Family Friendly Events Celebrate CT Grown Foods
Saturday, September 11th, 2010Tweet
Video from WTNH’s Good Morning CT segment with Annie Rourke on Saturday, September 1.
Bountiful late summer and early fall harvests of vegetables and fruits from CT farms will be transformed by chefs across the state at more than 80 restaurants, schools and caterers into special menus during the first ever Farm-to-Chef Harvest Celebration Week.
Running from September 26 through October 2 this celebration of fresh and healthy, locally grown food and wine is a new event conceived and organized by the CT Dept. of Agriculture and falls on the 375th birthday of our state. We still have working family farms that were established in the 1600s!
leFarm in Westport and Sugar & Olives in Norwalk are two Farm-to-Chef Harvest Celebration Week participants that are dedicated to regularly sourcing local and sustainably grown food.
Vegans, vegetarians, and meat lovers all have wonderful choices for a relaxed sit down meal or a casual lunch or dinner to go. The diversity of options, from burgers and pizza to heirloom tomato soup and grass-fed filet of beef, makes it easy for diners to find something that suits them.
There is a fantastic diversity of high-quality food grown and made here in CT. In addition to vegetables and fruit, our farms provide us with beef, lamb, pork , poultry, fish, cheese, eggs, yogurt, honey, maple syrup, and wine. Some participating restaurants have announced mouth watering yet affordable, multi-course prix fixe dinner menus for Farm-to-Chef Harvest Celebration Week. Please make your reservations early. Click here for a complete list of participants, menus and special events.
Many participating schools and restaurants are members of the CT Department of Agriculture’s Farm-to-Chef Program, a program that since 2006 has helped connect farmers with chefs dedicated to regularly sourcing CT Grown foods.
Lunch and Dinner at the Farm!
- Sport Hill Farm in Easton is hosting mobile, wood-fired brick oven caterer Skinny Pines for a pizza lunch on Oct. 1 featuring toppings fresh from the field. Click here for more information. Reservations should be emailed to farmer Patti Popp at farmgal596@yahoo.com.
- Chefs a l’Orange Caterers is holding a farm to table dinner at Treat Farm in Orange on Oct. 2. The seasonal menu will showcase Treat Farm’s vegetables and other locally sourced foods. For more information, or to purchase tickets, please contact Heather Bucknam at 860-658-4253.
Visit www.CTGrown.gov and www.CTFarmToChefNetwork.typepad.com for more information including a list of participants, menus and special events.
LiveGreenCT! is a fun-filled, family festival that celebrates eco-friendly living, caring for the environment and protecting our natural resources. This two day event is being held at Taylor Farm Park in Norwalk on Sept. 18-19 with over 125 exhibitors in all areas of sustainable living and features many free events and activities.
This free event runs from 10-4 on Saturday and 11-4 on Sunday and the $5 parking fee benefits SoundWaters & Norwalk Seaport Association. Come for a delicious lunch or snack made with local and sustainably grown foods and bring your reusable shopping bags to shop the Westport farmers’ market. You will find these Westport farmers’ market vendors at LiveGreenCT!:
- Sugar & Olives (lunch vendor)
- Bake Local (fresh baked goods featuring local ingredients)
- Skinny Pines (lunch vendor)
- Boxed Goodes
- Moorefield Herb Farm (organic her plants)
- El’s Kitchen
- Arogya
- Izzi B Cupcakes (allergen-free cupcakes)
- Raus Coffee
- The Little Chocolate Company
- Ladies of Levita (fresh cheese and yogurt)
- Boxcar Cantina (lunch vendor)
- Sport Hill Farm (organic vegetables)
- Nothing But (premium, handmade granola bars)
One of the easiest ways to live green is to choose local and sustainably grown food because they require fewer food miles (less fossil fuels), less packaging, less storage, and are fresher and more delicious and nutritious. The following special guest speakers will wow you with their knowledge and inspire you to eat green.
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Special guest speakers Michel Nischan and Marina Marchese will also be signing their wonderful books for guests at LiveGreenCT!
Michel Nischan, James Beard award-winning chef and author, local food advocate, and founder & CEO of Wholesome Wave will be a guest speaker on Sat. at 1:00. Michel was just named Best Locavore Chef 2010 by CT Magazine and his new cookbook, “Sustainably Delicious”, will be available for sale and signing. Wholesome Wave is an organization committed to bringing fresh, locally-grown fruits and vegetables to residents of inner cities, including Bridgeport CT, through its innovative Double Value Coupon program;
- Marina Marchese, founder of Red Bee Honey, will be leading a honeybee and honey discussion immediately following the 1:00 screening of the documentary film Vanishing of the Bees. Brush up on your honeybee and honey facts because 20 lucky audience members who correctly answer Marina’s trivia questions each will win a bottle of her honey courtesy of Whole Foods Market Westport. Marina will also be selling her single-source honeys and holding a book sale and signing of her book “Honeybee: Lessons from An Accidental Beekeeper”, which made the Washington Post’s 2009 Books We Love list.
Free Screening of Vanishing of the Bees at 1:00 on Sunday
About Vanishing of the Bees:
Honeybees have been mysteriously disappearing across the planet, literally vanishing from their hives. Known as Colony Collapse Disorder, this phenomenon has brought beekeepers to crisis in an industry responsible for producing apples, broccoli, watermelon, onions, cherries and a hundred other fruits and vegetables. Commercial honeybee operations pollinate crops that make up one out of every three bites of food on our tables.Vanishing of the Bees follows commercial beekeepers David Hackenberg and Dave Mendes as they strive to keep their bees healthy and fulfill pollination contracts across the U.S. The film explores the struggles they face as the two friends plead their case on Capitol Hill and travel across the Pacific Ocean in the quest to protect their honeybees.
Filming across the US, in Europe, Australia and Asia, this documentary examines the alarming disappearance of honeybees and the greater meaning it holds about the relationship between mankind and mother earth. As scientists puzzle over the cause, organic beekeepers indicate alternative reasons for this tragic loss. Conflicting options abound and after years of research, a definitive answer has not been found to this harrowing mystery.
For more information about LiveGreenCT!, please visit the event web site.
