Thriving too

Social Dining: Big tables + New Behaviours

I had the pleasure of have having lunch at Hub Islington last week. Laura and I popped over there to meet Amy Smith the new editor for The Community Lover's Guide to Islington and to talk to the Hub team about their clever use of The Civic Crowd website to map and connect with projects in the local community.  I really enjoyed the friendly and fun lunch – and the delicious food which magically appeared through everyone bringing and making a range of salads, soups etc. 

Food sharing in a community setting is much more than sharing big tables. There is a whole range of new ideas and behaviours springing up  - but overall from our work and study there are lots of signs that people want to spend time together in a way that goes beyond arranged social lunches and dinners – and moves towards a more inclusive, community feel, using food as a way for getting to know people in an informal setting.

And people are so clever - especially with a small amount of inspiration from what other communities are doing. In two of the workshops we did with Neighbourhood Challenge groups, one in Lower Green and the other in Boothtown, people came up with some fantastically imaginative ideas on how they could possibly use food and cooking to build relationships and using their existing resources, without waiting for big events, lots of funding... or permissions.

The Lower Green group had the idea that although they didn’t have a big enough kitchen for shared cooking on the scale they would like, they did have a big hall.  So their idea was to come together, prepare the food together, and then take it home to their own kitchens to cook it…. And then come back together to eat it.  The Boothtown group thought that rather than trying to engage everyone in a big street party straight away, that they would hold weekly suppers in the street, moving from one house to the other, growing the number of people taking part each week.

Sharing food is as old as the hills. But below are some examples of how social dining looks and feels different to a regular restaurant’s consumer-based offering (as lovely as that is too)... or indeed a lunch or dinner at a friends house.

Update: If you are interested in encouraging more social dining, where you live, or work for a local authority, here's the brilliantly easy way that the Hackney Chief Exec and team have decided to do it.

Bring Your Own Restaurant

Do it yourself fine dining on the streets of Holyoke. A plein air potluck held every other Friday.

Outdoor Community Kitchen - Copenhagen

I visited this last summer.  Every week up to 80 people in the local neighbourhood bring dishes and share a meal together.

School Kitchen in Rotterdam

Maurice Specht (right) in the kitchen of a [very inspiring] school in Rotterdam - made completely available for the community to use.

Kitchain 

Modular furniture designed for social dining in a public space.

Collaboration O 

Communal dining area at their collaborative workspace.

Sunday Soup - Meal-based micro-granting events (below pics from Bologne and New York's FEAST)

Streetfeast  A day of local lunches across Ireland - as an excuse to share good food, meet new people who live near you, celebrate our streets and show what is possible when a group of people come together to do something special. Organised by Community Lover's Guide to Dublin editor Sam Bishop, and crew. 

You Are Hungry

 

An edible tour of Hackney...

Led by Mikey Tomkins, bee keeper and PhD student at University of Brighton, we wandered round Hackney's hidden growing spaces. Actually, some were very much on view once you knew what you were looking at - with stretches of fencing covered in courgettes and beans (above) and elaborate living marquees called 'dudhi cages' for the dudhi or bottle gourd (below).

Mikey also runs Capital Bee and keeps bees on top of the Space Gallery on Mare Street, so we started the morning with a little taster. Light and full of elderflower and lime - matching the bees local diet. Did you know that 90% of the beehives in the southeast are in the Greater London area? And we've p lenty more rooftops that could become honey making bee farms...

Something else that was interesting to learn, was that most current urban growing plots like the ones we were viewing, are using tradition growing methods in whatever green space people have access to. So needing lots of soil, and flat space. And it isn't productive enough to really feed people fully. But what Mikey found people were valuing, was less the size or quality of the crop, per se. But the opportunity to reclaim  and reuse public land together.

We had an interesting debate about the untidy nature of growing, and how this often seems at conflict with the neat perfection of bricks and concrete. And also what happens when the growing pioneers take up lots of space and it's harder for newcomers to join in. Then we wandered past a little patch of strawberries on a front lawn, and having to work things out didn't seem like a reason not to try in the first place.

Space Gallery: You Are Hungry
Mikeys' edible maps

 

Social Spaces: Solar Powered Pops

Isn't this beautifully done... Solar powered van selling ice pops....

Herbaceous

 

I am surround by chocolate mint, purple basil, feathery fronds of fennel, meaty sage and tons and tons of basil. Where else could I be but a derelict plot of land by Brentford Lock in west London?

Thanks to Cultivate London (supported by Pathways, with land use provided by ISIS Waterside Regeneration) there are polytunnels full of herbs grown in pallets, ready to supply local shops and restaurants, and training opportunities  in horticulture for young people. And much like the Kings Cross skip gardens, then are designed to be portable, so they can move around the site as it gets developed.

We were well fed with mini grilled mushroom burgers covered in bright green pesto from the basil, and the chocolate mint was scrummy on a soft yellow lemon curd tart. And the PA for the talks was provided by some high energy pedalling!

The farms aren't normally open to the public, so you'll have to get in touch to come and visit. Or you can find out where the herbs are being sold on the website if you want to support the project and sample them yourself...

Read more:
Food production. Skill development. Job creation. www.cultivatelondon.org

 

Kefir Shepherds

I am now the proud guardian of a bubbly kilner jar of kefir grains. They are sitting on the kitchen top in the sunlight, bobbling up and down through the milky water like a lava lamp. I will feed them sugar and wash them twice a week and I feel somehow slightly more responsible than I did yesterday.

The gifted kefir is part of an art project by Synnove Fredericks, and is being run from the FARM:shop in Dalston. The idea is to cultivate the kefir, and as it expands, portion off small jars to give to people who want to experiment and grow their own (small donation for growing instructions leaflet). They then get marked on the map, and report back with pictures and stories.

Kefir grains are a mix of bacteria and yeasts, and can be used to make all sorts of fermented foods that are good for digestive health, such as yoghurt drink, ginger beer or kimchi pickled vegetables. I'm addicted to the yoghurt kefir from the Russian shop up the road, with a slightly tangy flavour and little creamy lumps (bordering on fizzy when open for a while). Perhaps it's an acquired taste, but I'm looking forward to making my own when my little grains have multiplied enough.

Synnove is an artist and designer interested in our interaction with natural surroundings, and is currently looking into nomadic agriculture. More on her website.

If you would like to see the installation come to FARM:shop. If you want a jar of the next batch, email Synnove.

Pizza Hut

Ok ok don't fall off your chairs, I haven't completely abandoned my principles. We are not talking about mass produced chain store fare, but fresh and crispy, covered in local Welsh cheese straight from a community oven - made on the spot in about 3 minutes flat. Fast Slow food if you will...

I was out and about in Wales this week, meeting more Slow Food groups and members around the country, from Angelsey to Aberystwyth, Machynlleth to Cardiff. One of the highlights of the trip was meeting the lovely Tom Bean (below), a project officer with Ymlaen Ceredigion (Onward Ceredigion).

He is involved in the Healthy Together project, which works to help people eat better and be more active. And one of their projects is a community pizza oven and veggie patch in a primary school. One of the dads, Ed (above), volunteered to be trained up to run the oven and now works with the school to keep turning the pizzas out and helping the little 'uns make the link between growing, cooking and the food they eat.

And in case you were wondering the pizza was delicious.

More on the website: Ymlaen Ceredigion

Eat your words

 

I've been getting out and about from the London bubble these past few weeks, and meeting more of the people who make the food most of us tend to take for granted. It's been a massive eye-opener.

This weekend, I saw two dairy farms and met two lovely, skillful and passionate cheese makers. Mary from Quickes Traditional (pic above) and Jamie from Montgomery's (pic below). Both of whom are making traditional cloth wrapped cheddar in the West Country.

I thought I was pretty up on food, but I guess I still hadn't properly thought through the time and care taken from looking after a herd of cows, to milking, culturing, mixing, salting, pressing, wrapping, turning, storing...

In an effort to encourage more young people to explore and develop a passion for communicating about local food, Slow Food Devon have just launched the Carol Trewin Young Food Writer Awards. For oung people under 30, living in or with a connection to the West Country - in memory of Carol Trewin, an influential food writer from Devon. Deadline for this year is 1 Feb 2011.

Find out more.

Future of Urban Farming Deux

No room for crop cultivation in your cluttered flat? Well tidy up for heaven's sake!

Or, hang them from the ceiling. Which ever takes your fancy.

Sky Planters by Patrick Morris. Available from Thorsten Van Elten

(Future of Urban Farming I)

You are what you eat

Researcher / London UK / 1 person household / Once sold a flapjack to a 10ft Elvis / 2009

More at GOOD's photogallery of Mark Menjivar's project

Tree-tastic

Organic Meltdown are preserving rainforests and making scrummy Fairtrade chocolate all at the same time. Busy guys.

Working with the World Land Trust, for every bar of chocolate you consume, they will save one tropical forest tree.

Now that's an excuse to get stuck in if ever I heard one!

Heart shaped

Heart shaped water melons from Japan that apparently took 3 years to perfect. Yours for the bargain price of 15,750 Yen, or £107. Eat your heart out...

Bugged out

The tomatoes and salad are coming along nicely on the balcony. I'm not sure any of them will get big enough for a sticker, but here's hoping!

Get your stickers here...

Mine, mine, mine, mine

Ah, the microcosm of society that is the communal fridge. The sharers, the hoarders, the sneaky milk drinkers.

Don't get me wrong, I love shared meals. I'm getting innordinately excited about international potluck dinner plans in a couple of weeks (Australian, Malaysian, Scottish, Canadian, American, Indian and English and still growing). Any suggestions for a vegetarian savoury main to fly the English flag?

Anyway, back to the issue in hand. If you have lovingly prepared your lunch, and used a steel will power to wait until midday to devour it, you don't want it to end up in someone else's stomach.

Enter the ingenious anti-theft lunch bag! (Provided you can keep your appetite)

Fuelling Creativity

A report on Creative Review about work by the Centre of Design Research to discover the foods and lifestyle choices that increase 'creative fluency'.

Apparently chocolate and jellybeans are out. White fish and chicken is in. What are the vegetarians going to do?

Presidential potatoes

One of the biggest carbon culprits is our long-distance food habit. Strawberries from Israel, sugar-snaps from Zimbabwe, and tomatoes from Morocco. Not to mention the mountains of plastic packaging *shudders*

Contrast with the idea of a crisp freshly picked salad or the smell of a warm muddy newly dug potato - right from your back yard / windowsill / front door / garden / anywhere.

Kitchen Gardeners International want to help us all to grow provisions closer to home, and they are starting with the Whitehouse lawn. Don't worry - you can start with cress.

I wonder does Obama have green fingers?