In my line of work -- software development -- we have an old saying: "Garbage In, Garbage Out" (or GIGO for short). In other words, I could write the most elegant software program ever, but if I feed in bad data, I'm going to get bad results.
The same is true for cooking. I spent more than a decade following my mother and my grandparents around the kitchen, absorbing centuries-old traditions and methods to create some of the finest Southern Italian delicacies you can find outside of the motherland. But I can't do these dishes justice if I buy industrial, travel-worn, GMO and chemically-treated food from your average grocery store.
Two generations ago, before WWII-era plants manufacturing poison gas were converted to pesticide factories and before bomb-making facilities were re-purposed to make nitrogen-based chemical fertilizers, nearly everything in the food chain was, in today's terms, "organic." Many of our grandparents either grew up on farmsteads or maintained a small family or community garden. Growing up in the East Bay, we had a half-dozen tomato plants we would rotate each year with legumes (green beans, favas, limas, etc.) in the age-old tradition of naturally reintroducing nitrogen to the topsoil. As a result, we would enjoy fresh, organic caprese salad with nearly every meal all summer long and still manage to give away bags and bags of tomatoes to our neighbors, fresh off the vine.
By all means, I encourage you to grow your own food, a practice that pays back tenfold the work you put into it. But for many of us, this is too impractical or time consuming.
The very next best thing to having your own garden is using our local farm-to-table service: Farmigo. We started using it at Hidden Valley last year under the stewardship of Erin Bergman, to whom we all owe a huge debt of gratitude. This year, she's passed the reigns to me. Farmigo provides organic, local, sustainable, GMO-free produce and an assortment of dry goods, baked goods, fermented foods, dairy products and pre-made items from local providers. It's easy to use and not any more expensive than high-end grocery stores like Whole Foods or Fairfax's marvelous Good Earth.
Here's how it works:
- Sign up for the Hidden Valley community on the Farmigo web site
- Place your order by 11:59pm each Sunday night
- Pick up your order from the foyer of the multipurpose room Wednesday between 1 and 2pm*
As much as I love Farmigo's food, customer service, web site and overall vibe, the best part about this great service is that Farmigo gives back to Hidden Valley.
Last year, we raised $1,443.30 for the school garden, an investment made toward raising a future generation of home-gardeners and conscious eaters.
Please join me and the 54 other Hidden Valley Farmigo Families in the local food movement by signing up today. You can place your first order by Sunday 8/30 and pick up your groceries on Wednesday 9/2. If you use the code LOCAL20 at checkout on your first order, you'll get 20% off.
Watch this space for cooking tips, recipes and other musings on how to eat well while avoiding the industrial food chain. And remember GIGO and its all-important inverse:
Start with fresh, local, GMO-free, organic raw materials, apply a solid recipe, and you'll likely get great results.
*As your Farmigo coordinator, I'll hang around the multipurpose room from 1-2pm each Wednesday to oversee pickups. Before leaving campus, I'll move any food not picked up by then to the fridge in the multipurpose room foyer (outside the bathrooms). You have until 6:30pm before the YMCA closes and locks up, but you can always pick up your food the next day.