The Walton Family, of Wal-Mart fame, may be in the ICU wing right now trying to breathe life into its organic milk supplier.Aurora’s close cousin, the Vander Eyk Dairy, met its demise earlier this summer.The disease that is killing these dairies goes by the technical name of Absencia Grassosis, loosely translated as “lack of grass.” The USDA has required that organic cows have daily access to pasture during the growing season…. Its path to wellness lies in the USDA’s demands issued in a USDA press release:Major adjustments required at Aurora’s Platteville, Colo., facility include:1) Providing daily access to pasture during the growing season, acknowledging that lactation is not a reason to deny access to pasture;2) Reducing the number of cows to a level consistent with available pasture with agreed maximum stocking densities;3) Eliminating improperly transitioned cows from its herd and not marketing those cows’ milk as organic; and4) Agreeing to use the more stringent transition process in the NOP regulations for animals added to its dairy herd.We all like to triumph in the face of adversity and the Aurora Dairy is already using positive self-talk to help itself move out of the ICU.

Heaven knows that "the lower-middle portion of the food pyramid" could use some grassroots advertising … but I don’t think this video, made by two guys working in the produce section of an A&P, is it. You can’t beet the silly wordplay, however, and I think it’s a shame that the supermarket chain thinks […]

A roundup of current news and commentary about everything from Farm Bill updates to backyard chickens, transgenic foods, E. coli recalls, and sustainable fish.

A roundup of current features and featured blog posts of possible interest to Ethicurean readers.

I started by cooking the chopped red onion and the hot pepper in a bit of olive oil over low heat, letting them take their sweet time to carmelize…. Peaches and Herbs Salsa Makes 1 pint of salsa 1 tsp extra virgin olive oil 1 small red onion, sliced thin and chopped coarsely 1 hot pepper, seeded and minced 1 clove garlic, minced 1/2 tsp minced fresh basil 1/4 tsp salt 5-6 peaches, peeled, pitted, and chopped 1 1/2 c chopped tomatoes 1 tsp minced fresh mint 1/2 tsp minced fresh basil Juice from 1/2 lime In large skillet, heat olive oil over medium-low heat.

After I built the solar oven, it was time to test it. Being an engineer, I wanted to start out with some measurements.
My first two tests were as simple as it gets: heating water over the course of a sunny afternoon. To monitor the performance of the oven, I inserted a thermocouple (a […]

(The Dying Fields: India’s Forgotten Farmers - TV - Review - New York Times )ht on PBS about farmers in India caught in a debt nightmare, you may find yourself thinking at first of America’s mortgage mess.But by the end, don’t be surprised if your neurons, always eager to categorize the new and the incomprehensible, give an entirely different spin to the strange goings-on the program documents: These impoverished cotton farmers have traits in common with suicide bombers.No, they are not blowing up bystanders in the name of a god or a political cause…. And the government support system in this country is close to non-existent - the central cause of the enormous distress that so many of them have had here in central India in the cotton farming belt.It is interesting to compare the transformation of the Indian economy and where the rural economy fits in, with what happened in the United States during the 1980s where we saw massive transformation of its rural farm economy.

It’s time for action on almonds.
The above photo shows almonds lying on the ground shortly after being shaken from a tree. The nuts are covered by a hull, which has started to peel back in the above specimens, and a shell. I took the photo during a CUESA-organized tour of Lagier Ranches in […]

A round-up of the most important news & commentary regarding SOLE- and anti-SOLE food issues, farming, policy, etc. that we think Ethicurean readers will want to know about.

A round-up of the most entertaining features we’ve run across lately.

A roundup of current features and featured blog posts of possible interest to Ethicurean readers.

Bob Scowcroft, director of the Organic Farming Research Foundation in Santa Cruz, Calif., says that Growing for Market “has become one of our favorite publications here at the office, and was identified as such by many of the respondents of our National Organic Farmers’ Survey.”… Nowadays, their Wild Onion Farm produces herbs and vegetables only for themselves, while the flowers are sold commercially to florists and the Community Mercantile, Lawrence’s natural foods grocery…. Certification grows Lynn notes that the USDA regulations have meant that getting certified is now more expensive and paperwork-intensive, a drawback to small growers…. And, despite a bit of an exodus from certification, particularly among CSA growers (including Wild Onion Farm) whose customers know and trust them, the number of certified farms keeps increasing…. An added benefit of the local-food movement is that small-scale market gardening (also known as truck farming), whether organic or not, offers an entrée into the industry for people who harbor dreams of farming.

The surroundings of Alemany Farm in San Francisco do not bring forth feelings of pastoral tranquillity. On one side is 12 lanes of high-speed traffic (Interstate 280 and Alemany Blvd), which showers the area with waves of noise. On another side, a large housing complex — a vast space of buildings, cars and […]

A roundup of current news and commentary about everything from Farm Bill updates to backyard chickens, transgenic foods, E. coli recalls, and sustainable fish.

A roundup of current features and featured blog posts of possible interest to Ethicurean readers.