From the General Manager�s Desk

Food Bills and Pistachios

For those of you who have seen information in the past few days about legislation dealing with food safety, here is the update:

HR 875 This bill is being closely monitored and currently poses no threat to organic growers, backyard gardeners or farmers� markets. Most of the claims about it on the internet are false. For the latest information check www.ccof.org/foodsafety.php.

HR 814 Currently calls for a mandatory animal identification system

HR 759 Complete overall of the FDA with attendant problems for small farms

Currently, Congress is dealing with the larger issues of the economy and climate change.

Any urgent need for action concerning organics will be communicated in the Co-op and on this blog as the situation warrants.

The Pistachio Recall

Our sources for organic pistachios are not involved in the current recall. Any products that are affected by a recall in the Co-op are removed from our shelves immediately.

Early April organic events: thinking, doing and no april foolin

Plato and Aristotle explore organic farming in Ireland

Plato looked to an ideal essence from which our understanding of reality is formed, Aristotle looked at things. Heaven and earth, the sky and the ground, the astral and terra firma.

From fundos to realos (see history here), the organic movement has alwys had both practical and philosophical dimensions. The beginning of April is a golden opportunity to engage in both.

The least apt day of the year for the now departed Merf � Dr. Charles Merfield � to give a talk in Ireland is April Fool's day, for he's far from a fool.

In fact, he's a classic brainbox, full of science, ideas, and inventions.

Merf, until recently an organic crop researcher with Teagasc and UCD, returns to Ireland to give a talk entitled 'Organics: Philosophy of Agriculture Science and Ethics' in UCD on April 1st at 1pm.

This talk is part of the UCD History and Philosophy of Science Lecture Series, and is being held in the Seminar Room of the Humanities Institute of Ireland at University College Dublin (UCD).

Merf's seminar will briefly review the history and context of organic agriculture from its beginnings in the early 1900s with its focus on soil nutrition and human health. It will then examine the 1960s anti synthetic biocide revolution and finally today's multiple organic systems will be considered.

This history will provide a foundation �to examine the fundamental differences between organic and industrial agriculture with a particular focus on ethics, and the role of science followed by and exploration of organic's critique of industrial agriculture� according to Merf.

The next day, April 2nd, features a perhaps more typical but nonetheless interesting organic farming day.

The Teagasc organic conference will be held in the Hodson Bay Hotel, Athlone. It begins at 9am, and features a host of important speakers and topics.

The first session deals with a topic close to every farmers heart. It is entitled, very straightforwardly, 'Making Money from Organic Farming'. Two Teagasc organic advisors James McDonnell and Dan Clavin will present on profitability of organic farms and financial planning for farmers undergoing conversion.

The next sessions deals with market opportunities for organic milk, meat and grain. Perhaps suprizingly, there is no place at the table for the newly formed Irish Organic Milk Producers Company.

However, Glenisk's Vincent Cleary will be one of the chairs, along with chair of the National Organic Steering Committee John Duggan.

A highlight in this session will be the presentation by Dr. Nic Lampkin ofthe Organic Research Centre, Elm Farm, Berkshire. Nic's 1990 book on organic farming is considered a bible while his work on developing the organic sector in wales has been considered integral to their strong recent growth. Nic' s presentation is on UK and EU markets.

Along with Nic, John Purcell of the Good Herdsman � the largest organic meat processor in either Ireland or the UK, John Flahavan of Flahavans who have capacity to talk in more Irish produce, and Anthony Murphy (Skettering Nutrition, Co. Mayo) will present.

The after lunch session gives a farmer's perspective.

Cavan's Richard Moeran has been described as a rare breed with a rare breed. He is chair of Cavan IFA, certified organic and stocks saddleback pigs. He also carries lamb and beef, and grows much of his own feed.

His produce is sold direct and through supermarkets, so he really can speak from and for a number of perspectives.

Also presenting the farmers' perspective is Noel Lynch of Macroom (beef, sheep, tillage)
and Fintan Rice, of Fethard, Co. Tipperary (dairying).

Following this, another session on profitabilty will be held. This time, the focus is on increasing profit margins outside the farm gate. This session is chaired by Peter Young, organic farmer and journalist.

His own Castlefarm enterprise is a great model for innovative ways to increase profitability. With his wife Jenny, they direct sell, make their own cheese, do school trips and a host range of courses. The next one is on making outdoor clay ovens.

Lorcan Burke (Bord Bia) will present on purchasing trends in the current climate, while Mark Winterbotham, (Gold River Farms, Co. Wicklow) will present on direct selling.

See here or ring 059 917 020

Micro Greens Series: Sunflower Greens Pt.1

Micro greens are at the heart of growing food organically without land. They're really fun to do with kids too, and hey, if you don't eat em, feed em to your pets. They're a powerhouse of nutrition and can add so much to a green salad. We learned how to grow these decades ago--here's my orginal instructions for our first ones, sunflower greens, courtesy of the late Ann Wigmore D.D. of the Hippocrates Institute. Her gold standard for healing has always been wheatgrass, and it's basically grown in the same way. I'll have photos of the process in a future post. Food as medicine. Chlorophyll increases the hemoglobin in the blood which then distributes oxygen to every cell in our body. All the microgreens and green drinks are powerful blood cleansers and blood builders.
$$Tip: These are so cheap to grow, and very expensive to buy, and then not as fresh as just clipping and eating them on the spot, no packaging either, just green green green in your bowl and in your pocket.

These are the instructions I've always used. You can use a baking dish, cafe tray, steel or enamel pan. This time I used a 10" plastic plant saucer that was free.

Big grey stripe organic sunflower seeds in the hull and raw.

Put them in the jar with water--they float at first. Soak 12 hrs.

The soaked seeds now laid on top of nice potting mix (add kelp powder for minerals if you have it), and the wet sheets of paper. I don't like to use newsprint.

Cover everything with a plastic bag to incubate for 2-3 days in a warm place. Part 2 will cover what happens next.

First Sunday in Spring in the City of Roses

Started off right at our Farmers' Market, they continue every other week through the winter, we're so lucky, and here's one of the organic anchor farms, "Gathering Together".

Nice work, "Gathering Together".

Spinach, avo and smoked salmon from Farmers Market for this Sunday meal. Give thanks for the farmers. We have many CSA's in our beautiful city, Community-supported-agriculture, where you can actually buy harvest shares in a local farm or coop, and receive weekly boxes of produce for the duration of the contract. Most go April-October, and it's definitely a good option if you need more food than you can grow. The co-op concept gives members a wider range of foods and harvest times, but most are single farms. It really helps the farmers too, it's a great partnership with both sharing the risk and harvest. It keeps all that food money local too, another healthy advantage to the community.

Downtown, I'm happy to see this ancient tree on board for spring one more time.

Did you know that violets are edible and have a cancer-fighting property in the leaves too? You can add them to a salad; grow as edible landscaping in a pot or in the ground. They smell divine.

Happy Spring!

Saving these seeds really paid off. "Hillbilly" is an heirloom tomato that I grew last year and loved. They were huge and made the best creamy, bright sauce. I put a few seeds from my best tomato in between paper towels and look! Potentially, about a hundred pounds of tomatoes, stay tuned.

Everything has just been sitting, waiting for more warmth, light, spring! These radishes are poised for quick growth, you can harvest in about a month.

I moved the baby pac choi into a bigger pot, still in clumps till they gain strength. Then I'll keep some here and spread some elsewhere.

I bought 6 of these for $2.50, about the price of one head of this gourmet lettuce blend. These will be the first to harvest, yippee.

Ah, the first day of spring...this is the day to stand back and watch and listen how the natural world celebrates this time. A day of balance -- equi + nox, equal night and day. It's a good day to get out there and just give thanks for this beautiful earth, give something back to the earth, make an offering to the earth and all the forces that work in harmony to support all life. Make that connection, even for a minute. We're very lucky, and we have a lot to be thankful for; it's a good day to set our intentions for our gardens, ask the spirits in the natural world to help and bless our efforts-- together we can keep growin that positive vibe.
Nationally and locally, the movement towards eating healthier, local, organic, gardening, edible schoolyards, farm to school programs, we're way beyond gaining momentum to packin a full head of steam! Every day seems there's more good news; today Michelle Obama broke ground with some neighborhood schoolkids for the new OG veg garden on the White House Lawn. Green light!

It's a recipe!

It�s official, spring has sprung . . . and the prospect of warming days has us skipping rope around the produce aisles (well, you can imagine that we want to) and cheering �Whahoooo� and �Yippee�! Another way to celebrate the first day of spring (besides skipping rope) is to make a lovely salad, laced with all sorts of wonderful things like collards and chard, cherry tomatoes and sunburst squash. Hey, that sounds like one of our favorites: the Funky Deli-C Salad! We make Funky Deli-C at the Co-op Deli and love to watch smiles grow like daffodils, as folks tuck into this sweet and savory delight. It�s simple to make, and oh so delicious. If you enjoy this salad, don�t forget to check out the O.B. People�s Deli Cookbook, available at Ocean Beach People�s Organic Food Co-op . . . where YOU own the store!!

Funky Deli-C Salad

Serves 4 - 6

1/2 bunch green chard, sliced thin

1/2 bunch collard greens, sliced thin

1/2 jalapeno, minced

1 cup red onion, sliced 1/4 moons

1/2 cups each red and yellow bell peppers, diced

1 1/2 cups sunburst squash, diced

1 1/2 cucumber, sliced half moon

1 handful of cherry tomatoes

1 1/2 Fuji apples, sliced 1/4 moons

Dressing

1 orange, juiced

1/2 cup apple juice

1/2 cup raw tahini

1/2 cup olive oil

1/2 tablespoon basil

1/2 tablespoon oregano

1/4 tablespoon sea salt

1/4 tablespoon black pepper

Place prepared vegetables into a large bowl. Blend the dressing, then pour over the vegetables and mix well.

Mossfield cheese: a(nother) good news organic story

�I sold more cheese this January than last January�. Not typical recessionista talk, but then Ralph Haslam cheeses are not typical either.

Ralph�s organic Mossfield cheese really is the cream of the crop. It has won numerous awards, including some of the highest ranking of awards possible.

At last year�s Great Taste awards in London, Ralph�s mature cheese was the highest placed Irish product, and made it to the last 18 out of almost 4000 products.

It also became something of a celebrity cheese, after a well reported mass order by Bruce Springsteen�s chef the last time the Boss was in town.

Along with the cheeses themselves, the farm has also been gathering up the garlands: Mossfield won the top price at the JFC Innovation awards last year.

The Mossfield range includes a young cheese, garlic and basil, tomato and herb and cumin seed, along with the iconic mature.

Things are going well enough for Ralph to open a new, purpose build 8000 square feet unit on the farm in fact.

This E1.5 million unit, complete with viewing area, was part grant aided by the Organic Unit of the Department of Agriculture Fisheries and Food DAFF.

This unit, indeed the whole farm, will soon be powered by an anerobic digestor, which converts methane gas from slurry, farm yard manure and whey into power. Sustainable Energy Ireland has helped with the process, as has LEADER.

This brand new building will allow for an expansion of the current run of 2-300 kg per week.

�It could take up to 350kg per day, but we�ll keep production lower than that � we want to retain the hand made artisan approach. I�ll probably keep it down to under 600 kg per week� he tells me.

Ironically, this up scaling of production will also result in a lower carbon footprint from the product.

Before this new unit, the cheese had been made in Portumna (East Galway) and stored in Ferbane (West Offaly), all resulting in a round trip of 100 miles before it left for the shops. Now it can all be done on site, from making to maturing, on the 340 acre limestone farm in Offaly.

�The best thing about it really is that you can control everything yourself on the farm. You are not relying on anybody or anything else� according to a visibly pleased Ralph.

Ralph intends to branch out into other types of cheese, possibly a smoked or another herb line. He will also soon start with frozen yoghurts, buttermilk and ice creams. Again, all the milk will come from his herd of 140 Rotbunt-Freisen crosses, 80 of which are milking cows.

Although he supplied Glenisk at present, it is likely that all of the milk produced on the farm will go into their own products quite soon.

As often is the case, many family members are involved in the business, from the farm to production and the retail ends of the spectrum.

Son Andrew and wife Lorraine work on the farm and the cheese production respectively, while son Jonathan runs Birr�s well-known and very busy Organic Store.

Jonathan is fresh from BioFach, the annual organic food industry trade show in Germany, where he kept a close eye on the emerging trends and developments in the organic sector.

There is also a cheese maker employed, with more employees coming on line as the business expands.

Incredibly, not only is business going well for the smiling Offaly man, who sells to premium outlets across Ireland and in the UK, he is also exporting a small but growing amount as far away as California.

The association of Mossfield with the Ryder Cup and the Boss may have helped. So too must the quality.

Farming since 1970 and organic since 1999, Ralph has seen a lot of changes in Irish agriculture. Considering his own vintage, his move towards ever more control of his own destiny is all the more noteworthy.

The "Potato Bag"

A St. Patrick's Day Special--
If you've never eaten fingerling potatoes, try some this year. They're so good they're almost self-buttering, seriously delicious. And this is the year to grow some taters, it's like diggin up gold at the end of the rainbow when it's time to harvest.
Now's the time to plant:
Since I don't have much room, I bought these cool 'Potato Bags' from Gardeners' Supply, and here's how I set them up on 'bare' ground.

I use cardboard as a weed barrier and because I want good drainage on the bottom so I can use it more than one year, no rotting. This is great for any kind of path you want to make, and you can throw it down right on top of the weeds too. Here, I'm covering bare gravelly dirt where some pots had been.

Use a coarse mulch on top that won't break down quickly under foot traffic. Make it twice as deep as you think, it settles; you want all the cardboard covered completely.

Details on the planting bag.

The bag set in place and ready for dirt. I filled it 1/3 full with a nice mix that I mixed up in the wheelbarrow: Planting mix, compost, and mushroom compost, with veg food mixed in too.

Do you have some potatoes like this in the cupboard? These are various organic market spuds that just need to be planted now. Aren't they pretty? A gift from my daughter.

Four purple potatoes and one gold in this bag, in place, before covering with soil. As they grow, I'll continue to add soil. Territorial says you can expect 10 times yield from what you plant for regular potatoes, and 15 to 20 times for fingerlings. Sounds good to me. And they're so easy to plant and care for. You can buy seed potatoes now at the nursery too. Pick up some other starts if you need them, like onions, lettuce, spinach and peas.

Cool Runnings

Check this out:
www.nytimes.com/2009/03/11/dining/11lady.html

Michelle Obama's message: 'Eat fresh food!' �Collect some fruits and vegetables; bring by some good healthy food,� she said. �We can provide this kind of healthy food for communities across the country, and we can do it by each of us lending a hand.� The Times goes on to say: In a speech at the Department of Agriculture last month, Mrs. Obama described herself as �a big believer� in community gardens that provide �fresh fruits and vegetables for so many communities across this nation and world."

March is a true lion. We did get snow 3 days ago, and sleet, hail, rainbows, sunshine, all in one day. Earth Box still tickin....

In other news, the takeout containers win in the germination contest. Tomatoes are up in 4 days.

Cute baby pac choi.

Back at the farm, those peas are finally home, with broccoli in front. Moon waning in Virgo, good for transplanting.

pure science proves organic tastes better

pure science proves organic tastes far better.....

boom

Funky tune too

The Macrocosm

We live in a gardeners' paradise here. There are 32 Portland Community Garden sites, containing over 1100 garden plots and approximately 3,500 gardeners. For the past 14 years, the "Produce for People" program has donated fresh produce grown in Portland Community Gardens to emergency food agencies. Produce for People has donated over 21 � tons since 2005 alone, all with volunteers, and 10,000 pounds just last year. That's a whole heap o good food. If you don't live where there's a great community garden program, start looking around the neighborhood and see what you can get going for your community. It's fast becoming time for some of that sod in the churchyard, in the schoolyard, in our own yards, to turn a new leaf, and grow some more to share with our neighbors.When you think about all the water and landscaping labor that goes into 'window-dressing' and curb appeal, might as well grow it without poisons and grow something delicious to eat, a good example is blueberries.

Fava bean cover crop in my neighbor's plot. You'll be seeing more from this master gardener, check out his setup. No one maximizes space like this gardener. One thing I love about community gardens is I get to see what others are doing and copy it!

Ah the freedom of a garden....you can go ahead and make a funky trellis if you want to, no building codes and contractors and permits. Speakin of which, keep your eye out for early spring pruning, and use some of those branches for a trellis for peas, they're free too.

A neighboring kohlrabi crop--this was planted in the fall too and is now ready for the kitchen.

A nice crop of garlic, sown in the fall for summer harvest. It's not too late to plant more here.

I could almost take a nap in here, it's so nice and warm and sheltered, wonder what they'll put in here? It's a nice likkle hoop house, they took a raised bed, and stuck the pvc pipe hoops into the ground, then homeland security-grade plastic held onto the pipe with clips. You could start hundreds of plants in here, plus extend the season by a couple months, pretty cool.

My Day Off

My view in the community garden, I'm surprised only a couple people are here. We may get a little snow in a couple days, but things are growing and the sun is shining sweet today.

I filled in by the fence with more garlic (use what's sprouting in the kitchen first), and some shell peas. It's old seed but it's early so I can afford to gamble. I keep adding to the soil with goodies. I expanded down the fenceline and transplanted some broccoli starts that survived the winter here.

This is it, my pride & joy, my 4' x 8' box at the community garden. This beauty can grow some food! It's in resting mode with the mulch blanket for the winter. I pulled over 60 lbs. of tomatoes out of here last year, it was a good year. Plus, peas, beans, leeks, basil, potatoes, onions, lettuce, pak choi and strawberries around the back. Some stuff I did in pots; this year I'll be using Potato Bags, a cool container I found at Gardeners' Supply, nice and big and under $10.

I pulled the mulch off to start warming up the soil, and threw it into the tomato cages to save space and dry it out. Moved around some transplants. I'll keep spreading these out as they grow and eating some too.

The soil is so beautiful, I just put in some compost and limestone and called it good. I don't really till much at this point, don't want to disturb the network of teeming life below the surface. Why do I think this way?

Some early influences: The Secret Life of Plants by Peter Tompkins, The One Straw Revolution by Masanobu Fukuoka, The Magic of Findhorn, Permaculture by Mollison, How to Grow More Veg Than You Ever Thought Possible by Jeavons, and How to Have a Green Thumb without an Aching Back by Ruth Stout. All amazing books that you can probably find in the library.

And soon, a discussion of organic methods...

So Far, So Good

Lots of peas are up now--these were the old seed tests I did. Cool! It's easier to monitor them inside while conditions are iffy and they are vulnerable. They seem happy.

My tomato and pepper starts with leeks, pac choi and others. I put a few seeds in each peat pot, I'll split em up when they get a couple sets of true leaves. Since I'm planting in a fertile sign, I wonder how long they'll take to sprout. Another experiment.

March 4

March 5

Porch is shapin up...

according to di plan...

organic sales in Ireland up 11%, organic sentiment reasonable

The absolutely latest organic sales figures that I've managed to access, which I received today, through Bord Bia from TNS, suggest the following for January 2009:

Sales of organic groceries: up 11%

Sales of conventional groceries: up 2.7%

Isn't that amazing? Despite all the hype, despite people's presumptions, despite people presuming the UK reality must always be the Irish reality, sales of organic produce is up 11% on last January's figures.

What's more, only a specific set of barcoded products are tracked by TNS. Organic accounts for a significant ammount of unbarcoded sales (e.g. loose fresh fruits and vegetables at farmers' markets) .

In other words, the true figure of organic sales increases may be higher again.

(Pic from the Wiki creative commons)

Below is an article on the statements people make about future spends - these always have to be taken with a pinch of salt, as people always paint themselves well in polls (well as in frugal these days)

According to a recent TNS mrbi survey on consumer spending plans for 2009, all consumer products will be affected by the state of the economy.

The organic sector can perhaps take some solace from the fact that that out of 18 spending options, it is placed 6th from the top, with the top being the least changed consumer spend.

Concerts, renting DVDs and overnight stays all fare far worse. Organic food will not be affected as much as treats - going out to drink - or bigger spends and investments, such as electrical items for the house.

However this consumer self assessment suggests that the spend on organic food will be 2/3 the level of 2008.

In general, it can be taken that the consumer will be more careful and thoughtful, and will put off some of the very big and perhaps unnecessary spends.

It is hard to be certain about how this sentiment will transfer into the weekly shop as the year unfolds, as food is neither a luxury nor a big marquee spend.

The different types of organic food are not demarked in this survey. A generic desire to spend less on organic is not subtle enough to be of much use to the food producer: how different will the organic food spend be on meat and milk when compared to pizzas and popcorn?

In other words, will it be more likely that consumers will think in the same way about their organic food preferences as their conventional ones, by keeping the staples?

Another confusing notion is surveying 100% of people about what only 45% of people actually do - purchase at least one organic item each month.

When I put this to TNS, they stated that �the data has been repercentaged (sic) to exclude those that do not buy organic�.

This then becomes a lottery of self-assessed organic consumers, where the respondents� relative organic spend does not even get taken into account.

Much of the growth in organics in the current decade has come from committed organic consumers expanding their purchasing range of organic food, rather than for new consumers, so the survey gives us little steer on the likelihood of these sales being affected.

There are always issues with aspirational surveys such as this one: in other words surveys which outline what people hope they will do in the future.

Perhaps these sorts of surveys should come with the kind of health warning that comes on a box of 20 Major.

According to this same survey, a full 49% claimed that they would be spending less on cigarettes in the coming year.

What exactly this means to the surveyor and to the surveyed, and how they are reconciled, is a minefield.

According to TNS, �spending less on cigarettes does not mean stopping smoking, but maybe cutting down one or two cigs a day, or switching to a cheaper brand or buying more duty free/illicit.�

Does the smoker hope, as almost all do, that they will just smoke less or even quit? This survey was conducted in the resolution month of January, after all.

In surveys, people tend to paint themselves in a positive light. Frugality is now chic, so promising to yourself that you�ll spend less on organic food probably resonates well with the consumer�s new self image. This may or may not transfer over into behavioural changes.

It is surely noteworthy that organic was in the indulgence category of the survey.
This would come as news to many, especially in the staple end of the market.

If I have another month of organic turnip soup indulgence, with the turnip clocking in at 1.20 in Tescos, I�d hate to see hardship.

However, it is certainly clear that the mainstream consumer is thinking about things never thought of since before the Tiger, and the organic sector like all the others needs to be aware of this.

Value is a combination of quality and price. To convince people of the price, the quality has to be there.

A Micra costs less than a Merc. Everyone knows and understands this. Does everyone know and understand why organic food is good value?