Good Food is Everybody's Business
In 2011 we visited more than 40 good food producers and providers in 30 cities across four states and British Columbia. We petted cows and goats in dairy barns, waded ankle deep in shellfish beds and waist deep in grain fields, trotted down rows of vegetables and fruit, and walked numerous orchards, large and small. We had to brush the flour out of our hair each time we left a grain mill. Here are some of the wonderful folks we met along the way.
How does one farm feed nearly a 1000 people? No, it’s not the miracle of the loaves and fishes; it’s the miracle of good soil, organic cropping, rotational grazing, and a community of busy hands. Jubilee Biodynamic Farm, Carnation WA, supplies 400 families with fruit, vegetables, and meat through a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program – all from just 40 intensively-farmed acres.
Sam Lucy, grain farmer and land conservationist in the Methow Valley of north central Washington, is a one-man search and rescue team for farmland. He has spent the last 15 years seeking out and reclaiming fallow farmland and bringing it back to viable production or transitioning it into native grasses and other plants.
The Methow is home to BlueBird Grain Farm, where Brooke and Sam Lucy raise an ancient grain called emmer. Farming 200 acres, the Lucy family takes their grain from seed to the store shelf and controls the quality through every step.
