Potluck 11/18 and Other News

Join us for a potluck this Tuesday, November 18, at our usual meeting place: room 109 of the Fuller Building (808 Commonwealth Ave.)! We will be meeting at 7:30pm and anticipate a small tasting of a couple of home-brewed, flavored kombucha! Also, remember to bring your own cups, plates, and cutlery, so we can reduce our waste!

On Wednesday, Nov. 19, Somerville Local First will be hosting a party, featuring local food from Sherman Market, Kickass Cupcakes, and various local brews! It will be held at Grand (374 Somervile Ave., Union Sq., Somerville) at 6:30 pm. But RSVP is required! To RSVP, e-mail somervillelocalfirst@gmail.com. Suggested donation for the event is $15.

Also, read this recent article that was in the Weekly Dig about CitySprouts, whose mission is to incorporate school gardens in Cambridge’s public schools.

SFBU November Calendar

There's so much going on this month!

MONDAY NOV. 10: THE BEEHIVE DESIGN COLLECTIVE gives a talk, or rather, an interactive picture presentation on how to make political posters. With huge portable murals of collaboratively produced illustrations, a six foot tall fabric picture book, and an engaging narrative, the Bees will take you on a visual tour of the interactions between colonization, militarism, and resource extraction in the Americas. Dismantling Monoculture: Tales of Ants and Economics in the Americas. BU Central (GSU basement, 775 Comm. Ave.) 7pm.

TUESDAY NOV. 11: This week's meeting will also be a restaurant outing to Asmara Restaurant, 739 Mass. Ave in Cambridge. It's Ethiopian food, communal and delicious, near the Central Square T stop off the Red Line. Please rsvp to slowfood@bu.edu by Sunday, Nov. 9th if you plan on coming so that we can make reservations. We'll meet at Asmara at 6pm.

WEDNESDAY NOV. 12: Andrew Rimas reads from his non-fiction work Beef: The Untold Story of How Milk, Meat, and Muscle Shaped the World, which examines the cultural and culinary history of cattle. Brookline Booksmith, 279 Harvard St., Brookline. 7pm.

THURSDAY NOV. 13: Louisa Dell Amico speaks on "An Inconvenient Food: The Link between Animal Agribusiness and Global Warming" at the Emmanuel College Library Lecture Hall. 7:30pm.

SUNDAY NOV. 16: SFBU goes roof-hopping in Somerville to check out Tufts' Green Roof Collaborative. We'll hear a bit about the project from Colleen Butler, and then take to the roof to see what's left of the verge.  We'll see how we can apply the Tufts model to a possible work-study/internship based green roof collaborative at BU. Meet in the lobby of Tufts' Tisch Library at 10am.

VOTE

Today's the day. 

Remember, voting, like eating, is a political act. Viva la comida rebelde!!!

Required reading: 

this crucial letter from Michael Pollan to the future president of the United States. 

General Updates

Hello Slow Foodies!

We took advantage of the nice fall weather on October 13th by taking a bike trip down to Russell Orchards in Ipswich, MA, to do some apple picking! This was followed by an Apple Bake-Off on October 20th with many apple baked goodies.

For those of you who were unable to attend, read about the panel discussion on sustainable food at Harvard that took place on October 14th during Harvard’s Sustainability Week! Speakers included Alice Waters, founder of Chez Panisse, Josh Viertel, co-director of the Yale Sustainable Food project and president of Slow Food USA, Harvard’s Humanities Center Director, Homi Bhabha, and Anna Deavere Smith from the Chez Panisse Advisory Board. Topics included the right to local and sustainable food, the pleasure in eating and sharing good food, and reducing our environmental impact.

This past Tuesday we enjoyed the wonderful fizzy and apple cidery taste of Kombucha while watching a demonstration on how to make it! If you missed this meeting don’t worry, a kombucha blog/forum of some kind should hopefully soon be in the works. Meanwhile, see an instructional video and read this Kombucha brewing guide.

The Boston Vegetarian Food Festival at the Reggie Lewis Athletic Center yesterday was also a blast! Free samples abounded, and speakers included the holistic nutritionist Jae Steele and the author of My Sweet Vegan, Hannah Kaminsky, among others.

Our next planning meeting will be at Espresso Royale (736 Comm. Ave.), Tuesday, November 4th, at 7:30 pm. So come if you want to help plan and be updated on upcoming events! Proposed ideas are a butchering workshop, a visit to Tufts’ green roof, and more!

Terra Madre 2008!

A few past and present members of Slow Food BU recently returned from Terra Madre, the world meeting of food communities, in Turin, Italy. Terra Madre brought together farmers, breeders, beekeepers, fisherpeople, chefs, academics, and students to expand the current dialogue about the centrality of food in our modern economy. More than 6,000 delegates came to the table, including 700 students and young farmers working to cultivate the growing international youth food movement. Click below to listen in on a breakout session. Topics include access to local, organic food, the nature of the Slow Food movement, and new opportunities to keep the flow of knowledge moving:

Terra Madre 2008/ reception day from Frank Corsten on Vimeo.

To add your voice to the mix, visit the Youth Food Movement website or join the Facebook group. There are more videos from Terra Madre posted there, as well as information from the network of incredible delegates, their projects, strategies, and plans for the future of food.

EAT-IN

Slow foodies from all over Boston attended this weekend's Eat-In on Harvard Yard. It was the perfect day for a long and leisurely picnic:

See more photos or upload your own to the the Slow Food in Boston group on flickr. 

Recipes from the event are being added to the SFBU Recipe Exchange. You can find log-in information under the About the Exchange tab. Write 'em up to keep a record of all the delicious things we've been eating this year!

What to Eat Now

Hello everyone! SFBU is back in action with workshops, potlucks and picnics happening soon. 

GENERAL INTEREST MEETING September 16th at 7:30pm in room 134 of the Fuller Building (808 Commonwealth Ave). If you can, bring a dish to share potluck style- but if you don't have access to a kitchen, no worries! Come anyway! We're making the most of the late-summer harvest.

EAT-IN ON HARVARD YARD October 4th at noon (postponed from September 27th foreseeing thunderstorms). Slow Food BU and Real Food Harvard are hosting a massive eat-in on Harvard Yard. The idea is to get people to slow down and take notice of what they eat- but we also just want to have a huge picnic before the weather gets too disagreeable! Bring a blanket, some home-baked treats and as many friends as you can find. This is gonna be big.

WORKSHOP IN URBAN FORAGING September 30th at 7:30pm in CAS 222. Russ Cohen, author of Edible Plants I Have Known... and Eaten gives a slide presentation on edible plants and mushrooms of the Greater Boston area. He will also lead an identification walk through the Fens the following Monday for those interested. Email slowfood@bu.edu to RSVP.

Also: a talk on the global food crisis at the Boston Public Library, pasta-making at Dave's in Somerville, and Slow Food Nation recap and photos.