Tag: Local Foods

Local Foods Featured at State Park Dinners

A series of nine Farm-to-Table dinners are being planned at state parks across West Virginia. The series of events, planned between June 15 and September 12, is aimed to source more ingredients from local farmers.

Several state agencies and organizations are collaborating on the series, including the West Virginia Department of Agriculture, the Department of Natural Resources, and the West Virginia Farmers Market Association.

This is the second year the series of Farm to Table dinners will take place.

The dinners will take place at state park restaurants, putting locally grown foods and products on the menu from June to September.

Several of the events will have themes such as “Hoedown on the Hill” at the Chief Logan State Park and “Pickin-Pull” at the Pipestem park in an effort to teach people about their local foods.

Full list of Farm-to-Table events:

Four W.Va. Communities Highlighted for Successful Local Food Programs

Four West Virginia communities were highlighted in Washington, D.C. this week during a national summit that supports local food initiatives across the country. Local Foods, Local Places is a federal initiative meant to help communities create healthy and economically vibrant neighborhoods.

The event this week at the nation’s capital was attended by 70 local leaders and participants of the initiative. Four West Virginia projects were spotlighted at the summit, making West Virginia the state with the most local food success stories at this year’s event.

The Wild Ramp in Huntington, and the town of Williamson, in Mingo County, were featured for increasing access to healthy foods in their areas, and for boosting the local economy through farmers’ markets

Local food advocates from Rainelle and Wheeling also spoke about their communities’ programs to promote the local food economy – and how their work connects to economic development.

The Local Foods, Local Places initiative is sponsored by several different federal agencies including the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and the Appalachian Regional Commission (ARC).

Local Foods, Local Places Grant Awarded to West Virginia County

The Local Foods, Local Places partnership is a yearly federal award to communities around the country to help integrate local food strategies into economic development efforts. The award was given to six Appalachian communities in 2016, including one in West Virginia.

The initiative started in 2014 as part of the White House Rural Council’s work to support communities that want to make local foods a stronger part of the local economy. There are now 60 Local Foods, Local Places partnerships across the country. More than a third are in Appalachia, including four in West Virginia.

The award includes a financial grant of up to 20,000 dollars and access to federal consultants.

The newest West Virginia community to receive the grant is Rainelle. The community plans on establishing a mentorship program for local farmers and producers, developing a community grocery story and converting vacant lots into agricultural production.

Previous awards have gone to West Virginia communities in Wheeling, Williamson and Huntington.

Appalachia Health News is a project of West Virginia Public Broadcasting, with support from the Benedum Foundation.

Business is Brisk at Fresh 'Oasis' in Alderson Food Desert

Food deserts are a growing problem in West Virginia and across the country. The USDA defines a food desert as a part of the country where people don’t have access to fresh fruit, vegetables, and other healthful whole foods. Parts of more than 40 counties in West Virginia endure some sort of limited food access and the number is growing as more and more grocery stores close their doors. But when the grocery store in one Greenbrier County town closed, the community worked to find local resources with hopes of becoming self-sufficient.

After the IGA in Alderson in Greenbrier County closed last November, all the community had was basically a Dollar General store, some gas stations, and a tiny co-op in the corner of a local gift shop that sold things like beans, seeds and nuts. That co-op was part of the Alderson Community Food Hub. It’s a nonprofit that runs a community garden and a farmer’s market. Organizers had been thinking of expanding the co-op, but they didn’t expect that to happen for a while.

A Sense of Urgency

Anna Osborne has been involved with the Hub for about four years now. 

“When the grocery store closed it started feeling more like an imperative,” Osborne said.

The Wolf Creek Gallery Gift Shop owner agreed to move her gallery to make room for the new, expanded co-op. The Hub named the new store the Green Grocer. They bought refrigerators and wire shelving and stocked the shelves with a $25,000 grant from the One Foundation last year.

Now, you’ll find folks sitting at one of the tables by the windows eating lunch from the café while a steady flow of traffic strolls by shelves of oranges, bananas and apples. Osborne says the project is meant to provide healthy food to consumers and to provide a market for local farmers.

“Nothing against the grocery store but most of the produce that was carried there was from out of state or not local and our mission has always been to support the local economy,” Osborne said.

Re-Investing in Locals

Store manager Ann Knotts says the customers are creating more demand on the local farmers.

Credit Jessica Lilly
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Organizers of the Green Grocer have put up more signs to try and raise awareness of the fresh fruits available in the store.

“They’re a busy bunch of farmers,” Knotts said.

Knotts says the project is doing well financially. It got a second, $30,000 grant from the One Foundation this year. But its largest chunk of cash came from donors to an Indiegogo campaign. Knotts  says folks from across the world sent a total of $31,000 to help the cause.

The co-op keeps its costs down by having volunteers on staff. Helping to run the register and the store today is volunteer Mari Moody. She moved to Monroe County in the 70’s as part of the back to the land movement.

“I feel like I’ve been very very fortunate in my life,” Moody said, “and it’s important to give back. I’m semiretired I have the time. I think this is especially special because of the local produce and meats that we buy.”

Volunteers also help with other odd jobs like cleaning.  It helps to keep prices low for this small non-profit co-op.

Getting to Know Alderson

The space in the Green Grocer and cafe is limited. The store just started offering fresh meats in June. Knotts says the store won’t please everyone but is still getting to know the community’s needs. Folks can also leave suggestions or feedback in the suggestion box. But so far, Knotts says, business is good.

Credit Jessica Lilly
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“We see an increase all the time,” Knotts said. “We’re trying to get a lot more visibility we have a lot of people say we don’t know you’re here because we don’t have enough signage out front, so we’re working on that.”

“Word of mouth has been tremendous too as you can see it’s pretty steady and sometimes we’re swamped and that’s a good thing too.”

Organizers of the project hope it can serve as an example to other communities that are losing grocery stores sometimes because the population is falling, and sometimes because of competition from chain stores that don’t stock much fresh food.

“There certainly is a need for greater access to fresh food and communities like Alderson all over the country but certainly here,” President of the Board of Directors of the Alderson Community Food Hub Kevin Johnson said.

Johnson says folks in the community have been supportive of the project because losing the grocery store was such a big loss to the area.

“Food is such a fundamental part of what people’s daily lives that it’s almost like a service,” Johnson said.

Organizers are hoping the Green Grocer project will continue to grow and reach more members of the community. Currently the group distributes food to the senior center to help out people who don’t drive. They’ve just gotten donations to get a system to keep food cold while it’s on the road. 

Cucumber Juice and Red Rice & Hemp Burger? Shepherdstown Restaurant Surprises and Satisfies

Shepherdstown is a little place with a lot of history. Harpers Ferry and the Antietam battlefield are literally down the road. The tiny downtown has Civil War era brick buildings filled with mom n’ pop restaurants and shops. But there’s a kind of counterculture side to the town, too.

Locals can be seen playing live music on the street with a cup of coffee or tea in hand – maybe even wearing tie-dye. And there’s a big demand for local, organic foods including a local favorite – a restaurant called Mellow Moods.

When you walk in to Mellow Moods, you might notice the old hardwood floor; dark and even crooked and uneven in some places.

There are chalkboards featuring food jokes, local artists have work hanging on the walls, and you can sit at a table or on a couch.

The smells of frying eggs, fresh, warm bread, vegetables, blended fruits, and different cheeses waft through the air mixing together.

Phil Mastrangelo is the owner and founder of Mellow Moods, which he opened in 2007. Mastrangelo grew up just outside of Shepherdstown on the Maryland side of the Potomac River.

He says he wanted to bring real, organic foods to people in a society stuffed to the gills with processed foods. He started by only serving vegetarian and vegan dishes, but eventually he began offering things like organic chicken and wild salmon.

“I didn’t really want to jump in where everybody else was doing, and everyone else’s menus have 90% meat, 10% vegetarian. I wanted to do 90% vegetarian, 10% meat, and it took off,” Mastrangelo said.

In summer, Mastrangelo gets most of his ingredients from local farmers. That’s how the Red Rice and Hemp Burger came to be – to support a local business.

“The Red Rice and Hemp Burger started with a friend’s shop that was opening up, a hemp clothing store,” Mastrangelo explained, “and we wanted to do a special for them to help promote them, and just fell in love with it. And we make our own barbeque sauce, and we grill onions off. We have this amazing ciabatta bread, and the Red Rice and Hemp Burger was our first vegetarian burger.”

The burger is a customer favorite, but Mastrangelo says one of his favorite dishes is a very Appalachian one; his ramp special once a year when they’re in season.

The menu changes from month to month, but it always has a taste of the season — and the region.

Recipes from Mellow Moods:

Red Rice & Hemp Burger:

  • 1/2 cup red rice uncooked (cook well till sticky)
  • 1 cup hemp seed
  • 2 tbsp olive oil — Food process cooked rice, hemp seed, olive oil (coarsely chopped)
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1 tsp black pepper
  • 1 tsp freshly chopped garlic
  • 1 tsp basil
  • 1 tsp onion powder

Mix in well and patty. Making the rice really sticky is the key to this recipe.

Credit Liz McCormick / West Virginia Public Broadcasting
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West Virginia Public Broadcasting
Red Rice & Hemp Burger with a side of Quinoa Salad.

Potato Ramp Soup:

  • 3 tbsp butter
  • 1 medium bunch ramps, bulbs, and greens divided
  • 1 large leek, trimmed, cleaned well, halved lengthwise and thinly sliced
  • 1 large carrot, peeled, halved lengthwise and thinly sliced
  • Pinch dried marjoram
  • 2 tsp sea salt, or to taste
  • 6 cups water
  • Zest and juice of 1 small lemon
  • 2 lbs potatoes, peeled and diced to ½-inch cubes
  • Freshly ground black pepper

Sweet & Sour Basil Smoothie:

  • Juice of 1 orange
  • Juice of 1/2 lemon
  • 1 banana ripe
  • 5-7 leaves of fresh basil
  • 1 tbsp honey
  • 1/2 cup ice
  • Blend well
Credit Liz McCormick / West Virginia Public Broadcasting
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West Virginia Public Broadcasting
Sweet & Sour Basil Smoothie.

Wheeling Local Movement Gets National Assistance

Momentum continues to mount behind local food and local economic development efforts in the Northern panhandle. Wheeling was one of the top picks in a national Local Foods, Local Places Competition. As a result, local organizations are receiving technical assistance from multiple state and federal agencies to help capitalize on the growing demand for local foods.  Meetings with federal agency representatives began last week.

Local Places Protecting the Environment?

The Environmental Protection Agency initiated the national Local Food, Local Places program. The idea is to bring federal, regional, and state agencies together to help find and support existing local food and economic development efforts. Why would the EPA get in on the local movement?

EPA policy analyst Melissa Kramer explains that one reason is to promote lifestyles that rely less heavily on automobiles and all their emissions. She says the local life could go a long way toward that end.

“When you have a downtown that’s vibrant, that people want to live in, that has all the services that people need, ” Kramer said, “people have options for getting around that don’t involve driving. You find that there are a lot of people who want to walk, who want to bike.”

Kramer says that is healthier for community members, healthier for the environment, and healthier for the economy because dollar wind up staying with local businesses.

Federal, Regional, State, and Local Converge

Folks came in to Wheeling last week from Charleston, West Virginia, Durham, North Carolina, and Washington D.C. representing EPA, the US Department of Agriculture, the Appalachian Regional Commission, the State Department of Highways, and US Department of Transportation. These partners met with local Wheeling groups to talk about how to promote a local food system and grow the local economy in general.

It all started with a city tour from one of Wheeling’s trolley busses …

One of the tour guides was the director of the nonprofit Reinvent Wheeling, Jake Dougherty. He heads up one of three organizations that joined together to apply for the federal Local Foods, Local Places Grant. Others organizations include Grow Ohio Valley and the Wheeling National Heritage Area Foundation.

“Of the over 90 applications just in the Appalachian region, Wheeling stood out among all of them,” said Wilson Paine, a program analyst from the Appalachian Regional Commission who was involved in reviewing applications for the Local Foods Local Places Grant.

“Wheeling is emblematic of what a lot of Appalachian towns are going through right now which is searching for what their identity is going to be in the 21st century and how they can focus on the local aspects of building an identity,” Paine said.

“Wheeling is emblematic of what a lot of Appalachian towns are going through right now which is searching for what their identity is going to be in the 21st century and how they can focus on the local aspects of building an identity,” Paine said.

A Perfect Storm

Paine says there’s a perfect storm in Wheeling, combining youthful leadership, local food and area revitalization efforts, and ongoing region-wide partnerships. He says the existing infrastructure in Wheeling, combined with an engaged community, made Wheeling an ideal candidate for technical assistance.

Growing the Ohio Valley’s Local Food System

Executive director of Grow Ohio Valley, Ken Peralta, took a lot of questions during the tour of Wheeling. GrowOV is already deeply engaged in laying groundwork for a local food system in the region. In addition to the greenhouse, GrowOV has built multiple community gardens and a small organic farm inside the city. They’ve also got wheels in motion, so to speak, for a mobile vegetable market that will serve several counties in the region starting in June.

In addition to visiting some local food initiatives that are well on their way, federal and local partners visited a few areas of town that have been abandoned because they’re too steep to develop residentially or commercially. One hillside is slated to be planted with fruit trees and berries. Another, that overlooks all of downtown Wheeling and the Ohio Valley, will be a green, public space of some kind.  Action plans that detail what, when and how are being developed.

Peralta is hoping for help testing water as well as engineering ideas or resources to help manage stormwater that flows off of these steep hillsides. He and his colleagues are enthusiastic about the raw resources that seem abundant in Wheeling.

And the Enthusiasm is Contagious

Jake Dougherty of Reinvent Wheeling says there’s now a critical mass of people in and around Wheeling who are dedicated to turning their “dying city” into a thriving Appalachian town. He also admits that new industrial development in the region could be playing a role in bolstering the economy over the last five years, perhaps adding to that growing sense of hopefulness.

“But what I think is great, and what I think we have learned most about our economy from the past,” Dougherty said, “the conversations we are having are not centered around a single industry; it’s centered around the diversification of our economy.”

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