Selected submissions are posted below!

Just a few years ago our family decided to start raising a few hundred chickens.  We have been amazed with our community’s new desire to buy local.  We feel embraced by this new "slow food" movement and are blessed to be a part of it. Thank you for reinforcing how proud we should be when we have hay in our hair and dirt under our nails!

-Katie, Mark, and James Bowen 
Meadowdale Farm, Putney, Vermont

We are a group of seven households in Stroud, England, who have been cultivating four 'allotments' every Friday morning for the last 8 years. We are passionate about local food and the joys of gardening together. The picture is taken at our winter solstice celebration. That morning we harvested savoy cabbages and parsnips for our Christmas dinners as well as leeks, curly kale and mizuna.

-Sheila Macbeth

Recently, it was my turn to host my book club, so we read Animal, Vegetable, Miracle.  For the event, I cooked a cauliflower and carrot casserole in a tureen, which refused to set; a broccoli, egg, and pinto bean dip; and a disastrous beetroot chocolate (which was fair trade) cake which just didn ’t worked. Most of the vegetables, though, were from less than an hour away. January was not the month to choose this book from the hosting point of view – we live in Scotland, so not too much grows around.
However, I have bought a selection of heritage seeds, including Drunken Women lettuce. But the timing of the book has actually been good, because a UK television show has highlighted the plight of intensive chicken farming in a really big way – certainly one topic for discussion tonight! 

-Katy Galbraith

We have spent the last year or two trying to eat more locally. We live on a bit over an acre on the edge of a city. We raise chickens for eggs and some for meat. We are going to add a chicken tractor this summer for more meat birds and one for turkeys. We keep sheep for wool but eat the neighbor's sheep and this summer bought a fourth of a cow from a local farmer. Thanks to your book we have joined a CSA for the summer to supplement what we grow in our garden. It is so nice to know that my children know where food comes from.

- Elisabeth Sonersen
Nampa, ID

People mistakenly believe that urban dwellers have a harder time going local. But I live in Brooklyn, and I like to say that I live in the country in the city. We have a small backyard (20 feet wide by maybe 35 feet deep) and we grow tomatoes, peas, string beans, zucchini, eggplant, cucumbers, cherry peppers, basil, yellow and red peppers, raspberries, apples, and strawberries in the spring/summer. We also have a year-round herb garden under a cold frame. And, of course, we compost. Brooklyn is already blessed with wonderful soil, but adding our compost to it is like frosting the cake.

Our garden isn't big enough to feed us, however, so we weekly walk our shopping cart to the Grand Army Plaza Farmers Market in Prospect Park, where we buy all our vegetables and dairy products from local farmers. Even in January, there are still farmers at the market -- it is amazing to have the luxury of fresh local greens in the middle of winter! I have not bought a vegetable from California or Chile at the supermarket in who knows how long.

-Therese Mageau
Brooklyn, NY

Aloha,

Being born and raised in a food- and organic produce-loving country (Germany), I just recently relocated to the magic island of Kauai, Hawaii. 

My passion and curiosity for cooking, eating, and entertaining has been nurtured from my upbringing in Germany where cooking among friends, sharing meals, and sitting down for a dinner is the “usual way of life.”  My mother was a chef and I also cook professionally. After 15 years in the US, I realized that a simple thing like sharing dinners around a kitchen table is something many Americans, even in my generation, never had the pleasure of experiencing. They grew up eating microwavable food while standing over the kitchen sink!

My husband and I will be relocating to Europe in 7 years when we retire to experience living in a slow food nation again.  

-Birgit Mitchell

This winter myself and 7-8 other friends are starting a cookbook club. However, it isn't all about recipes. We are learning, sharing, and celebrating food and the importance the table plays in our lives.  One of our meetings will be about understanding how low-income families live off $3.00/person/day and developing menus around it.  Another is about sending foods that heal to people who are in need of hospitality. It is about culture and traditions and the role it plays in our upbringing.  I can't wait!

Another one of our meetings is about eating locally, seasonally, and fresh; of course your book provides that inspiration for me....we will delve into the CSAs available to us and how to read "food labels" with a different eye. 

Also, our family went to Costa Rica over the holidays and we couldn't believe how local and fresh the bananas, pineapple, onions, potatoes, carrots, squash and coffee were!  Delicious and they traveled less than an hour to our plates. 

-Kay King

Greetings from The May Farm! 

On only 8 acres in Benzie County, Michigan, our goats, sheep, chickens and steer provide meat, milk, yogurt, eggs, fiber, maple syrup, lotion, manure and firewood for multiple families. A neighboring farm trades herbs, veggies, tinctures and salves.  For fruit, we freeze enough peaches, berries and cherries from other farms to last all winter. 

Instead of candy bars for fundraisers, local school kids now sell local honey and maple syrup.  

-Sharron May

We are an American family living in London and left a large garden and well-loved composter in Washington DC. We had vegetables and some fruit in DC, but when we first moved to London, we were out of touch without our garden. I immediately decided that we should sign up for a weekly farm box delivery and do our best to "cook to the seasons." We now eat 80% of our food from a company in Wimbledon that supports local farmers. The delivery just came in today, and now the beets are roasting and the sweet potato muffins are baking. Glorious.

The boys are delighted to see what comes each week and I have not heard a peep or complaint. They love scrubbing vegetable dirt off everything right now.

-Anne Dawson

Just finished your book and loved it. It felt good to know that there are others worried about the food supply.  We are in the suburbs of Washington, DC, in Maryland, and have a 1/4 acre lot (that includes the footprint of the house) where the garden keeps getting bigger.

Just had to share my pumpkin story: We had a "volunteer"  pumpkin vine come up from the previous year's compost spread on the garden.  Since I had not grown pumpkins, it was from one of the jack-o'-lanterns carved at Halloween. We left it where it was, and it took over last year's garden. We got 19 large pumpkins off that vine. We gave a few away as gifts,  but carved three and processed ten of them.  The pumpkin is still in the freezer in 2-cup amounts, which is just the right amount for a pie or a batch of pumpkin chocolate chip cookies, or pumpkin bread. It's a good thing my kids like all those things. 

--Linda B.
Bowie, Maryland

We live in Norway, where the transition from a local to a global food chain has been even more remarkable than in the US. For instance, oranges only became available all year round here in the late 1950s.  Today, the sweet peas in our supermarkets are from Guatemala or Kenya, not only in the winter, but right in the middle of our own growing season.  A quarter of our local community are living on welfare, and considered unfit for work.

To say that we were ready for your book would be an understatement.  However, Norwegians live at the latitude of Greenland.  They depend on imported food staples.This year, we're celebrating the 200th anniversary of Napoleon's blockade of our coasts, and the year 1807 is still remembered as one of extreme hunger.  Today's population is six times bigger and works only a fraction of the hours. Without imported grain, they would starve.

We have enormous quantities of fish, and practically no wheat.  Clearly, a system of international food trade is needed.  A compromise.  The challenge is to curb the senseless gluttony, and find ways of using the landscape for food production that are compatible with acceptable living standards.

Living on a small farm in the countryside like we do, is like sleeping in a small cocoon.  We grow potatoes, raise chickens for eggs and meat, and buy our beef, mutton and pork from our neighbour.  But the trucks are still thundering day and night through the tunnel under our hill, laden with luxuries. And before our neighbour's animals can reach our freezer, they are still required by law to travel to the slaughterhouse and packing plant, i.e. over 200 miles.  We must do something!!

--Karyn Seroussi and Jørgen Klaveness

My two daughters and I are growers and producers of Santa Barbara County's only Certified Organic Olive Oil. We also own the only "wine country" food tasting room where we educate our customers on the healthful attributes of olive oil as well as the other tasty but healthy products we produce (over 24 items—appetizer spreads, fruit vinegars, finishing glazes, snacks & confections)... Eating healthfully doesn’t have to taste like cardboard!

I am a single mother of two adopted daughters from Nepal and working very hard to make this business a successful sustainable one for my girls and me. I have included a press shot of Anita, 11, Sunita, 12 (in the chef hat) and myself holding our gold-medal winning, certified organic, extra virgin olive oil.

--Theo Stephan

For two years, I have been working with a group of fabulous, dedicated (and hungry) souls to start a natural foods co-op in our community, with the emphasis on fresh, organic and local food.  What a ride it has been.  In the photo we are standing on a frozen lake at a community “golf” event to raise awareness and solicit memberships. (Obviously the carrots are not local, but they are organic).  With a location soon to be named, we hope to be open within the next year with bins full of local produce from our neighboring farm communities.  We can all make a difference, and this is one way we’re doing that.

--Michele Krolczyk,  Orono, Minnesota

After listening to the chapter on making cheese, I jumped out of bed and went straight to my computer.  I was beside myself waiting for my first cheese making kit from the New England Cheesemaking Supply.  Here is a photo of my first batch of ricotta draining.  It is delicious.  I'm not sure how long it would have taken me to stumble upon the world of cheese- making without your book. 

--Kyle Putnam

Here's a picture of my husband Michael, showing off his 2 1/2 lb Brandywine tomato! He looks like the size of it scared him, doesn't he? Even with the record-breaking heat and drought we're experiencing here, this plant keeps on keepin' on! We're your (local) neighbors, living in Harmony, TN.
                    
--Sam Jones

After years of wild living as field biologists, my husband and I are slowly spreading roots on 25 hardscrabble acres in Arkansas. Out here, our kids are rewarded for getting dirty (pulling white icicle radishes from the garden!). We're nurturing a fledgling orchard, and we've got a slew of rare breed hens, including a busty White Jersey Giant named Big Delores.

We dubbed our farm The Flying Mulberry.

Why? Ask the birds.

--Jennifer Bové, Calico Rock, AR

Our local food adventure began eight years ago when we moved from Dublin to County Leitrim, located in the North West of Ireland. We bought an old farmhouse on three acres of the most inhospitable marginal land imaginable. Everything about the land was wrong for growing, with a shallow layer of topsoil, two inches at most. The soil is known locally as daub you could make bricks out of it.

The plan was to become self-sufficient in at least vegetables. Fortunately, my background is in horticulture, so I knew what we needed to do: raise beds, create drainage, and add oodles of manure and compost.

After all these years, the field is producing carrots (hoorah!); it literally is a miracle. We have approximately one acre in production and I run a box scheme locally in the village of Dromahaire.

The local food culture is in its infancy in this country, but in this county it's quite significant. The Organic Centre which is located in Rossinver is on our doorstep, a paradise created through incredible people to provide a center of education in all areas of organic sustainable living. As luck would have it, I moved to this county. I now work there parttime on our Community Food project which is basically a supervised community garden. We have six of them spread between Sligo Leitrim, and Donegal. This, I believe, is the way forward: education through hands-on experience, sharing the harvest, and learning to cook it.

As luck would also have it, because we work in education and community gardening, we got to go to the Terra Madre in Italy last October. It was an experience that will live with me forever and a day, and one that has motivated me so much to continue with all the back-breaking hard work, because it is so worth it.

-- Ingrid foley

I have been getting our milk and cream from a farm 15 minutes down the road, and making our cheeses, yogurt, and butter. After visiting the farmers market, I made a fresh mozzarella and tomato salad. After happily eating it, my husband declared, "Wow, that was great. It was in the cow the same day it's in me!" Now that's what we call FRESH. Thank you so much, your book has inspired us. Our food tastes so much better!

--Hassan Demartino

I'm a city girl, one who used to jump and scream when finding a spider inside the house. We moved to Italy for three years and that changed my worldview. I noticed that in the markets there, the produce would vary with the seasons. This is laughable in a way because I've obviously been spoiled by abundance and had lost touch with the most instinctive animal drive: how to eat. What made the biggest impression on me, besides being thrilled with offering my children such fresh, wonderful food, was the asparagus.
 
Now we live in the U.S. again. The kids and I started a compost pile this summer. We live in a suburban area, so this is no small feat. So far, none of the neighbors have noticed and I hope it stays that way. Our goal is to produce enough compost to start a small bed of vegetables for next spring. For now, we are relying on produce delivered from a local farm co-op. For the first time since Italy, I can taste the earth in my food.
 
--Eileen Lunardi

The wild asparagus I've been finding by the side of the road here in Central Kentucky represents a grand intersection of three great loves of mine:

Reading, because I had never heard of wild asparagus until I ran across Barbara's story in AVM about her father finding wild asparagus while making house calls and marking them to find in the Spring. I had never heard of wild asparagus before!

Cycling, because it is a perfect way to hunt for wild asparagus, riding slowly along roadsides and fencerows where it grows.  My eye was caught by this curious blue-green, feathery plant with bright red berries, and I knew immediately what I had found. I can't wait for my next ride!

And finally: Nutrition, because I'm a believer in traditional nutrition, and it just doesn't get any more local, fresh and organic than wild asparagus by the roadside! 

--Mike Haliday, Campbellsville, KY   

Soon after reading Animal Vegetable Miracle, I attended Parents' Weekend at my son's school: College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass. I was delighted to see they are offering Slow Food meals for students. Here a a few of the highlights of the meals:

*Choice of menu or create your own served family-style on original Holy Cross Crested dinnerware.
*Meals served in a private area of the dining hall.
*Locally grown foods and personalized service.

Hooray for them for nurturing bodies, minds and spirits.

--Susan Rome
Denver Colorado

I just finished reading Animal, Vegetable, Miracle and I wanted to share some of our local eating experiences and resources here in Belgium.  A Michigan native, I am very fortunate that, in spite of our cold winters, we have summers long and hot enough to produce a wonderful array of produce. Belgium has its own challenges: it's not nearly as cold in the winter as Michigan is, but it still freezes, and it's not nearly as warm and sunny in the summer. Additionally, when I first arrived here, it seemed to me that Belgians did not drink fresh milk as all of the milk was UHT and sold on shelves, a real surprise after living in Holland where all things dairy are fresh, inexpensive and plentiful. However,  I have now discovered that the province of Antwerpen, where I live, is rich in dairy farms where the cows eat clover and amazingly many of the farms have milk vending machines, where you supply your own bottle and put it under the spigot, put a bit of change in (about 80 eurocents a liter - which is 25-50 cents less than the grocery store) and get fresh milk. We also grade our eggs here: 3 means access to fresh air and open yard at all times; 2 is access to fresh air and some yard; and 1 is cage raised. I can tell you that I know the chickens roam free because, in my neighborhood, I have to be careful where I drive!

--Jennifer Kepler, Veerle, Belgium

I live in Riverside California, where oranges grow easily. However, I’ve been buying orange juice from the grocery store, without really thinking about it. After reading your book, I finally looked at the label, and my juice was coming from Florida and BRAZIL! Now—I literally drive by orange groves between here and the store, so I decided I had to do something. There is a hacienda-style nursery about a mile and a half away that sells plants and some produce. I can buy a 10-pound bag of oranges for $6.00, which yields nearly two of the store-bought containers. And boy does it taste better. So, it’s better for me and it’s better for the Hispanic family down the road. It’s so much more than just orange juice. It makes me a part of this place.