© Photo courtesy of Riverpark Farm. See caption at bottom of article.

Farm Table Opens amid Urban Farm Fields

Riverpark Restaurant, a tony new restaurant off the FDR Drive in Midtown Manhattan, added a new twist to urban farming when it unveiled a novel outdoor growing operation that surprised even the most jaded New Yorkers.  Peppers, eggplants, tomatoes and a multitude of other crops grew in thousands of double-stacked milk crates, the urban equivalent of farm fields.

Now diners can enjoy those fields close up.  Riverpark Restaurant set up an outdoor “Farm Table,” which customers can reserve for family-style lunch and dinner celebrations.  The restaurant can host up to 12 people at the outdoor table.  There’s a minimum charge of $1,800 for dinner events.  For lunch, it’s $1,400.

Diners better take advantage of the table soon as the farm will likely move indoors for the winter season, said Arianna Nuzzo, guest relations manager at Riverpark Restaurant.  The move won’t be hard as the farm — built in modular milk crates — can be easily transported.  It will move to a sun-splashed empty floor in the building in which the restaurant is located.  The restaurant plans to build a greenhouse to accommodate the farm during future winter seasons.

Caption for photo above: Riverpark Restaurant’s outdoor “Farm Table” is set in the restaurant’s urban vegetable farm.

© Photo by Margarida Correia. See caption at bottom of article.

Mr. Peanuts Inspires East Village Garden

Mr. Peanuts — the dapper mascot for the peanut products in Kraft Foods’ Planters brand — has inspired the creation of a new garden in the East Village.  The peanut-shaped garden — named Planters Grove — opened last week at the Lillian Wald Houses, a public housing development project. The garden features over 600 native flowers and a good many vegetables and herbs, including sage, rosemary and thyme.

Planters teamed up with the New York City Housing Authority and two nonprofits that train low-income youths in conservation and environmental careers — The Corp Network and Green City Force (GCF) — to develop the garden. GCF program participants will maintain the garden, which is located at Avenue D and 5^th Street.

Caption for photo above: Planters Grove, a peanut-shaped garden that opened last week at the Lillian Wald Houses in the East Village, features over 600 native flowers and many vegetables and herbs, including sage, rosemary and thyme.

© Photo courtesy of Farm City blog. See photo at bottom of article.

Staten Island’s Snug Harbor Heritage Farm had planned it for years.  Last month, it finally happened.  A one-acre field was tilled and covered with winter rye, hairy vetch and field peas and oats, marking the farm’s first official planting.

It was probably the longest-planned — or rather longest-delayed — planting ever, but Gus Jones, the farm’s newly hired full-time farm manager, wasn’t at all surprised.

The land was last used for agriculture 50 years ago, when cows grazed there, Jones explained.  The forest had to be cleared, trees chopped and tree stumps removed.  And compost — 1,000 cubic yards of it — had to be brought in. 

“It’s still very early,” said the Illinois native.  The first crops are expected next spring and summer, but it will be a few more years after that before the farm starts its stride, said Jones.

Snug Harbor Cultural Center and Botanical Center announced plans for the new farm nearly two years ago in a ceremony that drew New York State Assemblyman Matthew Titone and other officials.    The original plan included a third-acre demonstration vineyard, which was ill-suited for the farm location, Jones explained.  Farm capacity and other issues also had to be worked out before planting started.

Jones, who farmed for 11 years in Illinois, was enthusiastic about expanding the farming community in Staten Island.

“For the last 10 years, there was one farm for all of Staten Island,” said Jones.  “How in the world can you have one farm for 400,000 people?”

His short-term focus will be on building the nutrient quality of the soil, a process that began with the spreading of a generous layer of compost on the one-acre field.  The compost, supplied by Staten Island’s Department of Sanitation, and the cover crops he recently planted would help increase the fertility of the soil.

“You don’t want the field bare,” said Jones.   He explained that because the field was on a slope, “all the fertility would leach out” without crops and their root systems to hold the soil intact.  The plants would hold all the nutrients in their biomass, even after breaking down, he said.

The farm will expand gradually to three acres by 2014.  Half of the produce will supply food pantries and kitchens in Staten Island.  Thirty percent will be sold at a farm stand and the rest to local restaurants.

Jones will be more than the farm’s head farmer. He will also be an educator, hosting school groups and creating apprenticeships to help facilitate jobs and groom future farmers.

“We want people to be farming,” he said.

To read Jones’ blog, Farm City, click here.

Caption for photo above:  Snug Harbor Heritage Farm plants one-acre field with four staple cover crops:  winter rye, hairy vetch, field peas and oats.  The crops mark the farm’s first official planting.

New Farms with More on the Way

Farms have popped up in unexpected places, from rooftops to public parks and stalled development sites.  Battery Park opened a one-acre urban farm that has drawn hundreds of volunteers and scores of school children and neighborhood community groups. Riverpark Restaurant, a new eatery in Midtown Manhattan, took a less conventional approach, turning a stalled development site into a makeshift farm made up of thousands of moveable milk crates.

More are on the way.  Popular rooftop farms — Eagle Street in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, and the Brooklyn Grange in Long Island City — will soon have new farm neighbors.   The biggest is going to be the Brooklyn Navy Yard, which received a $593,000 grant to build a 40,000-square-foot commercial rooftop farm in the 300-acre industrial park.

Other newcomers include Gotham Greens, which opened a 15,000-square-foot rooftop hydroponic greenhouse in Greenpoint in May, and BrightFarms, an operator of hydroponic greenhouses.  BrightFarms announced plans to build a 25,000-square-foot greenhouse in Long Island City by March of 2012.  It is expected to be the largest rooftop hydroponic greenhouse in the nation.

Local Food Legislation

In August, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg signed legislation that is expected to boost urban farming in the city.  The legislation requires the Department of Citywide Administration Services to create a public database of all city-owned and leased property, giving urban gardeners and farmers a powerful new tool to identify land suitable for urban agriculture.

The legislation especially facilitates the development of rooftop farms and greenhouses.  It extends a tax abatement of up to $100,000 to owners of green roofs that grow vegetables and edible food. In addition, it excludes greenhouses from building height limitations, making it easier for rooftop farm entrepreneurs to meet the city’s rigid building regulations.

The comprehensive FoodWorks legislation championed by New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn aims to make more locally grown, better-quality food available to New Yorkers. It encourages city agencies, for example, to purchase local food, requiring them to provide annual metrics on the food they procure, including where it comes from.

City Council took a symbolic first move in the city’s all-out effort to increase the sourcing and eating of local and regional food: along with its staff, the Council participates in the city’s first workplace CSA.  Fruits and veggies from upstate Norwich Meadows Farms and Red Jacket Orchards are delivered weekly to the Council’s lunch room on Thursdays.

New Farm School

In January, local food advocacy group Just Food and an alliance of local horticultural and food justice organizations launched Farm School NYC.  The school offers a two-year certificate program in urban agriculture, covering everything from growing techniques to marketing and community organizing.

The school has generated immense interest, so much so that it bumped the number of program participants to 24 from 20.

State Support for Local Farmers

Local agriculture this year received a good deal of attention and support from New York State.  Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), for example, introduced legislation this summer that would create a competitive grant program within the U.S. Department of Agriculture to promote community supported agriculture.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo too has stepped in to support local farming.  In a 156-page report called Farm New York, Gov. Cuomo sets out a plan for reviving agriculture in the state.  He announced a program this summer to launch new farmers markets and expands others statewide as part of his Farm New York agenda. He also signed legislation earlier this year to reduce the regulatory burden on the state’s 300-plus farm wineries.

Lastly, there’s the New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets, which has launched initiatives to market local food throughout the state.  One program provides grants to grocers and other food retailers that promote local food.  Another program —funded with a federal grant — seeks to link local farmers and food providers with bed-and-breakfast operators.

Tropical Storm Irene has tested the will of even the sturdiest farmers.  In an interview with NPR, Cheryl Rogowski, owner of W. Rogowski Farm in Orange County, N.Y., talks about the considerable storm damage to her 150-acre farm. She lost 80 to 90% of her crops with most of the farm underwater at the time of the interview.

Rogowski’s farm is one of 15 CSA farms supplying New York City that suffered severe damage, said Jacquie Berger, executive director of the advocacy nonprofit Just Food, in the interview.

Irene may have knocked out half the city’s CSA farms (31 farms run CSA programs in the city) for the season, but it did little to diminish support for the concept of CSA (community supported agriculture).  The tropical storm put CSA to the ultimate test, as CSA customers — shareholders in farm harvests — bore crop losses along with their farmers.

“We’ve seen New York City communities rally around their farmers and ask what they can do to support them. It was both heart-lifting and heart-warming at the same time,” Berger said.

To listen to the interview, click here.

Halfway to a Million New NYC Trees

New York City is counting on volunteers to help it reach the halfway mark in its campaign to plant one million trees by 2017.  It has scheduled four volunteer tree-planting days in parks throughout the city. Some 20,000 trees are expected to be planted during the planting drive.

The MillionTreesNYC campaign — part of Mayor Bloomberg’s PlaNYC initiative to create a greener city by 2030 — has engaged public and private partners to reach its goal.  The first volunteer planting day — to be held Saturday, Oct. 1, at Co-Op City in the Bronx — is organized by American Express and the New York Restoration Project, a nonprofit gardening organization.

The volunteer planting days are listed below.

Saturday, Oct. 1, 2011 (registration begins 9:00 a.m.)

• Bronx:  The Co-op City Greenway Stage

Saturday, Oct. 22, 2011 (9 a.m. – 11:00 a.m.)

• Bronx:  Pelham Bay Park, Van Cortlandt Park, Shoelace Park
• Brooklyn:  Marine Park
• Queens:  Clearview Park
• Staten Island:  Clove Lakes Park

Sunday, Oct. 23, 2011 (9:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m.)

• Bronx:  Raoul Wallenburg Park

Wednesday, Oct. 26, 2011 (9 a.m. – 1:00 p.m.)

• Brooklyn:  Marine Park
• Queens:  Fort Totten Park

To register for a tree-planting event, please click here.

© Photo by Margarida Correia. See caption at bottom of post.

The temporary one-acre urban farm that opened in April at the Battery is not so temporary anymore.  It will shift to a new location in the park when a planned bike path comes through in 2012, said Warrie Price, founder of the Battery Conservancy, a non-profit dedicated to revitalizing the Battery at the tip of Manhattan.

“It’s been too much of a great positive thing for the neighborhood and for us as an organization,” she said as she made her rounds amid rows of tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, beans and a riot of other crops on Saturday.

Since it opened, the farm has received a great deal of media attention with Inhabitat New York City naming it one of the city’s top five urban farms. It’s been a hit with neighborhood school children, Lower Manhattan residents and local community groups who “adopted” or planted half of the 100-plus vegetable beds.  It also drew hundreds of volunteers eager to help the Battery run the operation.

“This is a dream come true,” said the farm’s manager Camilla Hammer, as a bevy of volunteers swirled around her with shovels, rakes and wheelbarrows.

Hammer cut her teeth in farming in rural communities in India and Europe where she practiced different types of agriculture.  To be in charge of the entire farm operation at the Battery — even if on a volunteer basis, as it was for the first four months — was an incredible opportunity, Hammer said.  She designed the layout of the raised beds or “berms,” determined what to put in them, and oversaw just about everything, including 10 part- and full-time interns.

Hammer and the interns work half of the farm and assist school groups with their plots, when needed.  The crops they harvest are given to kiosks and restaurants in the park, donated to food banks, and sold at an on-site farmer’s markets on Monday and Thursday afternoons.

“It’s been just fabulous,” said Price, noting that the Battery has always had good design but never any outreach. “This is the way to get people involved.”

The farm worked up even Frank Gehry.  The famous architect liked it so much he decided to incorporate a farming theme into the design of the Battery’s play space.

“All the play structures,” said Price, “will have veggie gardens.”

For a related New York Bounty post, click here.

Caption for photo above: Camilla Hammer, farm manager of Battery Park’s one-acre farm, cut her teeth in farming in rural communities in India and Europe where she practiced different types of agriculture.

© Photos by Margarida Correia.  See captions at bottom of post. 

Though bad weather destroyed most of their heirloom tomatoes, Eckerton Hill Farm still drew significant crowds to its stand at the Union Square Greenmarket on Saturday.  The Pennsylvania-based farm had plenty of hot peppers — its second most popular crop — to compensate for the missing tomatoes, and an unusual seasonal show stopper:  the jelly melon cucumber.

The oval-shaped cucumbers with protruding horn-like spines caught everyone’s attention.

“What,” most people asked, “IS that?”

Farm owner Jill Stark joked about wanting to put fake bulging eyes on the curious, unknown member of the cucumber and melon family.

“You slice them real thin,” she advised customers, adding that all parts of the fruit — the flesh, seeds and skin — are edible.

I tried a slice.  It was slightly more gelatinous than a cucumber and had a citrusy flavor — a very nice addition, I thought, to a sandwich.

Not everyone was unfamiliar with the jelly melon cucumber, which is known in the southeastern United States as blowfish fruit.  One woman packed a least a half dozen into a bag.

The wonder fruit, which was going for $2.50 a pound, is high in vitamin C and fiber, and will be in season for a couple more weeks, said Stark.

Why not give it a try?

Captions for photos above:

Photo 1:  Jelly melon cucumbers – also known as blowfish fruit in the southeastern United States – was going for $2.50 a pound at the Union Square Greenmarket.

Photo 2: A cross-section of the jelly melon cucumber. 

The New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets will administer the $5 million funding program in consultation with the New York State Soil and Water Conservation Committee, the agency that oversees New York’s 58 County Soil and Water Conservation Districts.

The Soil and Water Districts will determine land eligibility based on site inspections of damage, according to the Ag Department’s press release.  For farmland to be eligible for funding, damage from Tropical Storm Irene must have created new conservation problems that if left untreated would lead to environmental, health and other risks.

In an interview with New York Bounty in July, BrightFarms discussed its plans for marketing rooftop greenhouses to supermarkets.  The company was in talks with a dozen national supermarket chains, eight of which had signed up for the facilities.

BrightFarms will move its headquarters to the Long Island City rooftop location.  It will build a 7,000-square-foot office space on the 32,000-square-foot roof it plans to lease.

The New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets received a $74,000 grant to link local food producers with bed-and-breakfast operators throughout the state.  The State Agriculture Department — in cooperation with the Cornell Cooperative Extension of Madison County and a host of farming and food producer groups — will use the funds to organize regional opportunities for B&B owners to meet local producers and sample their products.

The first step is to identify the groups and make it easier for them to access each other’s products and services, said Steve Miller, a Cornell Cooperative Extension educator.  The program will encourage B&B owners to carry local jams, maple syrup and sauces and feature locally produced food and agricultural products in their menus.

The campaign begins this fall and will run for two years. Click here for the related press release.

Supermarket Opens in South Bronx

City and local elected officials last week opened a Western Beef supermarket in the East Tremont section of the South Bronx.  The 35,000-square-foot store on Webster Avenue includes a bakery, deli, walk-in meat cooler, and a produce department of over 3,000 square feet.  It is the first supermarket to open under a financial-incentive program called FRESH (Food Retail Expansion to Support Health) to encourage grocery store operators and developers to establish and retain supermarkets in low-income neighborhoods.

Western Beef received approximately $5.6 million in real estate and sales tax exemptions to build the supermarket.

Earlier this summer, the New York City Economic Development Council announced that grocery store operator Bogopa Service Corp. planned to build a new 10,000-square-foot supermarket in Corona, Queens, and renovate and/or expand five existing grocery stores in Brooklyn, Queens, and the Bronx.  Bogopa will receive sales tax exemptions totaling approximately $450,000 under the FRESH program.

For more information about the opening of the Western Beef supermarket, click here.

© Photo by Margarida Correia. See caption at bottom of article.

In the vast expanse of barren rooftops that mark this north Brooklyn neighborhood, one stood out far above the rest:  the one atop Bushwick Starr Theatre.  It was the only roof with plants — all happily soil-free, or “hydroponic.”

Rather than soil-filled terracotta pots, the plants grew in trays and tubs attached to tubes that piped in liquid nutrients. Most grew vertically, like the tomatoes and cucumbers climbing the roof fence and onto a trellis.  Others — the bok choy and collard greens, for instance — grew sideways from the side of a wall built from milk crates.

The plants – green and laden with vegetables – seemed at home in the Willie Wonkaesque environment.  Miniature melon-shaped “Mexican sour” cucumbers dangled from plant stems like earrings.  Peppers lounged under the shade of floppy leaves, while the herbs — basil, thyme, sage, parsley — basked in the sun.

The rooftop Eden functions as a lab for Lee Mandell, founder of Boswyck Farms, a start-up business that designs and builds hydroponic growing systems for residents, nonprofits and other small organizations in New York City.  Mandell tests and tinkers with the systems on the roof — as well as those in his loft apartment nearby — to see which ones work best for which plants.

“We test everything here.  When we deliver, we want to make sure the systems are bullet-proof,” said Mandell who has built systems for the Fountain House and the Child Development Support Corporation (CDSC), two non-profit organizations.

Boswyck Farms highlights yet another turn in the urban agriculture movement: individuals and small organizations are setting up on-site alternative systems for growing food. The systems are especially relevant in communities that lack access to fresh produce.

“One of our core missions is to bring high-quality food to areas of New York City that don’t have it,” said Mandell.

CDSC produces 150 heads of lettuce weekly with the hydroponic system that Mandell built and installed for the organization in May.  The lettuce grows indoors in three double-tiered, 20-foot-long rows that occupy 300 square feet of space.

CDSC installed the hydroponic system to supply its food pantry with fresh produce.  It harvests the lettuce Thursdays at 9:30 a.m., just 30 minutes before opening the pantry to the public.

“You don’t get it fresher than that,” said Mandell.

In addition to lettuce, the hydroponic farm at CDSC will produce bok choy and collard greens.

Mireille Massac, public relations coordinator at CDSC, liked the fact that greens would be available year-round for pantry clients.

“The season ends in October.  This will go on in the dead of winter,” she said.

Hydroponic farming also offers many environmental benefits.  Among other advantages, it uses 70% to 90% less water and is two to three times more productive per square foot than conventional, soil-based growing, said Mandell.

As big a proponent of hydroponics as he is, Mandell is not anti-soil.  He likes dirt and often visits Eagle Street Rooftop Farm, a soil-based urban farm in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, to get his “soil fix.”

“Hydroponics is just one component of decentralizing the food production system and bringing good food into the hands of the people,” said Mandell.

Mandell looked out into the vast landscape of empty rooftops. “There’s a lot of land up in the air,” he said.  “It would be great to see all the rooftops being used – for wind, solar, food production.  It’s an amazingly underutilized resource.”

Caption for photo above: Lee Mandell, founder of Boswyck Farms, harvests hydroponic tomatoes from a 1,000-square-foot rooftop test growing facility in Bushwick, Brooklyn.