This year Amy and I signed up for a CSA (it stands for community supported agriculture). It’s essentially a share of a nearby farm’s output for the growing season. That means we get a ton of locally grown fruits and vegetables every week, and it forces us to eat them. I already feel healthier because of it. The only problem is that it’s pretty expensive. We can solve a lot of societal problems “by increasing affordability and access to fresh, locally grown food.” That’s exactly what Wholesome Wave does. They’re a Bridgeport, CT based non-profit with a mission “to empower people in underserved urban and rural communities to make healthier food choices.” Not only can this be good for the environment and public health, but it can also stimulate local economies.
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Gardening is a lot like life. If you work hard, do things right, and get a little lucky, you’ll be handsomely rewarded. That’s why tending to a garden is great for kids. Not only do they learn about the rewards of hard work, but they also get to watch something as it grows from a pile of dirt into something beautiful or delicious. City Blossoms is a Washington, DC based non-profit that is “dedicated to kid-driven, community engaging, creative green spaces.” While they are cultivators of youth; youth are their main cultivators.
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I kind of think of Easter as a spring version of Thanksgiving. Though one holiday is religious and the other isn’t, they both have similar themes and, in my family at least, similar celebrations. Thanksgiving is about celebrating the season past, while Easter is about being hopeful for the coming season. Both have significant agricultural undertones, and that’s why I think we should take a look at Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture today. They are a Pocantico Hills, NY based non-profit that is not only hopeful for the coming growing season but also for the future of agriculture. That’s why they “are working to improve the way America eats and farms.”
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I’m definitely not a chocoholic, but I think that a good piece of chocolate is the perfect dessert for when you want something sweet but don’t want to loosen your belt after. The fun thing about chocolate is that it has a ton of range. Some people are completely happy with a Hershey’s bar, and others want something with a little more thought put into it. One of my favorite chocolate companies is Taza Chocolate. They are a Somerville, MA based company that makes “stone ground, organic chocolate” that is “perfectly unrefined, minimally processed with bold flavor and texture, unlike anything you have ever tasted.” Their Mexicano discs almost have a cookie like texture, and that’s why they’re one of my favorites.
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I swear that every kid who grows up in Connecticut goes on a field trip to Old Sturbridge Village at some point. For me it wasn’t until 10th grade (and we were on our way back from a longer trip to Boston and Plimoth Plantation), but I think most kids go earlier in their lives. If you weren’t lucky enough to grow up within a couple hour bus ride of Old Sturbridge Village (which is based in Sturbridge, MA), you should know that it’s the “largest outdoor history museum in the Northeast” and it “depicts a rural New England town of the 1830s.” It’s the perfect place for immature children to try to get the staff to fall out of character.
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In a few months my typical Saturday mornings will include a trip to the farmers’ market, but right now it’s not happening. They may keep the market going indoors, but it’s just not the same. Farmers’ markets have always been a thing, but they’ve surged in popularity over the past decade–especially in urban centers. As more and more markets pop up, they can all gain by banding together. That’s what Mass Farmers Markets is about. They are a Waltham, MA based non-profit that aims “to partner with farmers, consumers, and communities to foster, enhance and sustain farmers market in Massachusetts in order to improve regional farm viability, consumer nutrition, and community social and economic development.”
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I ate a lot on Thanksgiving, and I kept it up through the weekend. I used to be able to do that without feeling any ill effects, but those days are over. I guess it’s time to get back to a healthier lifestyle. Maybe I need to head to the store and buy some natural products. Though I’ll probably just do my typical meat cleanse instead, if I went the natural route, I’d probably be buying from clients of Pure Branding. They are a Northampton, MA based consultancy that “builds leading brands for values-based companies in the natural products industry.” They’re selective about the clients that they take, as they want to ensure that they’re working world changers.
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I am not a coffee drinker–never have been and never will be. I can’t even stand the smell of it, so it’s hard for me to comprehend how so many people want to start their mornings off with it. I’m either wrong or it’s the best marketing success in the world, but coffee is a massive industry–somewhere in the neighborhood of $20 billion annually just in the U.S. One of the more interesting success stories in the business is Green Mountain Coffee Roasters. They’re a Waterbury, VT based company that was founded in 1981 as a small coffee shop. Instead of sticking with that model and following the Starbucks path, Green Mountain Coffee Roasters went another direction. They decided to focus on helping other people make good coffee.
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I don’t think that I’ve had a frozen dinner since I forced my mom to buy me Kid Cuisine in the early 90s. If I’m going to eat something unhealthy, it should at least taste good, right? Clearly I’m biased against frozen meals (maybe because I consider myself a pretty good cook), but I shouldn’t write them all off as unhealthy and unpalatable. That’s especially true because one the nation’s leading frozen food brands is all vegetarian and mostly organic. Amy’s Kitchen was founded in 1987 by a couple looking for a way to provide for a new baby. They started in their home with a vegetable pot pie, and since then the Petaluma, CA based business has grown to hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue.
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In my fiancée’s mind there is no better dessert than fresh berries and whipped cream. I’d probably add a piece of chocolate cake to that, but the biggest variable in the equation is almost always the berries. Good berries, whether they’re strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, blackberries, or snozberries, taste better than candy, while bad berries often taste like dirt. Since I share Jerry Seinfeld’s feeling that fruit is a gamble, I’m not particularly brand conscious, but checking my refrigerator tells me that my most recently purchased strawberries are from Driscoll’s. They’re a Watsonville, CA based berry purveyor that has been family owned and operated for more than 100 years.
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Apparently IHOP has declared it National Pancake Day. (Shouldn’t the company formerly known as The International House of Pancakes call it International Pancake Day?) I tried checking out their website to look for interesting opportunities, but it’s getting slammed from all of the holiday related traffic and the site is inaccessible. I’m not kidding. Free pancakes do that to people. Since I’m a fan of making my own pancakes, I decided to celebrate a corporation’s self-created, self-serving holiday by spotlighting one of their competitors. Since I’ve already featured King Arthur Flour, my favorite source of raw materials for pancakes, I thought it would be fun to take a look at Austin, TX based Batter Blaster in celebration of such an important holiday. In case you’re the type who hasn’t been exposed to the finer things in life, Batter Blaster is essentially a whipped cream can that releases pancake or waffle batter. It sounds completely ridiculous, and then you try it. It’s so easy and mess-free, but what’s in it. Then you look at the label and the ingredients are organic. Genius.
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Earlier this week I was catching up with Jason Seiden. We covered a ton of topics, but one thing that we kept coming back to is how frustrating it can be to work in the careers space. Why? Because, as Jason said, “Truly valuable career advice is like vegetables–you can’t give it away.” This is so true. You can try to force things on people, but you won’t get anywhere unless they want what you’re selling. Super Sprowtz is a company that is trying to change the way people–namely children–think about vegetables. They’re based in New York, NY, and they’ve seen how powerful cartoon characters can be in affecting children’s food choices, so they’ve developed a cast of “vegetable super heroes” to “entertain and educate children about healthy eating habits.” I started out thinking this was pretty weird, but I’m kind of warming to the idea.
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Even though I’m not a huge fan of turkey, I love Thanksgiving. It’s an all around great holiday for spending time with family and friends, and it gives me the opportunity to do some serious cooking. Some of my favorites are yams with marshmallows on top, brussels sprouts with bacon and onions, and apple pie. I’ve also been known to make a maple syrup slathered, bacon covered turkey, but I usually get overruled by people who inexplicably love bland, overcooked, dry white breast meat. I’m actually dying to try America Test Kitchen’s recipe, which includes brining and putting ice packs on the breasts so they cook slower than the rest of the bird. Anyway, I’ll likely be doing some shopping at Whole Foods Market this afternoon. I used to shop at normally priced supermarkets, but there’s one thing that keeps me coming back to bougie grocery stores like Whole Foods: bacon. You can’t get good quality bacon at a regular supermarket. And once you’re buying fancy bacon, you might as well get organic brussel sprouts and grass-fed beef and those awesome salted, chocolate-covered caramels that they sell.
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Ten days ago we took a look at Rodale Institute, a non-profit that is “dedicated to pioneering organic farming through research and outreach.” We talked about how industrial farming has led to amazing boosts in productivity, but it’s also created a lot of problems. Marrone Bio Innovations is a Davis, CA based company that is taking a natural approach to one specific area of agriculture: pest control. They’re aiming to be “the world leader in natural product innovation” by making “natural, effective, safe, environmentally friendly products the mainstream future of pest management.” Usually you don’t hear organic and pesticide in the same sentence, but Marrone Bio Innovations’ business is predicated on bringing the two together.
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Last week I got an e-mail from a One Day, One Job reader who is just wrapping up a seasonal position and looking for her next gig. In doing so, she realized that other readers might be interested in her current position, so she wrote me to tell me about it. When I saw the name Rodale Institute in her e-mail, I swore to myself that I had already featured the organization, but it was actually a publishing company named Rodale that was started by the same person as the Institute and used to be financially linked to it as well. The Rodale Institute is a Kutztown, PA based non-profit organization that is “dedicated to pioneering organic farming through research and outreach.” They’ve been at it since 1947, and they’re going to keep “researching the best practices of organic agriculture and sharing [their] findings with farmers and scientists throughout the world” because they believe that eating organic is the healthiest option for people and for the Earth.
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While my dad was in college, he and a few of his friends started a café. More than 30 years later, that café is still thriving and was one of my favorite brunch spots when I was at Cornell. The restaurant industry usually chews people up and spits them out, so it’s pretty unusual to see any restaurants last that long, let alone one started by a bunch of amateurs. Hopefully we’ll be seeing more college town success stories like Café Dewitt come out of CoFed, which is a Berkeley, CA non-profit that is “empowering students to create ethically-sourced, community-run cafés on college campuses.” CoFed is all about the triple bottom line, as they not only want to start successful cafés that offer delicious food, but they want to do it in a humane and sustainable way.
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We’re supposed to reach a high of 56 degrees today in Chicago, which is great even if it’s foggy and gloomy. Spring is on its way, and in only a couple of months it will be farmers market season again. Although my city is short on farms (we have a few, really), there are a ton within driving distance. Many of them haul the food that they produce into the city on a weekly basis and sell it to the yuppies who love eating fresh, organic, locally grown food (also known as me). One of these farms is Tomato Mountain Farm, which is based in Brooklyn, WI. They have a presence somewhere in Chicago 6 days per week, and their produce offerings range from basil and beets to watermelons and zucchini. Obviously, they also grow a lot of tomatoes.
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Agriculture has done a lot for us over the past few millennia. It’s by far the biggest development in the history of our species, as it’s pushed us forward into all kinds of other technological advances. Sadly, most of us have left agriculture behind—we couldn’t possibly feed ourselves without supermarkets and restaurants. That’s not really a problem, but it’s still a bit disheartening. Luckily, there are some non-profit organizations out there like Portland, ME based Cultivating Community that are using agriculture to enact positive change. Cultivating Community, for example, grows “tens of thousands of pounds of organic produce with and for people with low incomes” while using “community food work as a platform for youth empowerment programs.” It almost sounds too good to be true.
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You’ve probably heard the term “heirloom,” in reference to fruits or vegetables. For the longest time I had no idea what it meant, but eventually I asked someone and the gist of the definition is “any garden plant that has a history of being passed down within a family, just like pieces of heirloom jewelry or furniture.” More often than not the plants are passed down in the form of seeds. Heirloom breeds of plants are important not only for sentimental reasons, but also because they provide genetic diversity. By maintaining old breeds of plants with their unique resistance to disease and pests, we are able to ensure the security of our food supply. Seed Savers Exchange is a Decorah, IA based non-profit that “saves and shares the heirloom seeds of our garden heritage, forming a living legacy that can be passed down through generations.”
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It always seems like you never have Chapstik – er, lip balm – when you really need it. Even Napoleon Dynamite was plagued by that little tube’s ability to disappear from his pocket and end up sitting on his desk at home. Some will argue that they never use lip balm because it just makes the problem of chapped lips worse, but I know for a fact that those people give in as soon as their “lips hurt real bad.” As life saving as lip balm can be at the right time, you’d still never expect it to allow a guy who lived in a turkey coop to be the face of a billion dollar business. Yes, Burt’s Bees was sold two years ago to Clorox for just shy of a billion dollars.
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Do you look at the labels on all of the food that you buy? Not only the nutritional facts but also the ingredients? If you answered yes, then you’re probably a health conscious consumer, or maybe you have a specific food allergy. Well what about the stuff that’s in your food that isn’t on the ingredients label? No mater what kind of drugs they pump into the cow that your hamburger is coming from, it’s always just going to be labeled beef. How about that bottle of water that you’re drinking from right now? It’s just water, or is it? A salmon from Lake Ontario is still just salmon, even if it’s full of PCBs (at least you can’t buy those in the grocery store). There’s a lot of stuff in our food and water that we don’t know about, which is why Washington, DC based Food & Water Watch exists. They’re “a nonprofit consumer organization that works to ensure clean water and safe food.”
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Today we’re celebrating One Day, One Job’s first birthday. We have “party favors” for you, so go check our birthday blog post. I considered featuring a special birthday related company, but we’ve already covered Hallmark’s internships, so I’m out of ideas. Instead, we’re going to do what ODOI does best and tell you about an awesome company that could use some stellar interns. Tom’s of Maine is a company that specializes in natural personal care products. What is natural care? It’s “creating safe, effective natural products free of artificial dyes, sweeteners, and preservatives; by harvesting, processing, and packaging with respect for our natural resources; by not testing on animals or using animal ingredients; and by donating 10% of our profits and 5% of our employees’ paid time to charitable organizations.” Tom’s of Maine makes toothpaste, soap, deodorant, mouthwash, shaving cream, and more – not the kind of products that most people get excited about, but people get excited about them when they’re made by Tom’s of Maine.
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Two Sundays ago we wrote about internships with Smokey House Center, a farming cooperative and outdoor classroom in rural Vermont. Today we’re going to take a look at another agriculturally focused non-profit, but today’s organization is located in the heart of Oakland. That’s right, City Slicker Farms is all about urban farming. Their mission is to “increase food self-sufficiency in West Oakland by creating organic, sustainable, high-yield urban farms and back-yard gardens.” City Slicker Farms is all about enabling people to directly improve their own lives through agriculture. Not only does urban farming provide delicious, nutritious food at a low cost, but it also makes the urban landscape more livable.
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You know that you’ve always wanted to live on a farm in rural Vermont. Here’s your chance. Smokey House Center is an outdoor classroom for middle and high school students where they can do “farming, forestry, and ecological research — learning in the process, science, math, ecology, communications, reading, writing, problem-solving, critical thinking, responsibility and teamwork.” Smokey House offers two applied learning programs – one for disadvantaged high school students and the other for mainstream middle and high school students. Beyond being a non-profit educational organization, Smokey House Center is also a real life working farm in Danby, Vermont.
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John James Audubon loved painting birds. His seminal work, Birds of America, was a collection of 435 beautiful life-size prints. To this day, when you hear the name Audubon, you think of birds. Interestingly enough, John James Audubon had no direct involvement with the founding of the National Audubon Society. Audubon’s widow, Lucy, tutored a man named George Bird Grinnell and some of Audubon’s love of birds must have rubbed off, as Grinnell was one of the Audubon Society’s founders. To this day, the Audubon Society persists in its mission “to conserve and restore natural ecosystems, focusing on birds, other wildlife, and their habitats for the benefit of humanity and the earth’s biological diversity.” The Audubon Society works to achieve this mission through a national network of community-based nature centers and chapters and scientific, educational, and advocacy programs.
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