detroit

City Farmers Cash In

scleaver — Fri, 16 May 2008 10:31:06 -0400

Gardens are popping up where you’d least expect them—under elevated train tracks, in partially torn-down factories, on balconies, and behind rows of apartment buildings. And, these aren’t just home gardeners growing tomatoes for the occasional marinara sauce, they’re real enterprises and can make a pretty penny.

As The New York Times reported on May 7, the urban agriculture movement that’s sprung up in New York City with farmers who grow plants in small neighborhood plots and sell the harvest to neighbors, local restaurants, or at farmers markets is growing fast. The trend is old news in some cities. Prime example: Detroit, where gardens have taken over abandoned lots and partially destroyed factory buildings.

And, like I mentioned, there's money to be made in urban ag. The Added Value Community Farm was constructed on an abandoned three-acre basketball court started in 2003, and last year, the high school students who work the Brooklyn farm sold $25,000 worth of arugula, heirloom tomatoes, and Asian greens to local restaurants, community supported agriculture organizations, and farmers markets. In Detroit, gardens with the Garden Resource Program Collaborative have set up shop in Eastern Market. In Philadelphia, a non-profit grew $67,000 of lettuce, carrots, and radishes in densely packed plots. Finally, in Milwaukee, Growing Power operates a one-acre farm that includes greenhouses and pens of animals, they grossed more than $220,000 last year.

There is a definite need for fresh, affordable produce for low-income residents in urban areas, something that’s often easier said than done (Even with urban ag, Detroit is still considered a food desert, with few local produce options for many residents).

Interested in starting an urban farm? It could be as easy as setting up shop on your back balcony or finding just the right plot of land. Here are resources to get you started:

1. Learn about the nitty-gritty of farming, from seeds to market: The Detroit Garden Resource Program Collaborative, Milwaukee or Chicago’s Growing Power, and Just Food in New York all offer training. For a more formal education, The Center for Agroecology and Sustainable Food Systems at the University of California, Santa Cruz offers a six-month course.

2. Remember, it’s more than a farm, it’s a business. Here’s how to write an Urban Farm Business Plan.

3. Keep up with the Urban Farm Project to see how other farmers are working the land.

4. Read gardening blogs like This Garden is Illegal and A Gardening Year for another type of education, and some camaraderie.

Urban gardens have a unique set of problems and solutions:

1. Soil contaminated with lead or other contaminants? Build raised compost beds to keep your plants out of the muck that can be urban soil.

2. Got too many wildlife friends? Marigolds deter squirrels, and avoid planting crops that rodents enjoy, like corn.

3. If you’re planting on a balcony, don’t mix sun and shade plants, make sure your balcony can handle the weight, and put tall plants in back, surrounded by shorter plants. To maximize water, try an Earth Box.

4. Connect with other gardeners at Garden Web.

Photo Credit: Denver Urban Gardens.

Thin Mints Win Again

scleaver — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 08:58:30 -0400

This has nothing to do with being green (unless you count the Thin Mints box that you can spot from a mile away during Girl Scout cookie season), but it is delicious news none-the-less.

Today, the Neal Rubin of the Detroit News discussed Girl Scout Cookies in his article Student chefs get a crush on Thin Mints at gala. Last night, Girl Scouts across metro Detroit gathered at the metro Detroit Girl Scout Cookie Gala to sample culinary creations made with their $3 a box goodies. Eight area restaurants were given a cookie to work with, then competed for the best Girl Scout Cookie dessert.

A run down:

Small Plates of Royal Oak drew Sugar Free Chocolate Chips—bummer for them.

Mosaic in Detroit used Samoas (my favorite) to make miniature bundt cakes.

The winner…Fifty-One O One, Henry Ford Community College’s restaurant, and their Cream D’Mint Brownies. Whipped cream ganache and mint butter cream on top of brownies using crushed Thin Mints topped with melted chocolate chips.

Once again, Thin Mints takes the cake.

Here are make-it-yourself Girl Scout Cookie recipes from the competition:

Peanut Butter Blondie with Do-Si-Do Fondue

Cream D'Mint Brownies

White chocolate banana mousse

Banana brulee

Photo from Chew On That Blog’s Thin Mints Rock! Post.

March is Maple Season!

scleaver — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 19:15:01 -0400

I’ve blogged about maple sugar before, so I’m happy to report that March is maple season in Michigan. The Detroit News recently reported on maple production in Michigan (see article Michigan syrup producers are ready). The good news: Steven Horn, supervising naturalist at Indian Springs Metropark, told the News that “conditions are right for the sugar maples to perform their yearly ritual.” The words “perform” and “yearly ritual” make it what’s happening sound a little more exciting than it is—sap is slowly dripping inside the trees. Still, the sweet stuff is the first harvest we have each year and we only have five to fourteen days to collect it, by the time the buds are forming on the tree's branches, the sap is already bitter and impossible to work with. Along with a love of syrup, Horn shares one of my favorite pastimes: making Sugar on Snow candy. “I like to boil the syrup down until it starts to crystallize,” he told the News, “and then pour it on a plate to cool and harden. That’s the best.” I couldn’t agree more!

Karma Chameleon:

khallgeisler — Wed, 06 Feb 2008 00:00:00 -0500

One of the most buzzed-about concept cars at this month's North American International Auto Show in Detroit, Mich., was the new sports-luxury plug-in hybrid from Fisker Automotive, called the Karma. Delivery of the first few models is planned for Fall 2009, a year and a half after its closest competitor, the all-electric Telsa Roadster, hits the streets this spring.

The Karma is powered by something the manufacturer calls QDrive: a small gasoline-powered engine turns a generator, which charges a lithium-ion battery pack that powers the electric motor. That's what gets the wheels turning—fast. The Karma promises to do 0-60 in under 6 seconds with a top speed of 125 mph. Just as importantly, Fisker says the Q Drive configuration can deliver up to 50 miles a day of emissions-free driving, aslong as the car is recharged every night. The company goes on to say that if Karma drivers cover 50 miles or fewer every day and charge every night, it's possible to only make one annual trip to the gas station to refuel the combustion engine.

The four-door body is low-slung and sexy, a rarity in alternative-fuel vehicles. (See the cute-as-a-button ZAP Xebra or blunt-as-a-bludgeon Toyota Prius for comparison.) People who pay attention to design may find the Karma has a familiar European sports sedan feel; that's because Henrik Fisker designed the Aston Martin DB9 and the BMW Z8 in a previous, gas-guzzling life.

The design has us smitten and the technology has us convinced we'd be better people if we had a Karma. We're ready to drop the cash to drive quick and clean. Not so fast, there, Sparky. The first run, which will look almost identical to the car shown in Detroit, is already sold out. In classic supercar fashion, $1,000 buys a place in line for the 2010 models,which will retail for somewhere in the $80,0000 range, a full $20,000 less than a Tesla. Karma comes to those with patience and a healthy bank account.

Does GM = Green Motors?

khallgeisler — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 00:00:00 -0500

The theme at this year’s North American International Auto Show in Detroit was green, green, green. Everyone has a concept car that runs on electricity, or it’s a plug-in hybrid, or you can fill the tank with long-lasting, eco-friendly pixie dust. Any of these would be improvements over our current gasoline-fueled cars, but none of the models seen in Detroit will debut before 2009, if ever.

GM is making more of an effort than most to get on the green wagon this year. (This is the same company that canceled, then smashed, its EV1 program, as documented in the 2006 movie “Who Killed the Electric Car?”) In addition to the three plug-in hybrid concept models it introduced, the company announced its partnership with Coskata to create an ethanol fuel from bio-waste such as cornstalks and even municipal waste.

The partnership between the fuel maker and the auto manufacturer is called A Next Generation Ethanol Company. Catchy, no? The process used to make the fuel involves “gasifying” the solid waste, such as wood chips or household trash, then feeding the gas to microbes that release ethanol as a byproduct. The idea is to use wheat straw or cornstalks after the food has been harvested, or sticks and leaves from the forest floor.

In a video press release distributed by GM, Sean Captain of Popular Science brings up the idea of clearing out debris from the forest floor and turning it into fuel as a way to curb forest fires in the American West and make a problem into a positive. There are as many voices opposing this solution to forest fires as supporting it, since the biomass on the ground is what makes new soil and provides habitat for creatures mostly small. So sending a giant Roomba into the Willamette National Forest might not be the solution, even if the result is inexpensive ethanol.

Venture capitalist Vinod Khasla, who is a major investor in A Next Generation Ethanol Company, says in the video press release that he dreams of $1.99 fuel at every Wal-Mart. Is two bucks per gallon the lowest price he can dream of when electric cars are sipping from the grid at pennies per charge? And isn’t Wal-Mart, with its acres of black-topped parking lots and disposable merchandise, part of the global warming problem? Would ethanol made from cornstalks offset the damage Wal-Mart has done? Probably not, but maybe this new fuel goes way beyond expectations.