Kim Bartko’s Decade of Good Food Leadership Earns Grateful FamilyFarmed Sendoff

FamilyFarmed salutes longtime associate Kim Bartko, and wishes her success, as she steps aside to focus on her new business venture: Outbound Lab, which seeks to advance the Good Food movement in the U.S. and around the world by forging partnerships between foreign food innovators and domestic food businesses.

Chef-Driven Pilot Light: Food Education For All Seasons

Pilot Light is a nonprofit organization founded by some of Chicago’s top Good Food chefs to bring food education to students in Chicago Public Schools. And even though school’s out for the summer, Pilot Light is doing events around town to spread the word about its important social mission.

Good Food Festival

Record Good Food Festival Crowds Reflect A Movement’s Rise

The record attendance at FamilyFarmed’s 2017 Good Food Festival & Conference in Chicago underscored important points about the Good Food movement’s growing momentum. More than 7,500 people attended the 13th Good Food Festival & Conference, held March 16-18 at the UIC Forum on the University of Illinois at Chicago campus.

Chef Johnny Anderes Is At Home In The Kitchen: A Frontera 30 Story

Johnny Anderes is head chef of The Kitchen Chicago, with a beautiful location overlooking the north bank of the Chicago River. The Kitchen restaurant group was founded in Boulder, Colorado in 2004 and features delicious food — with a strong focus on local and sustainable sourcing — at its restaurants in Colorado, Chicago and Memphis. Johnny will join Paul Kahan and an all-star lineup of chefs who are participating in the Frontera 30th Anniversary Celebration, a joint fundraiser for Chef Rick Bayless’ Frontera Farmer Foundation and FamilyFarmed, which will be held at The Art Institute of Chicago on Sunday, April 30.

Top 5 Reasons to Attend Saturday’s Good Food Festival

The three pillars of the Good Food movement are a healthier, a more environmentally sustainable, and more economically dynamic food system that puts Good Food on Every Table. This year’s Festival will put a special accent on that first pillar — Good Food’s massive contribution to building a society with healthier, happier people and lower health care costs — with panels on Good Food is Good Medicine and Food and Mood.

Windy City Harvest: Growing Good Food and Good Food Jobs

Windy City Harvest operates four training programs on 13 farm sites that, according to Director of Operations Kelly Larsen, “all aim to create a pathway of opportunity within local food” for urban farmers, including youths from economically challenging circumstances. Larsen will share her experiences and expertise in growing Good Food and Good Food jobs in urban communities tomorrow (Thursday, March 16) as a panelist at FamilyFarmed’s Good Food Financing & Innovation Conference at Chicago’s UIC Forum.

Mushrooms

Blending Mushrooms With Meat For Sustainability And Health

The Blend is a movement emerging nationwide, and it features the craft of blending finely chopped mushrooms with ground meat (beef, turkey, chicken, lamb) for meals that are more delicious, nutritious and sustainable. Visit the Mushrooom Council at table 44-45 — on Friday during FamilyFarmed’s Good Food Trade Show and on Saturday during the Good Food Festival — to sample Paul Caravelli of Chicago’s Knife & Tine’s take on a blended meatball.

Exhibiting Our Diversity at the Good Food Festival

FamilyFarmed’s Good Food Festival & Conference reflects the values of the Good Food movement: increasing access to food produced locally as possible using sustainable, humane and fair practices, to build a healthier, more sustainable and more economically dynamic food system. It also reflects the amazing diversity of this nation’s food and farm entrepreneurs, both demographically and in the types, styles and ethnic origins of food they produce.

Good Food Fest Raffle

Good Food Fest Raffle Features Tix to Rick Bayless, Jack Johnson Spectaculars

FamilyFarmed’s Good Food Festival is holding a fundraising raffle for the first time. And we’re pulling out the stops to persuade you to participate. The Grand Prize is two tickets to The Frontera 30th Anniversary Celebration that FamilyFarmed is co-producing with storied chef Rick Bayless on April 30. Second prize is two tickets to music star Jack Johnson’s June 2 concert in Chicago.

Brian Severson Farms

Brian Severson Farms: Grains From Seed to Store, All On The Farm

The demand for better grains, flour and bread is fueling a market surge that is benefiting grain growers in the Midwest and across the United States. Some of these producers are more deeply rooted than others — and one of these is Illinois organic grain farmer Brian Severson, whose family has been growing in east-central Illinois for more than 150 years. Brian Severson Farms/Quality Organics will be an exhibitor at FamilyFarmed’s Good Food Trade Show on Friday, March 17 and the Good Food Festival on Saturday, March 18.

Lambs, Organic and Fiber Make Big Rock a Destination CSA

Donna and Scott Lehrer gave up corporate work for organic farming near Chicago nearly two decades ago. Their Big Rock Organics at Lamb of God Farm not only provides the food products for their Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) subscribers, but also wool for daughter Natasha Lehrer Lewis’ Esther’s Place fiber studio. The farm is a member of Band of Farmers: The Chicagoland CSA Coalition, and will be participating in the CSA Pavilion at FamilyFarmed’s Good Food Festival at Chicago’s UIC Forum on Saturday, March 18.

School Food

The Children Will Lead Us: How Good School Food Is Changing How We Eat

Tim Magner works to integrate food education with fun through Chicago-based programs such as Nature’s Farm Camp. He reports that the longterm decline in the quality and nutrition in school food is being reversed, in sync with the rise of the Good Food movement. More school gardens, more cooking classes, more efforts by many administrators to find healthier choices for students. In his article below, Tim describes the positive impact that is having for our nation’s schoolchildren and our food system in general.

Farm bill

The Future of Good Food in an Era of Political Change

A new federal farm bill is on course to be enacted as early as next year. Sustainable farmers and Good Food advocates would have needed to be on guard to protect these programs under any circumstances. But with the volatile political environment in Washington, D.C., supporters of these programs will need to be especially engaged. The National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition has been the leading federal policy advocates for the Good Food movement for 30 years. Wes King, an NSAC policy specialist explains the political landscape for the 2018 farm bill and what advocates need to do to prepare.

Chillinois Young Farmers Coalition

Big Chillinois: Young Farmers Coalition Cultivates New Generation In Chicagoland

With the average age of farmers in the United States pushing 60, growing a new generation of young farmers is a regional and national priority. One of the most encouraging recent developments in the Chicago area is the creation of Chillinois Young Farmers — the northern Illinois chapter of the National Young Farmers Coalition — which is providing a much-needed voice to this important constituency. FamilyFarmed is pleased that “Chillinois,” representing the national organization, will be participating in our Good Food Festival on Saturday, March 18 at Chicago’s UIC Forum.

Lifeway Kefir’s Julie Smolyansky: Refugee Childhood to Good Food Success

Kefir is a probiotic fermented dairy drinkthat originated in Russia in the 19th century and only recently has developed a growing consumer market in the United States. The main catalyst for the rising interest in this product is Lifeway Kefir, started in 1986 by Soviet refugee Michael Smolyansky and today run by his children. Julie Smolyansky, the company’s CEO, writes here about the family’s gratitude to the United States; she will participate on a panel about Big Food’s Embrace of Good Food at FamilyFarmed’s Financing & Innovation Conference on March 16.

Good Food Festival & Conference

Pleasant House Can Make Your Day With Pies During Good Food Festival

Chicago’s Pleasant House pubs is best known for its flaky, savory Royal Pies. Owners Art and Chelsea Jackson are Fellows in the current cohort of FamilyFarmed’s Good Food Business Accelerator and will participate in our Good Food Financing & Innovation Conference. Their restaurant, located just a mile away, will be open during the three-day Good Food Festival & Conference.