If you went to the Union Station Farmers Market in the 2016 season, you saw an adorable couple running a stand stocked with gorgeous gourmet mushrooms. That’s Liz and Michael Nail and they are Mile High Fungi. Liz and Michael are “both passionate about fungus.” They’re pioneering the locally grown gourmet mushroom business here in the Mile High City. Not only that, they’ve already embarked on their next major effort, building what will become a full permaculture homestead.

Liz and Michael both hail from the Pacific Northwest and studied sustainable agriculture and environmental science, earning degrees from Evergreen State College in Olympia, WA. Together, they spent many days foraging for wild mushrooms in the Pacific Northwest.

Let me quote from their website; “For us, mushrooms just make sense. They blend our desire to provide healthy, local produce with finding creative solutions to harnessing the city’s organic waste stream. In this time of environmental instability, we strive to produce using the most sustainable methods available, including solar and LED technology. By partnering with local businesses we’re able to utilize resources from our community for our community. These amazing arborists, agriculturalists, wood workers, brewers and many more help us live the dream of sustainable mushroom farming.”

– LINKS & RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE –

• Mile High Fungi website
• Mile High Fungi on Instagram and Facebook
• Union Station Farmers Market
• Denver Botanic Gardens Chatfield Farm CSA and Sprout City Farms CSA
• Colorado Cottage Foods Act of 2012 on Colorado Farm To Market website and on the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment website
• Denver Sustainable Food Policy Council (SFPC)
• (My interview with Brian Coppom about Union Station Farmers Market)
• Colorado Small Business Development Center Network (CSBDC) (financial understanding)
• Colorado Department of Agriculture (regulatory understanding)
• Fooducopia Local and Organic Restaurant

– THANKS FOR LISTENING –

This episode (#29) comes from Mile High Locavorist.

It's a big enough problem that is touching enough of these different segments of the industry: restaurant, retail, consumers, institutional, farm...that here in the Denver Metro area, there’s room for a lot of solutions...” – Brendan McCrann, Future Pointe

Food waste. Over the last year or two, this issue has been finding its way into the headlines more and more, both at home and abroad. From features on John Oliver’s HBO show Last Week Tonight to major national initiatives in Europe, food waste has reached the mainstream consciousness. And Denver, of all places, is becoming a focal point for solving our food waste problem here in the US.

In this episode, we’re going to talk about what’s happening now in food waste at the national, state and local levels as well as what we might see in the future. Exactly where we’ll go is unclear, as it’s still early days, but significant efforts are starting to come together and again, with Denver as a national focal point.

Brendan McCrann is President of Future Pointe LLC, a Colorado-based enterprise recognized for its extensive experience and expertise developing solutions for food waste, including emergent technologies which mitigate harmful greenhouse gasses, generate fertilizer inputs and provide other societal benefits. Brendan founded Future Pointe in 2009.

Reuben Gregory, a Denver local who serves on the mayor-appointed Sustainable Food Policy Council, is a Consultant with Future Pointe.  Reuben has developed and implemented projects for food banks and farmers which keep food waste in the food system while saving - and often earning - money in the process.

– IN THIS EPISODE, YOU'LL LEARN –

• Are we at a tipping point with respect to action on food waste?
• How food waste impacts global climate change
• How much food we're wasting, exactly
• What coalitions and actions are taking shape at the national, Colorado and Denver levels
• What major steps have already taken place, creating momentum
• What the focus on Denver could mean for us over the next few years, though it's still too early to know for sure
• What citizens can do to stay informed and get involved in food waste solutions

– LINKS & RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE –

• Future Pointe LLC
• [email protected] and [email protected]
• Food Waste: HBO's Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (YouTube)
• Dan Barber's 2015 NYC "wastED" experiment (The New Yorker) and now moving to London in 2017 (Eater)
• Food Recovery Act (Eater)
• "Wasted" NRDC 2012 Issue Paper (PDF)
• Virginia Till, EPA Region 8 ([email protected], 303-312-6008)
• Boulder Food Rescue and Denver Food Rescue
• We Don’t Waste
• We Don't Waste and Coors Field (Colorado Public Radio)
• Metro Caring and Denver International Aiport (The Denver Post)
• Food Donation Takes off at PDX (Portland Airport)
• "Largest-ever campaign in Denver launched to reduce food waste" (video, Fox31 Denver)
• NRDC article on pilot cities of Nashville, New York City, and Denver (NRDC)
• Catherine Cox Blair (NRDC)
• Metro Caring
• Press Release Announcing Further With Food website (The Rockefeller Foundation)
• FurtherWithFood.org

– THANKS FOR LISTENING –

This episode (#28) comes from Mile High Locavorist.

Natural. Organic. Local. Heritage. Heirloom.

In this episode, I explore the confusing, even misleading range of choices we often face in the marketplace through the experience of buying an 18-pound turkey for my family's Thanksgiving celebration. I also delve a bit into the history of how today's modern turkey was created.

Did I make the right choice? What would you have done?

Let me know at [email protected] or at the website, www.milehighlocavorist.com. 

It’s August in the Mile-High City which means we’re in the middle of the harvest season in the Denver region. I’m pleased to welcome back Chef Elizabeth Buckingham of Moveable Feast Colorado to the second in a series of three episodes designed to help us get the most of the locally-grown fruit and vegetables we’ll see in the early, mid and late-harvest seasons in the Denver region.

Check out the first episode in the series on early-season produce, some of which we are still seeing (leafy greens, herbs): Episode 22: Make the Most of Early Season Produce.

In the mid-season, we’re seeing:

• The Holy Trinity: Tomatoes, peppers and summer squash
• Colorado’s best fruit: Melons from the Arkansas River Valley and peaches from the Palisade region
• Sweetcorn from the Olathe region

Chef Elizabeth is going to talk us through:

• What we’re going to see in the mid-season
• What to look for when we buy
• How to best store it before we’re ready to use it
• How to prepare it

Chef Elizabeth Buckingham is a Colorado native; she earned a Grande Diplôme from Le Cordon Bleu Paris. A spontaneous scuba diving trip to the Bahamas following her culinary school graduation led to a passion for the ocean and the next eight years of her career, first cooking aboard dive boats and later progressing to head chef aboard private yachts worldwide. In 2009, Elizabeth returned to Colorado and started her own private chef venture, Moveable Feast Colorado, through which she offers all kinds of fun and useful services from in-home classes to edible garden setups. Elizabeth is also a certified Master Gardener and runs a tiny urban homestead complete with chickens and a large vegetable garden. She is an avid home canner and preserver, a passionate advocate of local food and thinks everyone should know how to cook at least a little bit.

• Why you need to give ugly tomatoes a chance, and quickly, but skip the cooking
• Why you should consider eating zucchini raw, too
• How the size of a pepper tells you how spicy it is (generally, at least)
• Why plastic and the fridge don’t always extend the life of your produce
• How summer squash plants can make even a novice gardner feel like a pro
• Why with almost any veggie, a break in the skin signals a quick trip to the kitchen
• Why, surprisingly, September is our peak harvest month

• Chef Elizabeth’s private chef service Moveable Feast Colorado
• Get on her mailing list for monthly event announcements by sending an email with the subject “Subscribe” to [email protected]
• Grant Achatz’s “Carmelized Zucchini & Onion Soup” (Make this immediately!) (Food & Wine)
• Colorado Melons’ Claim to Fame (5280 Magazine)

“We’re a health equity organization before we’re a food security organization so we’re not going to deliver someone a totally unhealthy meal just for the sake of filling their stomach.” – Turner Wyatt

Increasing healthful food access is an effort that has grown in prominence over the last few years. It’s a complicated issue. So many factors influence healthful food access – the built environment, food costs, shelf-life, government regulation, nutrition, even social norms and stigmas.

• Why their original operating model from Boulder had to adjust to Denver
• How low-middle income people fall into a healthful food access gap
• Why being resident-led in their neighborhoods sets them apart
• Why linking food waste reduction with hunger relief can be problematic for low-income communities
• How this model, by its very nature (i.e. bicycles), encourages food localization
• Why they see themselves as a “health equity” organization over a “food security” organization
• How you can “Plant An Extra Row” to help those in need to access fresh, local food

• Denver Food Rescue
• Fresh Food Connect (The App)
• Fresh Food Connect Intro Video (YouTube)
• Rose Community Foundation
• Groundwork Denver
• Denver Urban Gardens (DUG)
• Impact 100 Metro Denver

This episode (#24) comes from Mile High Locavorist.

“Permaculture is the best toolkit we have to craft a truly sustainable future.” – Creighton Hofeditz

Permaculture – just what is it, exactly?

Here to tell us is Creighton Hofeditz, a CO native, permaculturalist, food educator and Board Member of the Denver Permaculture Guild. The Denver Permaculture Guild is a vibrant, sizeable and still growing group of folks focused on growing the practice and growing practitioners of permaculture in Denver. They also bring in some internationally recognized speakers from time to time and have a very active online community.

This episode is broken in to two parts. Part 1 – What is permaculture? and Part 2 – What is the Denver Permaculture Guild?

– IN THIS EPISODE, YOU’LL LEARN –

• The origins of permaculture
• The major elements and principles of permaculture design
• Why permaculture is necessarily customized to each place it’s applied
• How permaculture works with food production and with animals
• How you can get involved, in a big or small way, with permaculture and the Denver Permaculture Guild

 – LINKS & RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE –

• Denver Permaculture Guild Website
• Denver Permaculture Guild (very active) Public Facebook Group
• Denver Permaculture Guild Facebook Page

– THANKS FOR LISTENING –

 This episode (#23) comes from Mile High Locavorist.

“I want people to know that fresh is a flavor and should be considered as such.” – Chef Elizabeth Buckingham

We’re entering mid-June, the early harvest season in the Denver region. I’m pleased to welcome back Chef Elizabeth Buckingham of Moveable Feast Colorado to the first in a series of episodes to help us get the most of the produce we’ll see in the early, mid and late harvest seasons.

In the early season, we’re expecting:

• Salad greens: lettuce, kale, chard, spinach, mustard greens, collard greens
• Herbs: mint, arugula, flat-leaf parsley
• Radishes
• Early onions: chives, scallions, walking onions
• Green garlic and garlic scapes
• Really limited time veggies like fava beans and early-season peas

Chef Elizabeth is going to talk us through:

• What we’re going to see in early season
• What to look for when buying it
• How to best store it before we’re ready to use it
• How to prepare it

Chef Elizabeth Buckingham is a Colorado native; she earned a Grande Diplôme from Le Cordon Bleu Paris. A spontaneous scuba diving trip to the Bahamas following her culinary school graduation led to a passion for the ocean and the next eight years of her career, first cooking aboard dive boats and later progressing to head chef aboard private yachts worldwide. In 2009, Elizabeth returned to Colorado and started her own private chef venture,Moveable Feast Colorado, through which she offers all kinds of fun and useful services from in-home classes to edible garden setups. Elizabeth is also a certified Master Gardener and runs a tiny urban homestead complete with chickens and a large vegetable garden. She is an avid home canner and preserver, a passionate advocate of local food and thinks everyone should know how to cook at least a little bit.

– IN THIS EPISODE, YOU’LL LEARN –

• Why early season produce seen in the culinary magazines isn’t what we see in Colorado
• Why keeping your greens airtight and washing them in advance isn’t the best move
• How making shakes (and juicing, to a lesser extent) is a great way to absorb a lot of greens
• Why you might want to make the farmers market the last stop on your list (and you should bring a cooler!)
• Why shopping at the farmers market takes a lot of the guesswork out of buying the best produce
• The power of an ice water bath to revive wilted greens
• Why asparagus, while an early-season veggie, isn’t generally a great bet in Colorado
• Why joining a CSA, and getting the most out of it, requires some adjustments to our cooking habits and our perception of value

 – LINKS & RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE –

• Chef Elizabeth’s private chef service Moveable Feast Colorado
• Get on her mailing list by sending an email with the subject “Subscribe” to [email protected]
• Stonebridge Farm CSA (Kayann Short) and some great recipes broken down by season

 – THANKS FOR LISTENING –

 This episode (#22) comes from Mile High Locavorist.

“…What the markets offer in this growers-only context is an opportunity to reconnect to the food in a very meaningful way and it happens really simply by actually having that authentic connection to the source.” – Brian Coppom

The heart of Denver finally has its own farmers market! Union Station Farmers Market will launch on Saturday, June 6 and run weekly until October 22nd.

Union Station Farmers Market is operated by Boulder County Farmers Markets (BCFM), the non-profit that already runs the very well-respected and established farmers markets in Boulder and Longmont. According to their website, “We are a nonprofit organization operating producer-only farmers markets in Colorado since 1987. Our mission is to support, promote and expand local agriculture, making fresh products accessible to our community and strengthening relationships between local food producers and food consumers.”

Brian Coppom is Executive Director of Boulder County Farmers Markets. Brian, his team at BCFM and all his vendors have a lofty goal – to make Union Station Farmers Market “Colorado’s Flagship Farmers Market.”

Brian Coppom worked in the corporate world in product development, industrial design and telecom before joining Boulder County Farmers Markets in late 2013. Just two years later, in late 2015, he was surprised and pleased to win CEO of the Year from ColoradoBiz Magazine, despite carrying the title of Executive Director. He was also the first non-profit leader to win the award.

– IN THIS EPISODE, YOU’LL LEARN –

• What making Union Station Farmers Market “Colorado’s Flagship Farmer’s Market” means
• The challenges Brian and his team have faced in setting up the market and how they overcame those
• The enduring value and challenge of being a growers-only market
• How the market will fit in among the already strong and growing food options in Lower Downtown Denver
• How this market could impact healthful food access in Denver
• How we might think about the economics of food for not only consumers but farmers, too
• How we, as a society, treat food versus how we treat other critical public needs

– LINKS & RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE –

• ColoradoBiz CEO of the Year 2015: Brian Coppom
• Union Station Farmers Market
• Boulder County Farmers Market
• Partners: Larimer Associates, RTD Denver, Downtown Denver Partnership, Denver Union Station plus others
• NPR Story on Double SNAP and Farmers Markets (Late 2014)
• SNAP and Farmers Markets (USDA)
• RTD’s New A-Line Train

 – THANKS FOR LISTENING –

 This episode (#21) comes from Mile High Locavorist.

“There is literally no one thing that you can do that’s more

Engaging with local, whole foods requires a skill and that skill

Chef Elizabeth Buckingham is a Colorado native; she earned a

– BONUS AUDIO –

– IN THIS EPISODE, YOU’LL LEARN –

– LINKS & RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE

– THANKS FOR LISTENING –

This episode

“We’re starting to hear ideas that I’ve never envisioned or never imagined coming out of these plans and that’s really the exciting part of a community process like this. We hear what our businesses really need. We hear what our residents really need to have successful lives and we’re able to say, “How do we bake that in to a longer term vision and then how do we turn that in to immediate action…” – Blake Angelo

(Welcome to Season 2!!)

The City and County of Denver are in the process of creating a city-wide food plan called the Denver Food Plan. This subtly-titled document will help shape Denver’s food future through the year 2030. Community Listening Sessions are running from March through early June, 2016. These well-run meetings are YOUR CHANCE to offer your thoughts on what Denver’s food system should look like. What are your priorities? What’s your vision? Let your government know!

While the creation of the Denver Food Plan involves many people and organizations, in this episode, we speak to one leader closely linked to the creation of the plan. Blake Angelo is Manager of Food System Development for the Office of Economic Development at the City and County of Denver. Prior to this, Blake was Director for the Beanstalk Foundation and served as the first specialist in Urban Agriculture for Colorado State University Extension in Denver and Jefferson counties. He has a master’s degree in Public Health and a bachelor’s degree in Evolutionary and Ecological Biology.

– IN THIS EPISODE, YOU’LL LEARN –

 – LINKS & RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE –

– THANKS FOR LISTENING –

This episode (#19) comes from Mile High Locavorist.