Where do our favorite dishes come from? In our ongoing series ‘Food History’ we take a look at classic dishes and their roots, this time we step away from a specific dish and look at our all-time favorite food trend: the history of food trucks. 

Creme brulee carts and tacos sold in Airstreams. Nothing has become more synonymous with modern American food culture than mobile food trucks. There are entire festivals devoted to them, reality shows, and many a restaurant has launched a mobile version to supplement their brick and mortar locations. You might think food trucks are a catchy trend fueled by hashtags and the underground food movement (one that even the corporate world loves), but mobile food delivery is certainly nothing new.

Push carts date back to the infant days of the United States; New Amsterdam, now known as New York City, began regulating mobile food vendors in the late 1600s. But as many an American food-related custom does, the modern day food truck finds its roots in the heart of Texas. It was here in 1866 that ranger Charles Goodnight solved the problem of cooking well while out on cattle drives: he outfitted a United States Army wagon with kitchen accoutrements and began dishing out ample servings of fresh meat and coffee. A cowboy’s culinary dream. The chuckwagon – which you could call America’s original food truck – was born.

Beyond its push carts, today’s foodie metropolis New York City was an early comer to the food truck game as well with its Night Lunch wagons. In 1893, in an attempt to better feed the working class, the Church Temperance Society invested in a wagon that served meals from 7:30pm to 4am, giving workers a food option beyond the local saloon.

Much like today, the wagons were a budget friendly restaurateur option: the cost of outfitting a lunch wagon and opening it up for business was around $600. Today Henry Ford’s infamous 1890 Night Owl Lunch wagon is still in service, and believed to be the last remaining horse-drawn lunch wagon of its kind.

The United States Army started feeding its troops with mobile canteens in the early 1900s, and in 1936 Oscar Meyer rolled out its first portable hot dog truck, The Weiner Mobile. About the same time, Good Humor hit the streets with its first truck selling “ice cream on a stick.”

In a culture that quickly grew to love drive-thrus and fast food, it’s no surprise that mobile food took off in the way that it did. Even waffle carts were a thing before Portlandia was ever born, as witnessed in New Orleans in the 1940s.

Lunch carts and ice cream trucks soon became a standard occurrence–you know exactly what that chime on infinite repeat means when you hear it out your window–and in 1974 Raul Martínez founded King Taco, repurposing an ice cream van to start selling mobile lunch food, purportedly the first taco truck in the nation. Nowadays you’ll find food truck offerings everywhere from Anchorage to Austin in everything from Airstreams to Smart Cars.

It’s a business that isn’t always easy, but combine a slow economy with the appeal of buying creative fast food and there’s no doubt that food trucks are here to stay.

Check out more of our Food History series.

Image: Robert Neff, The Henry Ford, Louisiana Division/City Archives, New Orleans Public Library

The post Food History: The History of Food Trucks appeared first on EcoSalon.

Food on-the-go.

In recent years, the food truck phenomenon has exploded, bringing cheap, tasty cuisine to parking lots, sidewalks, and street fairs around the country. Whether you love food trucks or hate them, you can’t deny their convenience and relative cost-effectiveness, particularly when they’re parked outside your office at lunch hour. Here, a look at some classic, cool, and completely wacky roaming restaurants from across America (and beyond).

(above) Steve’s Catering Homemade Chunky Fries, Toronto, Canada

Fojol Brothers Truck, Washington, DC

The Fish Box, Miami, Florida

Coolhaus Ice Cream Truck, Los Angeles, California

Mr. Good Stuff, Miami, Florida

Pyongyang Express, San Francisco, California

King’s Fries, Toronto, Canada

Mud Coffee Truck, New York, New York

Ludo Bites Food Truck, Los Angeles, California

Suzi’s Lunch Truck, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Tamale Spaceship, Chicago, Illinois

Love Balls, Austin, Texas

Pi On Wheels, Washington, DC

Stephanie Taco Truck, Los Angeles, California

Good Dog Hot Dogs, Houston, Texas

Happy Kebab, Charlottenlund, Denmark

Fish & Chip, Toronto, Canada

Bernie’s Burger Bus, Houston, Texas

Honest Tom’s Taco Shop, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Divan Bakery and Coffee Truck, Dania Beach, Florida

Drift Truck, Edmonton, Canada

The Crispy Truck, Santa Monica, California

Burger Theory, Adelaide, Australia

Chimi Truck, New York, New York

Gyores Express, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Cookie Time, San Francisco, California

Nineveh Assyrian, Olympia, Washington

Curbside Cupcakes, Washington, DC

Fahrenheit Truck, Cleveland, Ohio

Farmhand Foods, Durham, North Carolina

SEE ALSO:

40 Photos of Bikes from Around the World

40 Photos from Flea Markets Around the World

30 Photos of the World’s Most Uniquely Designed Buildings

25 Photos of Urban Green Spaces

View more photo collections here. 

The post 30 Photos of Food Trucks appeared first on EcoSalon.

A film about entrepreneurial solutions to social issues.

The statistics surrounding the state of public health in the United States are overwhelming. Today, 72.5 million Americans are obese, resulting in $146 billion dollars per year in obesity-related costs. That number is estimated to jump to $343 billion by 2020.

This is how the documentary film Apple Pushers begins, with a strident reminder of the food and health crisis we’re currently in. We live in a country where the disparity between communities that have access to fresh food and those that don’t is shocking. In fact, 23.5 million Americans don’t have a supermarket within one mile of their home, putting these Americans in the heart of food deserts, and while convenience stores and fast food may abound, getting healthy and affordable food is difficult and inconvenient.

In response to food deserts in New York City, in 2008 the Laurie M. Tisch Illumination Fund gave a $1.5 million grant to launch the Green Carts initiative, creating 1,000 permits for green carts, mobile food carts that sell raw fruits and vegetables. The grant funded micro-loans and technical assistance for Green Cart operators to ensure that low-income communities would have the access to healthy food they so desperately need.

The story of the Green Carts initiative and its positive effects is the subject of documentary film, Apple Pushers, screening online April 22-30 as a part of Whole Foods’ online documentary film festival Do Something Reel, featuring a variety of documentaries on food and environmental issues.

First approached by Laurie Tisch, filmmaker Mary Mazzio launched herself into telling the story of four immigrants positively impacted by the initiative, all starting their own mobile food cart businesses, and the effects that this kind of philanthropic effort can have. In the process, she was immersed in the world of food politics and the importance of access as it relates to healthier communities.

“When these low income residents can use their food stamp cards, demand skyrockets, whether it’s farmers markets or pushcarts… [it]has to be a price point that makes sense. Low income communities want access to food too,” says Mazzio.

Providing access to good food might seem like a no-brainer, but watch the film and you soon learn that getting Green Carts launched was not a path without obstacles. A contentious issue when it came to City Council, politicians were concerned about the effects on local business that such a model would have, contending that mobile food carts would pull consumers away from local establishments. In the film, we see the heated debate that ensues. “I waded through all the 100s of pages of testimony… what was really interesting was, yet another universal concept, whether you have a 2×4 cart or you’re Walmart, people go ballistic because it means change,” says Mazzio.

But the launching of a program that would support mobile food carts wasn’t just an economic question. “What did surprise me were some of the arguments, like ‘those people don’t eat fruits and vegetables.’ I think that is a misguided notion of how you look at the issue. That’s like saying ‘oh, those people don’t have checking accounts’ Well guess what, where are the banks? It’s an issue of red line food districts,” says Mazzio.

Put good food into these places and people will buy it. “Low income communities want access to food, too,” says Mazzio. (That this should even be a matter of debate says much about our current cultural climate.) When we’re talking about public health and eating habits, we have to start with infrastructure and equality.

And the stakes are high. As Mazzio points out, obesity alone “is a problem that could bankrupt our children if we don’t keep it in check. It’s going to overshadow almost every other problem we have financially. Really? This is a problem we can fix.”

And that’s where the idea of mobile markets comes into play. From mobile grocery stores in Nashville to a mobile supermarket in New Mexico to a $25,000 grant to fund a mobile farmers markets in Houston, initiatives similar to Green Carts are popping up around the country, providing a grassroots solution to an overwhelming problem. Beyond providing access to good food, as they are “rooted in micro entrepreneurship” as Mazzio says, these programs are also economically empowering.

For Mazzio, if we’re going to solve the obesity crisis we need more programs like this. Not just government subsidies, but the kind of micro loans and programs that bring long lasting returns. Ultimately, programs like Green Carts are “entrepreneurial solutions to social issues,” says Mazzio. Because when it comes to food, we all need to eat, and we all deserve the access to the food that is good for us.

“This is basic human rights. That’s kind of overstating it, but this is food justice,” says Mazzio.

“The Apple Pushers” theatrical trailer from Paul Gattuso on Vimeo.

Do Something Reel festival opens April 22, with a live screening of “The Apple Pushers,” followed by a panel discussion with the film’s writer and director, Mary Mazzio; executive producer, Laurie Tisch; and celebrity chef, food policy advocate and founder of Wholesome Wave, Michel Nischan. The event will take place at Alamo Drafthouse’s Slaughter Lane Theater in Whole Foods Market’s hometown of Austin. Additionally, theaters in Boston, Detroit, Pittsburgh and San Francisco will host simultaneous screenings and will stream the panel discussion. For more information click here. To learn more about Apple Pushers visit the film’s website. 

Image: Apple Pushers

The post Solving the Food Crisis: An Interview with ‘Apple Pushers’ Filmmaker Mary Mazzio appeared first on EcoSalon.

ColumnAs the food truck trend grows, corporate chains like Jack in the Box are paying attention.

It was only a matter of time.

There was no way we could keep guerrilla marketing techniques and word of mouth culinary tips to ourselves. No, after several years of brief stints in the limelight, the food cart world was destined for mainstream. And last week, Jack in the Box was the latest chain restaurant to jump on the bandwagon.

Jack in the Box’s new “Munchie Mobile,” which is hitting the streets of Southern California, is certainly making food cart lovers across the nation cringe. The simple beauty of a unique food truck serving up dishes you would only ever hear of via word of mouth or Twitter is completely lost on the chain. Well, except that the Munchie Mobile does have a Twitter feed.

A food cart traditionally provides the opportunity to seek out a new business venture, to take a stab at crafting one’s own recipes, and to make a name for oneself in an unpretentious, efficient manner. For big brands, it’s simply the latest marketing tool.

Last fall, in order to promote its new Dip & Squeeze Ketchup, Heinz outfitted a truck to become a veritable moving billboard, starting in Philadelphia and making stops along the way to share french fries and ketchup with the masses. Of course there was an entire coordinated social media campaign along with all this, with prizes given away for Foursquare check-ins and tagged Twitter updates.

Five years ago, such an initiative may have seem a little over the top, or out of place, but in the age of food carts, the Heinz truck fits right in. In larger cities these days it’s practically second nature to walk up to a truck window and place an order.

One could argue that the true original franchised “food truck” was the Oscar Meyer weinermobile – which is still traveling around and keeping up its own blog written by the “hotdoggers” who drive it. But the difference here is between an over-the-top marketing gimmick (a vehicle shaped like a hotdog) and the incorporation of guerrilla street tactics to make marketing efforts seem more genuine (franchise in a truck). Efforts like this aren’t just happening on the street. Take Starbucks, which is putting a large effort behind making some of their thousands of worldwide coffee shops appear more like local institutions that the global multinational brand that they are.

Why do initiatives like this feel inherently dirty? Because larger interests are encroaching on the success that has been created by independent business seeking to do something different, veering from the norm and surprising customers.

Just a few years ago, food carts were nothing more than obscure. You wouldn’t find lines around the block or well-known chefs hitting them up for lunch. But nowadays they’ve come to define an important part of American food culture; one that’s important precisely because it isn’t based on marketing to the masses.

And that means money. Whereas many independent food trucks and food carts started small, creating their business as they grew, now there’s a market for getting everything in place from the get-go. There’s even a company called Mobi Munch that is “the nation’s first mobile food service infrastructure company and online marketing channel dedicated to providing established chefs and restaurateurs an integrated online and offline platform for launching innovative restaurant concepts aboard state-of-the-art food trucks.”

Mobi Munch helps franchises get food trucks going. And as the food truck industry continues to grow, business for them is booming. “Six months ago I projected that 10 percent of the top 200 restaurant chains would have some mobile presence,” Aaron Noveshen, founder of Mobi Munch said. “Now I think that number will be higher.”

As conscious lunchtime consumers, maybe we should feel honored that we’ve had a part in driving a movement that’s become so popular it’s now being co-opted by fast food. Then again, maybe not.

This is the latest installment of Anna Brones’s column at EcoSalon, Foodie Underground, taking a conscious look at what’s bubbling in the underground food movement, from supper clubs to mini markets to the culinary avant garde.

Images: krysnky, ohfaceKillah

The post Foodie Underground: Corporate Food Cart Nation appeared first on EcoSalon.

Food carts. If you’re not up to speed on the latest trend in food movements you’ve been living in a cave; a very dark one. Food carts are everywhere, and they’re bringing rise to some of the coolest in local, sustainable creations by some of the most up and coming chefs out there. And they’re quick and cheap.

Portland, Oregon has long been one of the US leaders in street food – even ranked #1 by some – so it’s no surprise that Microsoft would choose this city to launch a hyperlocal Bing product: the Portland Food Cart Finder.

You can use the desktop and mobile application to access information on over 250 carts in the Portland metro area, including reviews, photos and menus. With carts offering food from Guam to Germany, you’re sure to find something.

The food cart finder is part of the search engine’s larger foray into localized products, and we can only hope that this means more food cart-related search apps for other foodie centers. In the meantime, there are plenty of websites devoted to tracking individual city’s food cart scenes, like Austin, San Francisco and Atlanta.

Thanks to Read Write Web for the tip!

Image: vespar avenue

The post Foodie Underground: Bing’s New Portland Food Cart Finder appeared first on EcoSalon.

We’d rather live near a taco truck, than a Taco Bell. Sure. And summer wouldn’t feel the same without the occasional Mr. Softee/Frosty Treats/ or Tactical Ice Cream Unit soft serve indulgence.

But at some point this whole thing gets a little ridiculous. First there’s all those disposable plates and utensils – though some trucks use only compostable ware, provide receptacles and recycle their frying oil into biofuel.

Then there’s the fact that street food is supposed to be affordable, simple, and accessible. But with the cool factor off the charts, people sometimes wait hours for a small portion of very expensive food that they then have to scarf down while perched precariously on a urine soaked curb. Is it that good, really?

Then there are all these trucks driving around and sometimes idling in parking places all day and spewing out noxious fumes along with the emissions caused by their refrigeration systems, stoves, fryers, and grills.

In New York, the city council just moved forward on its first anti-food truck law due to idling and parking issues.

Not to mention complaints from non-mobile restaurants.

Though some trucks are greener than others, there is a real lack of discussion overall about the environmental impact of the explosion in food trucks. This how-to article doesn’t mention it at all.

Thankfully, there are food trucks heading in the right direction. Here’s our list of 10 mobile vendors and one futuristic pop up restaurant that are curbing the use of excess resources.

1. Kickstand Coffee in Brooklyn NY uses bikes to transport its coffee and even uses bike power to fuel a portion of the brewing. If they don’t use disposable cups or plastic lids, they’d get extra points in my book, but their website doesn’t mention it. Hey Brooklynites! Are they totally green or not?

2. The Green Pirate Truck Juice Truck in Brooklyn NY runs its truck on biodiesel, composts all organic waste and works with farmers to get it to farms in upstate NY. They also use compostable cups.

3. Green Trucks in the LA area power their trucks on vegetable oil and biodiesel, make their food in a solar powered kitchen, use green packaging (though they don’t say what kind), and have a lot of organic vegetarian choices. They still serve meat of the slightly more humane variety, though it’s not grass-fed from family farms and “sustainably farmed” shrimp. To me these look like compromises to stay in business and keep their price points reasonable, which is understandable.

4. Liba’s Falafel Truck in San Francisco and Emeryville, CA serves a totally organic, vegetarian (mostly vegan) menu, recycles its frying oil into fuel, and uses all compostable packaging while providing the necessary receptacles to customers.

5. On the Fly in DC vends organic, local foods from their specially designed, American made zero-emission plug-in”smartkarts®“. They also use eco-friendly packaging, though they don’t say what kind.

6. Austin’s Soup Peddler has been around since before the current mobile food trend grew wheels. Soup Peddler started out delivering soups by bike in his Austin neighborhood. The business has grown to include entrees, and other foods and, while some deliveries are still done by bike, customers have the option to pick up as well. Hopefully at least some of them are on two wheels.

7. Steubens Food Truck in Denver is still in development but founders say its solar-powered, biofueled, locally grown goodness is coming soon!

8. DC’s Sweetflow Yogurt is a truck designed to run without a generator so it uses less fuel. They also use local and organic ingredients and 100 percent compostable packaging.

9. Fresh Local in New Hampshire is run by actual farmers. The products are all sourced from local family farms, the disposables are biodegradable and they feed any kitchen scraps they don’t compost to their very own chickens.

10.  Clover Food Lab runs trucks in Boston and at MIT. Founders are nuts about compost and are working toward a zero waste operation. The trucks are run on biodiesel, and the food is local and organic. Their blog, which documents the process of getting the business up and running, provides a fascinating window into what it takes to start a green food truck.

The whole scene in Portland is greener from an emissions point of view because many of the carts are stationary and in pods concentrated in downtown areas easily accessible by bikers and walkers.

And here’s the future of the pop-up restaurant – somewhere between a stand-alone business and a restaurant on wheels, the solar powered, foldable, moveable Muv Box may be the biggest future trend yet.

This is the latest installment in Vanessa Barrington’s weekly column, The Green Plate, on the environmental, social, and political issues related to what and how we eat.

Image: ricardodiaz11

The post What Starts with F, Ends with Uck? Our Love/Hate Affair with Food Trucks appeared first on EcoSalon.

You may have noticed some of the interesting new foodish ventures happening in various parts of the country. L.A., Portland and the San Francisco Bay Area all have thriving street food cultures.

New York always has – especially in Queens where informal vendors gather under the overpasses at odd times of day and night.

There’s a cool factor in this (anything underground is automatically cool), but the compelling thing is how the economy is driving interesting new models and innovations. People are attempting to color outside the lines. New ideas are flourishing and they don’t always match up with the regulations meant to keep everything tidy, legal and predictable.

Why Food Crazes Are Taking Off

On the consumer side, people are searching for authenticity and connection, and they want to meet face-to-face with the people who make their food. My theory is that the economic collapse has shaken our trust in “the system” (food safety scares haven’t helped either), and as evidenced in Katherine Butler’s piece on guerilla gardening, people have become so passionate about “going green” they are willing to break the law by planting their own produce.

Producers, who want to meet this need, and perhaps monetize a passion for artisan food production, are finding that the barriers to starting a new food business – whether leasing a building, licensing a cart or setting up a table at a farmers’ market – are sky high. From permitting to health department inspections, there are many hoops to jump through and daunting up-front expenses.

Many chefs who lost their jobs when their restaurants closed (not to mention great cooks from other employment sectors) would like to start their own food businesses. Whether that’s a salami and sausage business, a hot soup delivery service or a cart selling prepared foods, such start-ups are challenged in trying to get their wares to potential customers. Confusing regulations and conflicting rules between cities in the same metropolitan areas are just a few of the issues. There’s also the high start up costs due to the requirements that all such foods be produced in commercial kitchens.

But the customers want it, as evidenced by the lines around the block at the “underground farmers’ market” or the hours-long waits at the San Francisco Street Food Festival last August.

Here’s a rundown of just a few of the creative (and barely legal) ventures enabling would-be food sellers to creatively work with existing regulations until they can be rewritten.

Pop up General Store:

This venture is in Oakland (mere steps from my home, I’m happy to say). It’s a collection of local chefs and legit food producers who use commercial kitchens but don’t have brick and mortar stores.

Samin Nosrat and Chris Lee, two chefs who were thrown out of work when their restaurant closed, founded the Pop Up General Store. The store “pops up” every two weeks in the large, open lobby of a historic streetcar station turned catering kitchen. Customers can order ahead using a digital form, or pop in and buy what’s available. Until the website is built, organizers communicate with their customers through Facebook and an email newsletter. The foods are fantastic, and seasonal. Recent offerings included Posole Verde, Fresh Rigatoni, Corned Beef and Cabbage, Spring Lamb Roasts and for Passover, Matzoh Ball Soup.

I caught up with Nosrat and asked her where the idea for the general store originated. She told me she and Chris would often run into former regular customers of Eccolo, the Berkeley restaurant where the two chefs worked, and customers would tell them how much they missed certain foods.

“Why can’t we make it and sell it?” says Nosrat, explaining the thought process. “We wanted to find a way to keep making the foods we loved and share them with the people who want to eat them, while making a name for ourselves for the future,” she added.

Starting with the restaurant’s email list, the two got a much larger response than they expected. Soon, other chef friends and food artisans joined in. Many were chefs having a hard time economically due to layoffs or reduced hours. Others simply wanted to start their own food businesses, but not before testing the waters. Many, like Lee and Nosrat, are alumni of the illustrious Chez Panisse in Berkeley, so we’re talking about some stellar vittles. If you visit the Pop Up General Store, more likely than not, the very people who produced the food items you see there will be proudly hand-selling them too.

Just a few weeks in, the popularity of the Pop Up General Store is growing fast. Nosrat ventured a guess as to why customers so immediately latch on. “People like seeing the cooks who make their food,” says Nosrat. “In restaurants, cooks are never the ones sharing the food with the customers. They are always in the kitchen.”

331 Cortland:

This San Francisco start-up is an incubator. Somewhere between an indoor collection of food carts and a store, it’s a cooperative retail space that, once open, will house six vendors selling delectables like Japanese deli foods, vegan baked goods, fresh produce, pickles, sandwiches and more. There’s also a knife sharpening business that for years has been housed in the operator’s nearby home.

The original intent of the space was to be a flexible, indoor food market. The spaces were to be customized to the tenants so vendors could cycle in and out as they find success, gain clientele and move onto their own retail spaces.

The building’s owner, Debra Resnik, wanted to provide a place for vendors who were producing their foods in commercial kitchens and had begun to make a name for themselves through personal deliveries, catering or other avenues, but who weren’t ready to take the leap into a retail space all their own.

I spoke with Resnik on the phone, where she outlined her mixed success with the planning/permitting functionaries in the city of San Francisco. I knew the opening of the space had been much delayed due to permitting issues, mostly because the space doesn’t fit into any well-defined category.

She explains, they were cleared to open and the vendors had started their build-outs, but her original idea for the space had to be adjusted to make it happen. “Because of the regulations,” said Resnik, “Some of the aspects of the flexible floor plan are impossible. We basically won half of what we wanted.”

In this case, the neighborhood and city wanted 331 Cortland to open, but it was difficult to get off the ground due to regulations. The various agencies haven’t been able to figure out where 331 Cortland belongs.

Resnik added that because they “went out there and tried this new concept, maybe other people will have an easier time. Hopefully their experiences will be streamlined.”

Though the process has taken much patience and work, Resnik remains excited. “Working with all of these creative food people has been incredibly rewarding,” she says.

331 Cortland is planning a mid-April 2010 opening.

Vendors are Della Terra Organic Produce, Bernal Cutlery, Paulie’s Pickling, El Porteño Empanadas, Wholesome Bakery, and Ichi Lucky Cat Deli.

Community Commercial Kitchens:

For farmers, being able to sell value-added products like jams, preserves, canned vegetables and pickles can mean the difference between survival and getting an office job. Legal food production, however, has to be done in a licensed, inspected commercial kitchen. Most farmers don’t have the resources to build one from scratch.

All over the country community kitchens are popping up. Many are in rural areas near farms. This is very exciting because, with all the talk of local food, it’s still a minuscule percentage of total food dollars spent. The distribution and transportation issues are just too great with perishables. But once a food is shelf stable, this becomes much easier. A quick Google search turns up dozens of these ventures across the country, in areas as diverse as New Mexico, Florida and North Carolina. (Some of the funding for these operations is coming from the USDA’s new Know your Farmer know your Food program.)

SF Underground Farmers Market:

The SF Underground Farmers Market is a project of Forage SF, a business that offers a CSA box and dinners to help diners become acquainted with the wild foods that exist all around.

Attending The SF Underground Farmers Market is a way to taste and purchase the food that is being produced in backyards and home kitchens in the Bay Area by artisans who lack the resources to “go legit”. The SF Underground Market is a place where budding businesses can get a leg up on their road to legitimacy.

According to the website, the first market was held in a private home in the Mission neighborhood of San Francisco, with eight vendors and about 200 attendees. By the time the third market was held, there were 47 vendors and over 1,200 people attending. How does The Underground Farmers’ Market stay on the right side of the law? To get notification for the events attendees must sign up for a free membership.

All these businesses have two things in common: Creativity and cooperation. Our society could use a little more of both.

Leave a comment and tell us about any favorite innovative new food businesses in your neck of the woods.

This is the latest installment in Vanessa Barrington’s weekly column, The Green Plate, on the environmental, social, and political issues related to what and how we eat.

The post Barely Legal: A Look Inside the Underground Food Craze appeared first on EcoSalon.