Tuesday September 16th, 2008
In this issue:
Can Slow Food Feed the World?
By Bryan Walsh
Over Labor day weekend, thousands of foodies flooded a special farmers'
market set up by Slow Food Nation in San Francisco's grand Civic Center.
But the gourmands who showed up eager to fill their baskets with dry-farmed
Early Girl tomatoes and muslin-wrapped Cheddar cheeses might have
been surprised to find that the first event of the conference wasn't
a seminar on artisan bread but an earnest panel on the global crisis
of rising food prices. Slow Food--the anti-fast-food, anti-industrial-agriculture
movement launched in 1986 by a left-wing Italian journalist--too often
has tilted more toward high-class gastronomy than hard-to-solve public-health
issues, a criticism the weekend conference sought to address. "This
is a coming-out party for a more inclusive Slow Food movement,"
says culinary writer Michael Pollan, who moderated the panel.
With worldwide crop prices soaring, the élitist charge often
tossed at Slow Food groups--which have some 16,000 members in the
U.S.--suddenly stings a bit more. Who cares about the perfect mushroom
when more people are going hungry? The movement's leaders are responding,
however, by putting politics back at the center of Slow Food's agenda
and calling for reform of a global agro-industry they say has failed
farmers and eaters alike. "How did we get to a place where it
is considered élitist to have food that is healthy for you?"
asks Katrina Heron, head of the San Francisco-based Slow Food Nation.
The one thing Slow Food and its critics agree on is that something
is wrong with the global food system. According to the U.N. Food and
Agriculture Organization (FAO), in 2007 50 million more people were
hungry than in 2006. At the same time, unhealthy, heavily processed,
American-style fast food has spread beyond our borders, eroding traditional
ways of eating. The solution, say Slow Food devotees, is to shift
to cuisine that is "good, clean and fair," grown mostly
organically by local farmers.
Sure, slow food tastes better, but agribusiness has long argued that
industrial farming is the only way to economically feed a global population
nearing 7 billion. Organic farming yields less per acre than standard
farming, which means a worldwide Slow Food initiative might lead to
turning more forests into farmland. (To feed the U.S. alone with organic
food, we'd need 40 million farmers, up from 1 million today.) In a
recent editorial, FAO director-general Jacques Diouf pointed out that
the world will need to double food production by 2050 and that to
suggest organics can solve the challenge is "dangerously irresponsible."
Of course, most Slow Foodies aren't arguing that we should eat only
organic arugula. In its broadest sense, the movement is trying to
get people to stop and really think about what's on their plate and
how it got there. In the end, Slow Food is more interested in producing
better-tasting food than leading a jihad against chemical fertilizers,
and there's something to be said for appealing to the stomach to get
to the head.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1838757,00.html
Copyright 2008 Time Inc. All rights reserved.
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Upcoming Events
Great Food. Great Fun. Great Fundraiser. Everyone Leaves Feeling
Great.
Harvest in the Square is a festive celebration of community and cuisine,
and Manhattan's premier food and wine tasting event.
Join us on Thursday, September 18th, for the 13th annual extravaganza
featuring chefs from some of the hottest and most popular restaurants
in the Union Square district as they prepare signature dishes using
fresh farm produce from our very own Union Square Greenmarket. New
York microbrews and wines from New York State and across the globe
are carefully paired with each dish so bring your appetite for a night
of unforgettable food, fun, music and more under the fall foliage
on the West Plaza of Union Square Park! Harvest in the Square is presented
by the Union Square Partnership, a 501(c)(3), non-profit organization,
and proceeds from the event benefit the organization's ongoing beautification
efforts in Union Square Park.
TICKET INFORMATION
General Admission tickets are $115 in advance ($125 at the door).
To purchase tickets, click here. Friends of Union Square Park VIP
tickets for early admission at 6:00 PM are $400 and can also be purchased
online or by calling the Event Hotline at (212) 460-1208.
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Recipes
Home Cooking: Slow Roasting Tomatoes
Last year, we slow roasted a big batch of tomatoes that we froze
and added to soups, casseroles and pasta dishes throughout the winter.
This weekend, we're gearing up to do it again.
Read on to find out about the recipe we use and a few tips.
The recipe: Perfected over several years of roasting
by Alanna Kellogg of A Veggie Venture and Kitchen Parade
The tomatoes: Skip the heirlooms for this one. You're
going to need a lot of tomatoes, and that could get really pricey,
really fast. Go with something meaty, preferably that can be purchased
by the box – usually 20 pounds. We used Romas and had great
results.
The seasonings: For us, garlic is a must. We also
used a mix of Italian herbs on all of our batches last year. This
year, we're going to mix it up a little bit, maybe with some herbes
de Provence and some plain batches to use in homemade salsa.
The timing: This recipe is all about the low-and-slow
method – 10-12 hours at 200F. Finding that much time to cook
can be difficult, so we prefer to let our batches roast overnight.
Waking up to wonderful smells is a bonus.
The roasting: We found that roasting two pans at
a time, both placed in the middle of the oven rack worked best. When
we tried cramming two pans onto each rack, the tomatoes near the sides
of the oven were a little overdone. Use your best judgment with your
individual oven.
The results: The tomatoes should be perfectly wrinkled
and concentrated, and all that's left to do is pop off the skins,
freeze in batches for easy use and enjoy all winter long.
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