Allan Appel Photo
Carmen Perez grew up thinking kale and spinach were “stinky and gross.” In her native Puerto Rico she had never once eaten them, either.
Now Perez not only makes leafy green vegetable and fruit smoothies in her kitchen. She also helps to grow the fresh, organic produce herself and, in the process, has lost 30 pounds.
Those achievements were noted late Tuesday afternoon on the first day of fall, down by the sun-dappled confluence of the Mill and Quinnipiac Rivers in Fair Haven.
Maisonpierre has put in marigolds this year as a deterrent to vegetable-loving beetles.
That’s where New Haven Farms staffers and students marked the change of season among their idyllic rows of greens, cherry tomatoes, beets and others of the earth’s treats. The veggies were growing in bounteous raised rows on the margin of the parking lot of Phoenix Press on James Street, the largest of New Haven Farm’s seven citywide growing fields.
As the sun set and their kids frolicked among the crops and the marigolds, two dozen people coping, like Perez, with diabetes and high cholesterol — most referred to the farming activity by the Fair Haven Community Health Center (FHCHC) — harvested and mulched and participated in a nutrition and cooking class.
This evening — as on all three evenings of the 19-week course — the recipe and nutrition basics culminated in a delicious meal; this night it was white bean stew, with garlic, parsley, leeks, and onions, all (except for the beans) grown on site and harvested by the eaters.
Kline with the kale.
“They come, they farm, they get a class, they take home a share” of the harvest, said New Haven Farms Executive Director Rebecca Kline.
Of the 55 families participating this season, 86 percent are referred by FHCHC as part of their treatment. The balance are employees of Chabaso Bakery, whose founder, Charles Negaro, a New Haven Farms board member, provides the class as a health benefit.
Kline said the group, which operates seven small sites citywide, is still looking for an additional large plot of land so that it can expand the number of families doing urban agriculture for health and development of community, the group’s aims. (Click here for a story from last winter on the failed attempt of the group to convince neighbors to embrace the use of an acre of English Mall site, in Fair Haven near Clinton Avenue, Peck and English Streets.)
On Tuesday Kline said that she and board members met with city officials to explore possibilities for multiple sites of an acre or more.
Elizabeth Petruzelli, Jose Ortiz, and other participants begin nutrition class with breathing meditation.
That would enable the farm staff and volunteers to double production. The current seven sites— mostly small lot areas from the Hill to Fair Haven, of which the James Street/Phoenix Press is the largest — all add up to only about a half an acre.
Still, Farm Manager Jacqueline Maisonpierre noted, last year about 6,000 – 7,000 pounds of produce were harvested. This year, it will be eight, she estimated.
Some of that harvest — the kale, parsley, leeks, and onions — was about to be placed in the bean stew. First, the participants learned that leafy green vegetables contain lots of calcium.
With the help of a Spanish translator, Noreen Purcell conducted the class, based on the National Institute of Health’s diabetes prevention curriculum. Volunteer Ted Strombley demonstrated best techniques for slicing the leeks.
There was a question: “With calcium in milk, we hear you can take in too much. Is it the same with green vegetables?”
Purcell answered that you shouldn’t overdo any category of food. Then she added, “It’s not the same. You don’t have to worry about limits” with green vegetables.
Peels, Wheels Launched
Meanwhile, nearby the tent where the class was going on, Domingo Medina was busy aerating his latest batch of compost, gleaned from the refuse of New Haven city households.
Click here for a story from earlier this year about how Medina, who works as the compost director with New Haven Farms, planned to launch his subscriber-based business. He planned to pick up kitchen scraps on his bicycle, haul them to the James Street farm site, and create local, organic compost, mainly through the power of his back and shoulder muscles and the help of bacteria.
Medina announced that the venture is now rolling! It even has an official name: “Peels and Wheels,” a program of New Haven Farms.
In the second week of bicycle-with-trailer-in-tow pick-up, Medina said, he has collected 200 pounds of kitchen scraps from 11 households ranging from East Rock to Downtown to Fair Haven. “They pay $8 a week, or on a monthly basis,” he said. In return, every six months his clients receive up to 20 pounds of organic compost to use in their own gardens.
“Or they can donate it” back to New Haven Farms, he added.
Medina’s aim is to add customers to the route so that he will be able to produce enough truly organic compost to supply New Haven Farms’ growing requirements locally, and in the process reduce the amount of garbage generated by city folks that ultimately goes to incineration.
He pointed out not only the spiffy new trailer attached to his bicycle, but also a new three-bin composting system (pictured). It uses a blower and timer to send air through PVC pipes to aerate and compost without the back-straining labor he now puts into the work.
That should put him in position to take on more clients, create more organic compost, save the atmosphere some pollution, and save New Haven Farms the $7,000 it spends purchasing the stuff from outside providers.
Medina said that although a good number of companies pick up kitchen refuse, they subcontract it out to other companies that do the composting. Peels and Wheels does it all. He characterized it as a Connecticut first in that he picks up, hauls, and composts locally. And the only wheels involved belong to his Yuba Mundo bicycle.
U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro dropped by at the end of the class to visit with Perez and the other students.
She had never been to a New Haven Farms site and was wowed by what she saw.
“We need to get the word out how important good food is. Sometimes it’s tempting to pick up a bag of potato chips, but it’s better to grab some celery and carrots,” DeLauro said.
“And some kale,” someone shouted from under the tent.
“And kale,” the congresswoman repeated.
