I met Heidi after the Grammy Greening Summit, where she excitedly talked to me about her new food company, Luko Foods, which she founded 9 months ago with best friend Nikki. Yes, a new food baby has been brought into the world and it’s delicious! :) Heidi’s contribution to Luko Foods is her fresh salsas, the thought of which leave my mouth watering at the thought of how fresh they are (made with ingredients from local farms, so the ingredients are extra fresh!).

Nikki’s contribution is a line of jams, including Orange Ginger Marmalade, Fig Balsamic (which is being served on the menu of Malibu Golf Club restaurant Malibu and Vines), Blueberry Lemon Lavender, and Strawberry heat (a spicy strawberry jam!).

Both of these former advertising professionals left their jobs, feeling disenchanted with having to conduct analyses of the marketing statistics of iPods and to design plans for pushing Dr. Pepper sodas into schools.

One day while discussing future plans, Nikki told Heidi that she was interested in selling jams she had been creating at a farmer’s market. Prior to this moment, Heidi had won 1st place in the 30th anniversary celebration of Los Angeles farmer’s markets for her salsa, which at the time was called ‘The Loco Local by Luko’ (her last name at the time, and the origin of the Luko Foods name brand). In that moment, they both saw an opportunity presenting itself to create an independent business, selling fresh, artisan, hand-crafted foods to the Los Angeles community.

Most of the ingredients in Luko Foods are locally grown –- They are building relationships with Los Angeles based food growers from who they get many (if not most) of the ingredients in their jams and salsas. Luko Foods currently sources their food from two farms – South Central Farmers and Marina Farms.

I asked if they are completely local and organic, and Nikki said that they are not yet so, since it is difficult to find local or organic makers of some of their ingredients, such as port wine for the Fig Balsamic spread. They also use spices in their foods, some of which have uncertain origins. They emphasized, however, that they are very open to learning, exploring options, and constantly improving the deliciousness, quality, and organic and local nature of their products.

We also had a conversation about their containers, which are printed with gorgeous, artistic labels. They told me that they have friends who have designed the art for their labels, which made them pause to reflect on all the support and input they have had from their community of friends and family. Nikki’s jams are packaged in glass jars, for which there is a bottle return policy: return your empty jar and get $1 back.

Heidi is currently packaging her salsas in plastic containers, because she wants to sell fresh salsa, which she wouldn’t be able to do if she packaged it in the Mason jars (you have to put the jars with its contents in boiling water to vacuum seal them). She said that she is interested in alternatives to plastic, but has not been able to find any thus far. If anyone has any ideas, feel free to comment on this article, or to connect directly with Luko Foods on their Facebook page.

When it comes down to it, I probably have three favorite facts about Luko Foods. Firstly, Heidi’s recipe is a modified version of her mother’s salsa recipe. This just made me happy, since I learned to cook fresh from my mother too. :) Secondly, Nikki’s jams are LOW SUGAR! Nikki told me that she compared her recipes to others online and realized she uses about half of the sugar called for by the standard jam recipe.

You can clearly taste the unique flavor of each of the fruits in her jams, which are very delicate and vibrant, since they are not weighed down by syrupy sweetness. She designs her recipes to let the fruit speak for itself. She made the point that people enjoy fresh oranges and blueberries plain –- they don’t dump spoonfuls of sugar on top, so there is no reason to do so in jam making. Her jams are very light and flavorful, without the heavy syrupy texture of others jams/marmalades I have tried.

My third favorite fact is one about which we had a huge conversation -– Luko Foods feels passionately about their products not just as a business, but as a way to power forward, invest in, dialogue about and support the food movement. As I mentioned in my Grammy Greening Summit article (and this is a point of discussion I shared with Heidi and Nikki), food is a central part of the green movement. If we are going to change our society to live more sustainably with the planet, we MUST change our eating methods and habits. Heidi and Nikki both emphatically stated how happy they are to be supporting and investing their time and energy into creation of fresh, local foods as an alternative to the corporate takeover of our food system.

Heidi and Nikki recently joined me in my home for a Luko Foods tasting, leaving me with full containers of all of their current products. :) I say current, because they work with seasonal foods, experimenting with new ingredients as they present themselves throughout the year, such as Heidi’s summertime Peach Piñata and seasonal blood orange salsa. They both agreed that it is more important to them to get ripe, fresh, seasonal ingredients than to get foods that have had a long shelf life, are out of season, genetically modified, or that have been shipped across the nation or world.

When they first came to my home for the tasting, I tried the jams and salsas on a whole-wheat sourdough bread I had made. I have since experimented with a few different recipes. I LOVE both the Blueberry Lemon Lavendar and Orange Ginger Marmalade on plain yoghurt (mmm… parfait!). I had made a cashew cream (plain yoghurt, raw cashews and a little coconut oil in a food processer), which paired deliciously with the Fig Balsamic. I was given a jar of their Bacon Maj (Maj = everything opposite of jam). I don’t eat bacon, so I shared it with my students to give them a gourmet treat. I baked a raisin flatbread (1.5 cups sourdough starter, 1.5 cups whole-wheat flour, 1/2 cup raisins, sugar, salt and allspice/cinnamon, prepared and baked like a pizza crust), which I topped with honey cashew cream (cashew cream recipe above + honey and a little salt) and Bacon Maj. The kids loved it. :) I tried this combo with the Fig Balsamic, which was also delicious. I love the Strawberry Heat with a nice thick layer of pasture-raised butter on some of my homemade toast.

Nikki has some other recipes on her website that look delicious. Be sure to check them out. :)

If you want to meet these wonderful women in person, be sure to visit them on Sundays between 10am – 2 pm at the Melrose Place Farmer’s Market in West Hollywood. They are there come rain or shine! You can also order online, including beautifully prepared gift-baskets. See below for links to their websites and Facebook page.

Enjoy!!!

LUKO FOODS

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HEIDI’S SALSA

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NIKKI’S JAM

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All photos by Nisha

Image via Blog Downtown

I have become very involved in food issues, having realized that food production, vending, consumption, and other food related issues including waste and human health are fundamentally related to environmental health.

As I mentioned in my Grammy Greening Summit article, local growers are uniting with raw foodists who are in turn forming food coops to provide things like raw milk. These efforts are being spawned by the exponentially growing number of people who have come to realize how enormously detrimental “conventional” farming is on human and environmental health, while also discovering the superior potential of responsible, sustainable, live agriculture to augment the Earth’s ability to grow and regenerate, while still providing more than enough food for the world’s peoples.

As many of you know, in the United States, purchasing an industrially farmed, processed and packaged food item containing ingredients shipped several times across the globe and requiring laboratory work (in the form of pesticides and genetically modified seeds) is often far cheaper than purchasing a locally grown carrot or tomato from the neighborhood farmer’s market.  Industrial agriculture is a primary contributor to global warming, behind automobile and factory exhaust, and highly processed foods resulting from the industrial agricultural process are a primary contributor to obesity, diabetes, heart problems and other illnesses. Over 80% of foods eaten by Americans contain genetically modified seeds, and the farming of soy is a primary contributor to the massive destruction of the Amazon rainforest. Food is traded as a commodity on stock exchanges, meaning that it is grown and sold to raise a profit for business people. Meanwhile, in the United States, we waste about enormous amounts of the food we produce.

In response, urban communities across the United States have started to grow their own food from organic and heirloom seed and have started to investigate these issues and how healthier alternatives can be created.

Siel has blogged extensively about the urban garden movement in Los Angeles (and related issues), including info about: signs of its growth; books, and more books; LA based environmental charter schools; yard sharing for those who don’t have land; guerilla gardening; dirt and its importance to our lives; points of personal change and advocacy; etc.

I am dedicating the rest of this post to things you can do and organizations you can follow, join, or donate to in Los Angeles, working hard on these related issues.

1.) First, to have immediate access to gardening and planting related grants, talks, events, classes, etc., join UC Davis cooperative extension Master Gardener program manager Yvonne Savio’s listserve (email ydsavio [at] ucdavis [dot] edu). Also, check out the UC Davis Extension webpage. If you want to learn urban vegetable gardening basics, sign up for the Victory Gardener program at a community garden near you (these classes take place ALL over the city).

2.) Check out the UC Davis list of LA based community gardens, or check the LA Community Garden Council website to find out where the community garden nearest you is located, and go volunteer there. You might be able to take home free veggies, fruits and herbs for your efforts.

3.) Subscribe to the Los Angeles Agriculture blog and LA Farm Girl.

4.) Check out the work of EnrichLA, an organization dedicated to putting a garden in every school in Los Angeles. They do GREAT work, so donate or volunteer at one of their sites if you can.

5.) Check out the trailer for the GMO Film (made by the creators of Dive! for which I posted the film trailer above), and donate to them if you can. They are working hard to create a film to raise awareness on the giant corporate takeover of the American food system, starting with the most ancient of human inheritances: seeds.

6.) Get involved with the campaigns to put an initiative on the upcoming November ballot to label GMOs (genetically modified organisms). Either donate to one of the two major campaigns (Labelgmos.org and Justlabelit.org). Labelgmos.org is doing a lot of work to recruit people to petition the public, so check their website for more info. Host a petitioning party and gather a bunch of signatures to put this issue on our ballot. Attend this Saturday’s SLOLA meeting, where labelgmos.org will be present and handing out free seeds from Baker Creek Heirloom (see info at bottom of this post). We have the right to know what is in our food!

7.) Subscribe to my blog, Local to Global Life Works, to learn more about these issues and how actions and decisions local to Los Angeles are connected to global trends and have global impact. I host events, post about events, etc. to keep you in the loop.

8.) Check out, support, volunteer for or donate to the work of the Los Angeles branch of one of America’s first peace and justice activism organizations, the American Friends Service Committee. One of the LA office’s main projects is maintaining four urban gardens (called Friends Peace Gardens) at high risk Los Angeles high schools to combat gang violence and to create access and awareness about healthy eating and fresh foods.

9.) Check out, support, volunteer for or donate to work of TreePeople, who have been active in LA for decades, and the new project 100 Seeds of Change through the Social Justice Learning Project, trying to bring urban gardening to South Los Angeles food deserts.

10.) Check out, support, volunteer for, donate to, or become a member of SLOLA – the Seed Library of Los Angeles ($10 lifetime membership), and attend their weekly meetings at the Venice Learning Garden. If you live closer to downtown LA or Pasadena, do not fret, because SLOLA is creating an eastern library branch. Feel free to email me for more information on this (namorandovida [at] gmail [dot] com).

If you have some free time this Sat., Mar. 17, be sure to stop by the Venice SLOLA meeting, since they are discussing a subject close to my heart – crop plants plants native to the Americas and their historic/cultural importance, with resources on how to obtain and care for their seeds. Plus, LabelGMOs.org is also sponsoring a distribution of seeds — free to SLOLA members — from Baker Creek Heirloom Seed Company. And at the close of the meeting, SLOLA’s ever-expanding seed library will open again for check out.

If you’ve never attended a SLOLA meeting or have questions about seed saving, you’re invited to come 15 minutes early for a “Seed Saving Basics” presentation.

Image via LA Farm Girl

If you want an organic meat burger — and you want it fast — stop by O! Burger in West Hollywood.

Yes, there are other options for eco-friendlier burgers in Los Angeles. Want a sumptuous, gourmet organic burger with a price tag to match? I recommend BLD. Willing to settle for “natural” instead of organic? Try Fresh East. Vegan? Head over to The Veggie Grill. Cool with carcinogens as long as they’re veg? Boca Burgers are cheap. Don’t give a shit about yourself or the planet? McDonald’s still has many locations all over SoCal.

But if you want a fast food burger made organic, O! Burger is the place. Really in a hurry? Order it online and pick it up.

Though the grass fed organic beef burger’s its raison d’etre, O! Burger has organic turkey burgers too and does offer a veggie burger — though I have to say the house veg burger isn’t the tastiest veg burger I’ve come across. The deal is healthy though, with a medley of spinach, corn, carrots, and peas — all under crisp cucumber slices.

But really, this place is great for your occasional meaty indulgence. Get your burger the way you want it — all organic sans hormones or antibiotics — salad style on greens or on a yummy bun — always in recyclable, compostable or biodegradable packaging.

Instead of the usual high fructose corn syrup sweetened coke, you can get natural sodas or kombucha. Don’t miss the chocolate chip peanut butter cookies!

O! Burger. 8593 Santa Monica Blvd., West Hollywood. 310.854.034. 10:30 am – 9:30 pm daily.

During my trip to EARTH University, we spent a day in the banana fields and at the packaging center. In the fields I was blown away when I saw how the bananeros harvest the bunches. One man uses a machete to separate the bunch from the tree, and another man hoists the 60 lb bunch onto his back and sprints across uneven terrain. He then nimbly chains the bunch onto the train that will take them to the packing plant.

There, workers spend 10 hours a day wielding knives at lightning speed. They inspect and separate the big bunch of bananas into the smaller banana hands that you pick up at Whole Foods.

While I was watching them work very hard, what I was really witnessing was the Whole Trade Guarantee in action. Whole Foods trusts Transfair USA, Rainforest Alliance, and Fair for Life to certify that suppliers have met criteria including quality, premium price to the producer, better wages and working conditions, and environmental sustainability.

According to Fair Trade USA, “Many of the developing worlds’ small farmers live in poverty, struggling to feed their families and to maintain ownership of their land. Hired workers are often denied basic employment rights and fair wages, unable to escape poverty no matter how hard they work.”

This is especially relevant to the banana industry because the companies that have dominated it have a dark history of treating workers unjustly, including knowingly exposing workers to toxic chemicals.

When workers and the environment are treated fairly, one could assume that the products will inevitably cost a little more. So how much are you willing to pay for the piece of mind that your bananas were not involved in the exploitation of innocent workers?

If you have extra pocket change, a dime to be exact, you could put it toward a good cause and potassium rich produce. I called several grocery stores and couldn’t find bananas more then ten cents a pound cheaper than the fair trade variety, so why choose cheaper? Sometimes when you get a deal, someone else is paying for it.

Apparently a lot of shoppers feel the same way. According to a recent press release by Fair Trade USA, it was announced that sales of fair trade certified products are up 75% in 2011 in the U.S. That means huge improvements in a lot of peoples lives, and is proof of what big changes a small amount of change can make.

Photos by April Gilbert

Photo via SLOLA website

>> Big City Forum presents Fast Forward: Los Angeles on the Verge, featuring a panel of speakers that will harness creative methods for a lively discussion around livability, sustainability, community, and the politics of place in Los Angeles. Takes places tonight, Wed., Mar. 7 at 7 pm at the Armory Center for the Arts, 145 North Raymond Avenue, Pasadena. Cost: free.

>> What exactly is a ‘genetically modified seed’? What is ‘heirloom’? How do seed saving and local food growing relate to local and global peace? Who owns the future of food? Join the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) Friends Peace Dialogue, speakers Megan Bomba (SLOLA) and Deanna Marie Weakly (Master Gardener, founder of Skid Row Rooftop Garden), and green LA girl writer Nisha Namorando Vida to learn and dialogue on these questions this Thu., Mar. 8 from 7-8:30 pm at the AFSC headquarters, 634. S. Spring St., 3rd Floor, Los Angeles. Cost: free.

>> The G2 Gallery has begun a weekly screening of Ken Burns’s six-part documentary The National Parks: America’s Best Idea. The screenings provide a deeper understanding from a historical perspective of the people and places that shaped America’s national parks. The screenings will be held every Thu., Feb. 9 – Mar. 15 at 2 pm. Check out this week’s screening “Great Nature (1933–1945)”, on Thu., Mar. 8 at 2 pm, G2 Gallery, 1503 Abbot Kinney Blvd, Venice. Cost: $5. All proceeds will be donated to the World Wildlife Fund and the Sierra Club.

>> Santa Monica College is conducting its 10th annual Environmental and Urban Issues Speakers Series. Join Genevieve Bertone and other Santa Monica College faculty, staff, and students to learn how we are working on transportation, energy, food and other projects that make SMC more efficient and a better neighbor on Tue., Mar. 13 at 6:30 pm in HSS 263 on Santa Monica’s Main Campus (Map). Cost: free.

Photo via Big City Forum