eating food, growing food, reading about food

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 the beginning of a new adventure! i am spending a month WWOOFing on a farm in Salinas, living in Marina with the family.

Marina is an interesting town, and I'm curious to explore more. it is a mix of sand dunes and housing development type residential areas, but i have easy access to the Fort Ord National Monument trail system from the house, so morning run prospects are great! it is fun exploring this new ecosystem. i also want to make it out to the beach and dunes there, which is just a short drive from the house. the meandering paths of the residential area makes for good walking, and im pleased that the air quality has improved so that i can get back to my morning run, afternoon walk routine. how nice to be outside again!

the academic portion of the Harvest Corps is basically a speaker series! this week's theme is soil and microbes, so we've heard about composting systems on a farm in New York and urban garden in the Bronx, and also talked to a mushroom guy -he's a professional forager for the fancy restaurant tied to Stone Barns, the education center/farm that is organizing this academic portion. compost and soil were big themes from my study abroad too, so the magic of microorganisms isnt totally new to me, but its fun to learn more about the fungi and bacteria and nitrogen and carbon vibes. fungi feeds on carbon and bacteria nitrogen and its all about that balance for good compost whee! you can also try to add indigenous microorganisms by going to collect them from nearby forests/healthy soil spaces. i think i want to try this but also be mindful of extraction practices ? also, if anyone is looking for a fun 30 min listen, might i suggest radiolab 'from tree to shining tree' :)

due to weird scheduling and an unexpected power outage, today was actually the first day that i went to the farm! its 1 acre, which seems small, but they can grow so much and intentionally choose to be small and diversified rather than larger and less diversified, and even with this there is still extra! its been fun to talk ideology around farming and choices for sustainable agriculture, and also interesting to see in person the differences of conventional ag, industrial-mindset organic ag, and then our 1 acre which is trying to be more diversified and not really profit mindset. the variety is a dream for me! peppers, tomatoes, eggplant, lettuce, spinach, arugula, mizuna, summer squash, winter squash, broccoli, celery, corn, carrots, and oh so many herbs! basil cilantro parsley thai basil rosemary sage thyme ginger turmeric garlic and onions and also lovely flowers and also spicy spicy peppers! its a good space with quite the bounty. today we took out bolted lettuce and planted some crocus bulbs for flowers

the farm is part of alba, which is an organization that trains farmers -original focus was on migrants- for organic production. they have 100 acres of land that they lease out to farmers after they go through a 1-year training program with the organization. they also have equipment and such that is shared among the farmers. so, our 1 acre is amidst everyone else's crops too, although other folks have larger landholdings and less diversification

im still getting comfortable with everything, but hoping to do some more kitchen cooking besides just helping out soon. first day i helped with a sweet corn soup, simple but delicious! today robina made roti and daal and curry, very yummy! i added a salad with some veggies from the farm. there are some truly giant zucchini, so i am hoping to do some baking with that soon, stay tuned

amidst all this fun, i am also thesis-ing and revisiting my old readings. falling in love again with agroecology and food justice as a holistic approach to systems change and feeling inspired! really vibing with coop models as a way to start the food revolution while understanding the constraints of neoliberalism













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