By Allyn Farach
While there’s absolutely nothing wrong with buzzing out to Walmart for a can of spaghetti in red sauce, there’s a sense of satisfaction that comes with making the food you’re eating yourself. Taking it a step further – going out and acquiring the food yourself can be even more rewarding than picking it up at a grocery store or restaurant. Forget convenience: Below are ways to get creative with alternative food sources. Before we begin, let’s address that some of these methods are not for the weak-hearted.
Dumpster Diving
To be clear, Dumpster Diving doesn’t involve actually diving into dumpsters.
“You can open the lid and gingerly pull out goods or jump in and dig deep. If you’re grossed out by the idea, wear rain boots and bring gloves,” writes Vanessa Alvadaro, native Floridian and dumpster diver. Furthermore, what you pull out probably won’t be overripe produce and rotting meat.
Approximately 40 percent of food bought in the US goes to waste, so what may be found in a dumpster may be okay, if not in perfect condition (unless it’s covered in mold. Don’t eat anything covered in mold.)
Luckily, the dumpster diving community is pretty open to new people, and almost always ready to help. R/DumpsterDiving is full of people giving advice to newbies, people planning to make runs together, and even a map that lists good diving spots. With an engaging community, free food and stuff to resell, what could possibly be the downside to such a concept? The law.
The owners of the Miami Produce Center were cited after video cameras captured people going through their dumpsters for food, some of which was later resold to restaurants. Furthermore, some business owners may set up cameras, dumpster locks and signs warning people not to trespass or go through the garbage. If they catch anyone, they may have them taken in by police.
So what can potential divers do? They can travel in groups to be safe, be discerning about what they pick out so that they don’t get sick, scope out spots before they leave, ask business owners before they dive and be wary of cameras!
Urban Farming
If Dumpster Diving isn’t your cup of trash, gardening might be a more appealing route to alternative food sources. A community garden offers people who register a small plot of land to grow whatever they want, from decorative flowers to bountiful fruits and vegetables. Laura Lafata, who runs social media and organizes meetings for the South Beach Community Garden, elaborated that the garden offers all kinds of things for people.
“It’s a piece of paradise in a very densely populated part of the city that allows one the pleasure of digging in the soil and the joy of producing one’s own food supply,” Lafata said. Indeed, the benefits of a community garden are being allowed to pick what you want to grow and owning a little plot of land in the urban jungle.
“Everyone can grow whatever they want, but we encourage gardeners to grow what will grow best in our climate with a focus on heat tolerant varieties, Asian and Caribbean vegetables, lettuces, sprouts, okra, sweet potatoes, radishes, beans, tomatoes, snow peas, eggplants.”
So there’s no risk of getting bored when it comes to food and the garden, Miami Beach Parks and Recreation Department offers a budget for hoses, trash cans and water, so the simple parts of taking care of a garden and growing your own food are covered as well.
Growing your own food isn’t always easy. The Garden covers the basics, but the gardeners have to bring their own soil and seeds, build their own boxes and maintain their own plots. The prices of soil, seeds and wood are steep, so the cost of urban farming can easily add up.
Gardeners are left to the whims of Mother Nature when it comes to the fate of their plots. Frosts can kill a crop, hurricanes can tear them down, heat can dry them up, and rain can drown them.
“Heat is a bigger issue here, along with rain, sometimes not enough, sometimes too much.” Lafata said.
With Miami having an average of roughly 60 inches of annual rainfall, along with a dry season that runs throughout winter, the best that gardeners can do is prepare and prevent for the worst. Gardeners have to prepare against pests such as the Eastern Lubber Grasshopper and even iguanas, all which want to chow down on fresh garden greens. Finally, simply, and most importantly, running a garden takes a lot of work.
“The biggest problem we have at the garden is commitment,” Lafata said. “You need a lot of time to nurture and care for your plot to successfully grow anything.”
Smaller plants such as radishes and cucumbers can take up to three weeks to grow, while larger plants like pumpkins can take even longer. The combined factors can easily wear anyone down, but reaping your own delicious rewards in the form of a salad or a fruit tart can be a great joy at the end of the day.
“Everything grown tastes sweeter and better when it’s just picked,” Lafata said.
If the messiness of Dumpster Diving and the arduous labor of gardening threatens you, Farm to Table (FTT) is an alternative food source that you don’t have to work for.
FTT is a movement primarily for getting food locally and serving it to local customers. It also keeps customers informed about where their food came from.
Jensen Eddings, the director of Media & Marketing for Batch Miami, explains the benefits of those contacts: “Farm to table and using fresh ingredients benefits everyone: the supplier has the client, the restaurant enjoys the lower costs, and the customer gets fresh, local food. It’s a win-win-win…Through strengthening relationships with regional purveyors and highlighting local ingredients, South Florida cuisine has a chance to set itself apart from the rest of the country.”
Eddings also said that FTT is an easy, effective way to get fresh food. The quick access to local suppliers means that food can be used the same day that it’s picked, caught or slaughtered.
Like the rest of alternative food sources, FTT doesn’t come without its costs. Using local suppliers means that FTT restaurants can only use what grows in the area, and it can impact what gets cooked.
“Using local ingredients definitely forces flexibility,” Eddings said. “Sometimes people just run out of things. We do our best to stay ahead of slip-ups and make up for when it does happen with fun specials.”
Essentially, diners probably won’t be seeing things like cherries or Atlantic salmon on tables at FTT restaurants. Furthermore, some people are beginning to see FTT as a fad that’s quickly fading. Vanity Fair published an article titled, “Is It Time To Table Farm To Table?” dissecting how FTT is merely a fad popularized by good PR – a buzz word for fast food companies to use to prove that their food isn’t processed.
Eddings writes that FTT is more than just jargon to turn heads-it gives people the information that they want about the food that they want to eat.
“People love to get more out of their dining experience than ever before, so it’s raising the bar for everyone,” Eddings said. “In turn, we’re getting higher-quality restaurants. It’s awesome and an exciting trend to embrace.”
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Cover Photo Credit: Wei Tchou/Flickr (CC by 2.0)
Correction (9-17-2015, 12:27 PM): The original version of this story incorrectly identified the person who runs social media and organizes meetings for the South Beach Community Garden. Her name is Laura Lafata. We regret the error and are happy to correct the record.
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Never Forget What July 4th Is Really About
By Christopher Kelly
As we pause to celebrate the anniversary of our nation’s independence, it seems appropriate to consider the vital role played by the American military in the creation of our nation and its transformation of our world.
We are not a militaristic nation, but we are a nation that is deeply proud of its military. We are not a perfect people.
We have made many mistakes. We have not always lived up to our noble ideals.
It is important to remember what happened at Wounded Knee, My Lai, and Abu Ghraib. But it is also important to remember the amazing things that the US military has done in our world.
On April 19, 1775, British soldiers marched from Boston to Lexington and Concord to seize a cache of arms.
They were confronted on the Lexington Green by citizen soldiers who were farmers, merchants, and tradesmen.
The “shot heard round the world,” so named by Ralph Waldo Emerson in his poem “Concord Hymn,” was fired later that day on the Old North Bridge.
Liberty was not a gift of the English crown; she had to be taken by force by an armed rebel populace.
Later that year, American forces invaded British Canada.
My own ancestor, James Van Rensselaer, was a citizen soldier in the siege of Quebec, and his commanding officer was Benedict Arnold.
The American Revolution is often portrayed in rosy colors due to its remoteness and patriotic outcome.
Photo Credit: Vinoth Chandar/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)
It was, in fact, a horrendously bloody conflict. Recent scholarship has placed the total number of Americans killed in the American Revolution at around 25,000, out of a total population of the thirteen colonies in 1775 of 2.4 million.
Thus, over one percent of the population was killed over the course of the war’s nearly eight and half years.
After the American Revolution, we would fight Britain again in the War of 1812. We also fought our way westward across the continent, engaging in many brutal wars against the Native Americans.
In 1846, President Polk launched a war against Mexico.
This was and remains a controversial chapter in American history.
Congressman Abraham Lincoln opposed the war. Henry David Thoreau refused to pay taxes to support the war and was briefly jailed.
Even Ulysses Grant, who fought in the war, condemned its prosecution in his memoirs.
But without the Mexican-American War, the states of California, Arizona, Nevada, Utah, and New Mexico would never have been added to the Union.
Without the Mexican-American War, the United States might never have become a coast-to-coast superpower.
Imagine for a moment what World War II might have been like had Polk not fought the Mexican-American War.
It is unlikely that an American naval base would have been built at Pearl Harbor without Polk.
If there had been a Pacific base, the Japanese would never have sunk the Arizona to start the war, because the state we call Arizona would have belonged to Mexico.
If there had not been Alamogordo in New Mexico where the atomic bomb could be tested, would we have been able to drop an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, thereby ending the war?
Without Polk’s war in the nineteenth century, the United States might not have been strong enough to deal with the challenges of fascism and communism in the twentieth century.
Nearly a hundred years ago in 1917, America citizen soldiers went “Over There” with the American Expeditionary Force to fight the Central Powers in World War I.
By 1918, German Kaiser William II would abdicate.
In 1941, American citizens would get the call to combat Hitler and Imperial Japan.
Just over seventy-one years ago, American soldiers liberated the Nazi concentration camps, such as Buchenwald and Dachau, thereby helping to end the Holocaust.
Without American invasions at places like the beaches of Omaha and Anzio, the world would undoubtedly be a darker place.
After World War II, American forces remained engaged with Europe, joining NATO and garrisoning the nations of former adversaries during the Cold War. The Cold War was won without a shot being fired.
Today we face the threat of global terror networks that have perpetrated horrors in Brussels, Paris, San Bernardino, California, and, most recently, Orlando, Florida.
Our enemies must know that Americans do not love war for war’s sake. To do so is the definition of fascism. We are and always have been reluctant warriors. But when provoked, we know how to fight, and we will endure until victory and a lasting peace is won.
Thanks to the courage and sacrifice of those American patriots who have served in our military and those that serve today, we are able to celebrate the Fourth of July and to confront the challenges that face us around the world.
Christopher Kelly is the co-author of America Invades: How We’ve Invaded or Been Militarily Involved with almost Every Country on Earth and Italy Invades: How Italians Conquered the World. His newest book, An Adventure in 1914, will be published this fall. For more information, visit www.americainvades.com and www.italyinvades.com.
RISE NEWS is a grassroots journalism news organization that is working to change the way young people become informed and engaged in public affairs. You can write for us.
Cover Photo Credit: Kevin Muncie/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)
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VIDEO: People Are Mad As Hell That Alice Burch Is Supporting Daphne Campbell’s Re-election
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This Politician Dressed Up Like Donald Trump At An AIDS Walk To Make An Important Point
North Miami City Councilman Scott Galvin is known for his unique approach to serving his constituents.
An early adopter of email newsletters and blogging to keep people that live in his city informed, Galvin has recently started producing web videos for the same purpose.
But none of that quite compares to what Galvin did to support the Florida AIDS Walk and Music Festival.
Galvin is not afraid to take a stand on issues that are a bit bigger than North Miami, a diverse northern Miami suburb with nearly 60,000 residents.
So he decided to make fun of Republican Presidential front-runner Donald Trump to raise money for the AIDS walk.
Galvin dressed as “The Donald” and walked around the event carrying fake money with Trump’s face on it.
“I’ve been wearing silly costumes in the Walk since 2009, when I was a leprechaun,” Galvin said in an interview with RISE NEWS. “I always try to do something unique, as it’s a big point in my fundraising efforts. This year, I truly didn’t have an original idea. And then I saw a recent Republican debate. My costume immediately became clear.”
Galvin has been involved with AIDS walks for years and has been walking in them since 2007.
While most people at the walk understand that Galvin was making fun of Trump and his arrogant manor (he was also saying one-lines as he walked around like “I’m building a wall around YOUR house”), some people didn’t get the joke.
“A few were unsure, however, and wondered if I was supporting Trump,” Galvin said. “A few wouldn’t even take my fake money and just gave me disgusted looks.”
While it was all in good fun, Galvin said that he really does believe that Trump poses a threat to the LGBT community.
“An affront to any minority community is an affront to us all,” Galvin said. “If we sit silently as Trump insults Mexicans and Muslims, who will be around to defend us when it is our turn?”
Galvin’s efforts seemed to have paid off as he was able to raise around $8,000 for the walk.
“Trump’s campaign is as much a hot mess as I was walking in the sun wearing a clown wig and orange make up,” Galvin said. “At least I was able to turn his idiocy into a few laughs for a good cause.”
Cover Photo Credit: Scott Galvin/ Facebook
RISE NEWS is a grassroots journalism news organization that is working to change the way young people become informed and engaged in public affairs. You can write for us!
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