swaps – Sept 25 and 11

Posted on by bart
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Garden Swap
September 25 (Saturday) 11 am
Common Ground Garden Supply
559 College Avenue, Palo Alto, off of El Camino Real

[A Slow Food Event will be held at the same time – see below]

September 25 – Dig In! Breaking Ground, Breaking Bread

Join Slow Food South Bay and partners Acterra, Barron Park Green Team, Barron Park Garden Network, Barron Park Association and Transition Palo Alto in the parking lot of our host Common Ground for a Garden and Food Swap as part of Slow Food USA’s National Work Day – Dig In! Breaking Ground, Breaking Bread.

Backyard gardeners, home canners and other people who enjoy the Slowest of food, here is your opportunity to meet like-minded people in your community to exchange the excess produce of your garden, seeds, home-made products, recipes, ideas and more.

We intend this to be a regular event, to be scheduled according to the desires of the members and the produce of the season. As such, we are in the process of creating a database of people and their produce which will help us connect with each other on a regular basis.

Recognizing that a Garden and Food Swap is the most local of events – you neither should nor want to drive half way across the county to swap your excess apples for someone else’s excess tomatoes – we intend to replicate this event at a number of other locations throughout our region as we can.

Come help us kick-off what should be a great project. Bring your tomatoes. Bring your grandmother’s secret tomato sauce recipe. Bring your ideas. If you live in or near Palo Alto, you’ll want to check this out, so that you can help organize it and plan to attend regularly. If you live elsewhere in the area, you’ll want to check it out, so that you can help set up a swap in your neighborhood.

[Text from Slow Flood South Bay Newsletter]

Garden Swap
September 11 (Saturday) 11am to noon
Main Community Garden, located by the Palo Alto Main Library parking area
1213 Newell Road off of Embarcadero.
Continue reading →

Local Garden Swap: Neighbors sharing the fruits of their labors

Posted on by Paul Heft
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What a great idea! Many of us have extra fruits, vegetables, flowers, and herbs in our gardens—so Jan Butts figured, why not swap them for produce that we could use?

Jan organized what might be this century’s first free exchange of Palo Alto’s garden bounty. Judging from the positive response, there just have to be future swaps.

This free backyard farmers’ market was held 11 AM ‘til noon on Saturday, August 21, in the parking lot at Common Ground Organic Garden Supply & Education Center.

We saw the “gift economy” at work! About 25 people brought items to share and sampled the wide variety of beautiful produce available. Folks were glad for the chance to chat with one another, marvel at interesting varieties, share gardening experiences, and offer ideas of how to use the food. There was even more conversation than we see at farmers’ markets.

The swap is supported by a coalition of community groups including: Acterra, Barron Park Green Team, Barron Park Garden Network, Barron Park Assn., Common Ground, Palo Alto Community Gardens, Slow Food South Bay, and Transition Palo Alto.

Drop by next time, even if you don’t have a harvest to share yet!

Next swap event: 
Saturday, September 11, 11 AM – Noon

at Palo Alto Main Community Garden
located behind the Palo Alto Main Library at 1213 Newell Rd.

(Check for announcements of more garden swap events on this website.)

Follow-up activities for Film Series

Posted on by bart
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Dear Film Series attendees,

Thanks for participating in our fabulous Films of Hope and Vision Film Series! At our potluck on June 18, we talked about ways to learn more and take action. Please read on for information and group contacts. If you’d like to be on the list for a group, just drop the group leader a email message.

We hope to see you at our next Film Series (tentatively scheduled for September). And we’ll let you know about any other activities of interest!

Gardening/Foot Production/Slow Food
The group shared interests, including lawn conversion, fruit trees, apartment gardening, agroecology, tinkering, and information sharing. We are considering an intergenerational gardening project in San Jose that would give us a chance to be involved with gardening and local community members. If you’re interested in keeping in touch on this project or other related activities that come up, please write to William Mutch at permifree AT yahoo DOT com.

Learning More About Transition
Motivated by the film series, about 10 of us will start reading the “The Transition Handbook” as a book group in July. An email message will soon go out to those who have signed up. The group will be co-chaired by Bart Anderson, Paul Heft and William Mutch of Transition Palo Alto. If you are interested (and haven’t signed up already), please write to Bart Anderson at bart AT cwo DOT com.

If your summer is already full, don’t worry. Another group will be starting later in the fall. Also, the “Transition Handbook” can be ordered through local book stores. We’ll probably put in a group order through one of them, to get a discount. Other ways to learn about Transition:

Transition Handbook: http://transitionculture.org/shop/the-transition-handbook
Transition Palo Alto: http://transitionpaloalto.org

Film Series and Community Building
We talked about starting a new film series on Energy/Transportation in September. To do so, we’ll need to identify and preview films. Our first group assignment is to work on ideas. Then we’ll get together starting in July to preview and select films. Also, group members expressed an interest in activities over the summer to continue community building. If you have ideas or would like to help with film series planning or other activities, please write to Barbara Weinstein ( barbara AT ontrk DOT com ).

All the best,
The Films of Hope and Vision Planning Team

movieattendees mailing list
To add/remove yourself from this list, follow this link:
http://www.svanetwork.org/mailman/sub/movieattendees

Friday Night Film Series: Food Issues

Posted on by Paul Heft
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Free   Friday Night Film Series

at World Centric, 7:30 – 9:30 P.M.
2121 Staunton Ct., Palo Alto    (behind JJ&F Market)

  • May 14 – Power of Community –  When the Soviet Union collapsed, Cuba couldn’t export its sugar or import oil . This film shows how Cuba weathered the crisis.  Powerful, insightful, and uplifting.  Don’t miss this one!  (Check out the post-film discussion “map” from Feb. 19, PDF)
  • May 21 – King Corn  – A feature documentary about two friends, one acre of corn, and the subsidized crop that drives our fast-food nation. 
  • May 28 – Two Angry Moms – What’s wrong with school lunches? Strategies for overcoming roadblocks and getting healthy, good tasting, real food into school cafeterias.
  • June 4  – Establishing a Food Forest  – How to establish and maintain a food forest, one of the main sustainable systems that will allow us to inhabit this planet indefinitely.
  • June 11 – In Transition – How local communities, like ours, can respond to peak oil and global warming while building community and enjoying life.  (Check out the post-film discussion “map” from Mar. 12, PDF)
  • June 18 – Potluck (Let’s share food that’s been grown within 100 miles !)

Lively discussions will follow each film.

Sponsored by Acterra, Silicon Valley Action Network, Slow Food South Bay, Transition Palo Alto, Transition Silicon Valley, and World Centric

Film series starts Feb 19

Posted on by bart
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Films of Vision and Hope
Community, Connection and Sustainability

Dates:  Feb 19 – March 19.  Five Fridays.
Times: 7:30 – 9:30 pm

Place: Acterra
3921 E Bayshore Rd., Palo Alto
Directions

Feb 19:  The Power of Community  (post-film discussion “map”, PDF)
Feb 26: The Yes Men  (post-film discussion “map”, PDF)
March 5: What’s the Economy for, Anyway?  (post-film discussion “map”, PDF)
March 12:  In Transition  (post-film discussion “map”, PDF)
March 19: Follow-up (World Cafe discussion of themes from the movies, particularly around ideas of “community”.)

Click for more details.