Build It From the Ground Up!

Denverites,

The time has come! The Westwood Food Co-op memberships have officially opened! There has been so much happening here at Re:Vision in the past week. Here is a peak at what has been going on:

If you want to continue your participation in the Buying Club or purchase a CSA share, you must first join the Westwood Food Co-op. This a huge day in Re:Vision and Westwood's history. We invite you to be a part of the story. 

Additionally, we have changed the pick-up days for Buying Club. Take a look below for the new schedule. CSA shares will be available for pick-up at all of these locations as well. A one-stop shop! 
 
Buying Club orders must be placed by Wednesday at noon for the following pick-up days: 

Re:Vision 
452 S. Newton St., Denver, CO 80210 
Friday 4-7pm (FRIDAY CSA SHARES ONLY! NO BUYING PICK-UP)
OR 
Monday 4-7pm 
 
Denver Community Church
1101 S. Washington St., Denver, CO 80210
Sunday 9-1pm 
 
JVA Consulting
2465 Sheridan Blvd., Denver, CO 80214
Monday 3:30-6
 
Alliance Center
1536 Wynkoop St., Denver, CO 80202
Monday 4-6pm 

Join Re:Vision in Welcoming Seven New Team Members!

In 2007, Re:Vision started as two cool college kids with one big vision… and one haircut from the 1970’s.

Over the years, Re:Vision has grown like a good idea whose time has come, with over 300 gardening families welcoming one of ten Re:Vision Promotoras into their homes to talk about health, nutrition, and wellness. We recently bought a promising neighborhood lot (i.e. a former junk yard about to undergo a ground breaking metamorphosis). And our commercial kitchen is whirring with trainers being trained and dips being dipped. 
This exciting growth includes seven new members of our team. You can read their formal bios here. To learn surprising facts that they would never share in their bios, read on…

Let’s start by saying, “Dumela,” to Lindsay Kuck (which is Setswana for “hello!”). Lindsay speaks Tswana from living in Botswana for over two years as part of the Peace Corps. Beyond Botswana, Lindsay has traveled to over 23 countries and climbed to the top of over twenty 14,000 ft peaks in Colorado, making her an avid explorer (and skilled number tallier!). Lindsay has also graduated from cosmetology school and brews beer, making her skills in high demand by everyone in the office.  

Becoming our 11th Promotora, Maria Coronado comes to Re:Vision with years of service in the Westwood community under her belt. She is originally from Tizapan el Alto Jalisco and is married with two sons. She is excited to be joining Re:Vision as a Promotora because she can move beyond her volunteer work and earn a living doing her passion of service. 

Re:Vision’s new Program Director, Kristin Lacy comes to us from Guatemala, where she spent the past two and a half years co-founding a non-profit that works with local farmers. When she is not impressing everyone with her mad organizing, evaluation, and Spanish skills, she is crocheting hats and gloves (as we write this, we are hoping she will be fielding staff requests for hand warmers). Kristin loves to dance and once sung in a wedding band, a hobby we aim to see resurface at upcoming events.

Mirna Morales moved from Durango, Mexico to become a resident of Westwood and now a Promotora at Re:Vision. She has two kids and has always loved working with the land and the community. She believes that as a mother, it is her job to help and teach her children every day. 

Megan Lloyd is Re:Vision’s new Food System’s Coordinator, and her first day is today! We didn’t think it would be fair to post too much about her on her first day of work, so instead, we offer a limerick. “Megan Lloyd, we welcome you. Life in Westwood has quite a view. You will love it here, Lindsay makes beer! We bet that you have fun skills too.”

If you stop by the office, chances are that you might meet our new part-time office pup Maya. Maya hails from a reservation in Arizona. She loves all people and treats, she spends her weekends skiing and eating snow, and on sunny days, she skateboards in the park. 

Maya’s caretaker is Cat Jaffee, Re:Vision’s new Director of Communications and Public Affairs. Cat is a National Geographic Young Explorer and spent most of the last decade hunting honey in the South Caucasus. In her free time, she is training to read the news as a volunteer for KGNU (Colorado’s community radio station), and can be found sitting in the Re:Vision office after hours talking to herself through a Blue Yeti mic. 

Re:Vision is growing beyond gardens, staff, and cooperative food spaces – we are becoming a larger community of friends and partners. Join one of our many events, and get to know every one of the incredible characters that make up this powerful network, of wedding singers, parents, and skateboarders.

Re:Vision is a community that believes in putting local leaders first, striving tirelessly to be inclusive, empathetic, creative, and collectively powerful. We are artists and visionaries, organizers and farmers. Are you interested in joining our ever-growing team? Check out some of our team openings here.

Announcing Re:Vision’s Annual Photo Competition

Growing gardens, working with the community, cooking up delicious food…the work that we do is mighty photogenic!

And we think your gardens and food is pretty photogenic too!

We are announcing our very first Annual Photo Competition to display everyone’s beautiful work. We have three categories: Best before and after garden shot, tallest plant, and biggest zucchini.

The top winners of each category will be announced on September 10th at the Harvest Festival, and the top three finalists will be recognized publicly. The top winners will receive a surprise prize from Re:Vision.

All submissions can be sent to cjaffee@revision.coop, and the deadline for final submissions will be September 1, 2015.

Here are some of our favorites from 2014.

Meet new staff and join the team!

Hi! My name is Tyler Schrock. As part of a volunteer program, I came to Denver to intern with Re:vision and the Bridge Project who are both doing some amazing work in Westwood. Since joining the team in September, I’ve watched Re:Vision grow and seen a crew of pretty incredible people come on board. Let me tell you about two of our newest staff members:

Josh Sampson digs into the soil at the Westwood Food Co-op

Josh Sampson has been obsessed with soil his whole life. His passion for dirt led him to study urban farming in 2013 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and then work with Will Allen at Growing Power Inc. where he learned how to turn depleted soil into black gold. After living in Brooklyn and LA, he moved out to Denver and worked to support the Denver Urban Farmer’s Collaborative, and start the Big Wonderful, and the Friday Night Bazaar. He has recently joined Re:Vision as our new Farm Manager, working to make the Westwood community a leader in organic local foods grown from the most nutrient rich soil in the front range.

Hannah Synder leading Re:Vision Volunteers.

Hannah Snyder is originally from Portland Oregon. She started her career as a community organizer and a political activist working to take on Big Ag in the Southwest, and retire coal fire power plants on the east coast, eventually helping to run a ballot initiative to stop a tarsands pipeline in Maine. Hannah started gardening and farming when she was 11 and never looked back—and now she is happy to through down her roots (literal and metaphorical) in Colorado and at Re:Vision where she is leading the charge as Office Manager. You might have already met Hannah through her incredible work uniting 80+ volunteers at Re:Vision, and if you haven’t, you should join Re:Vision’s cohort of volunteers and come say hello!

Americorps volunteers help manage Re:Vision’s community farms in 2014.

We are also looking for interns to come and join us to work on Social Media, Grant Writing, Food Policy, and become our Garden Manager. These are amazing opportunities to work on the ground and outside with the community. Don’t miss the chance to be out here working with the incredible people of Westwood.

The Buying Club Becomes the Westwood Food Co-op

We've got big news. As many of you already know, for the past year Re:Vision and residents of Westwood have been hard at work to launch the Westwood Food Co-op. This is the first co-op of its kind--started, owned, and operated by a community living in a food desert. 

On June 9th, membership will finally be open to the public. And we want you to be our first members and help launch this incredible initiative. To be the first to know when sign-ups are ready, register here and we will keep you updated on everything right in the moment.

The Re:Vision Buying Club began as a way to lay the foundation for the Westwood Food Co-op. We have spent our time seeking out the best possible farmers, ranchers, and producers for the purpose of building a regional supply chain. We have worked to build a customer base through various drop-off locations in the city. And we've worked to raise awareness amongst incredible supporters like you about local healthy food.

We will continue to do all of this to ensure a successful launch. But Buying Club is about to become so much more. 

Re:Vision will soon be handing over the Buying Club to the Westwood Food Co-op. Because of this switch, we will be changing the structure of the Buying Club to support this positive growth and ownership. When we began, we waived the membership fees to introduce the initial benefits of the Buying Club to a wider scope of customers, including the Westwood community. On June 9th, all Buying Club members will need to become members of the Westwood Food Co-op in order to continue ordering.  

Becoming a member of a co-op is an exciting and important step towards a new type of business relationship. You have the chance to build the first grocery store with a lasting effect in a community that needs it. No longer are you simply a customer. You become a member-owner.  

The Westwood Food Cooperative has the enormous potential to impact the local communities surrounding Westwood, Denver's urban agricultural landscape, and the way the country approaches food co-ops at large. You are the building blocks from which we will collectively create wealth and increase food access in a sustainable way. 

So stay tuned for the June 9th launch! Sign up for more details on how you can become a founding member of the Westwood Food Co-op!

How to love the Rain (Hint: It Involves Chili)

Denverites,

It is difficult to imagine working in your garden or strolling through the farmer's market when it's a cloudy and rainy 40 degrees outside. It's mid May and despite the recent snowfall, we have the warm taste of summer on our lips. But the reality is that I am currently wearing a heavy scarf and much of our staff is covered in muddy compost. 

Don't get me wrong, this rain is so very good for us! We have a city full of thirsty yards and gardens that need some love, and thankfully things are looking as green as the north coast around here. So what do we, as spoiled, sunshine-loving Denver dwellers do in the meantime to cope? Some of us hit the climbing gyms, watch an unhealthy amount of Netflix, work more, finish those six books we started in the dead of winter, and pull back out the flannels and wool socks.

Some of us cook. Many of your would agree that dreary days like these call for comfort food and  the Re:Vision Buying Club is an awesome resource! Included to help you get through this week is a recipe using our ground elk meat from Frontiere Natural Meats. For all the vegetarians out there, substitute some of our pinto beans, black beans, or rice to fill you up! 

Enjoy!
Megan 

P.S. And if all of this didn't cheer you up, start looking forward to our newsletter next week - we've got some big news to share!

Elk Chili

INGEDIENTS
4 tablespoons Golden Organics Extra Virgin Olive Oil
2 lbs. Frontiere Meats Ground Elk (thawed)
4 (4.5oz) cans of diced tomatoes
2 tablespoons tomato paste
375 ml red wine
1 large onion, diced 
5 stalks celery, diced 
5 Re:Vision Garden garlic cloves, minced
1 cup water
1 teaspoon ground cayenne pepper
1 teaspoon chipotle powder
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 tablespoon cumin
1 tablespoon + 1 tablespoon salt 
1 teaspoon pepper 
1 tablespoon Golden Organics Raw Cane Sugar

DIRECTIONS
Heat heavy stock pot w/ 2 tablespoons oil. Add ground elk and cook until meant has browned. Remove meat to separate bowl. Add 2 tablespoons of oil, onions, celery, and garlic. Sauté until onions are translucent and soft. Add 1/2 bottle of red wine to pot to deglaze. Add cooked meat, tomatoes, tomato paste, seasonings, and water. Simmer for 2-3 hours, finish your book, and stir intermittently between chapters. 
I encourage you to add other seasonal veggies to the chili like hearty winter greens! Soups and chilis are great for packing in all kinds of veggies on the verge of going bad. 
Garnish with Rocking W White Cheddar Cheese, hot sauce, cilantro, or any other goodies you can find! 

The Art of a Thoughtful Grocery List

A couple weeks ago, my partner and I were doing our usual weekly grocery shopping at Natural Grocers.  When we went to check out and unload our cart, the cashier said, “You guys stocking up for the month?”  “No”, we replied a little sheepishly, “These are our groceries for the week.”  The total rang up to about $135 and was a plethora of different veggies and fruits (probably around 20 lbs.), a whole organic chicken, a pound of grass-fed beef, two cans of coconut milk, a variety of tea, nuts, peanut butter, milk, bread, and some other stuff I can’t remember.  This was not the first time we’ve experienced amazement from fellow consumers at the amount of groceries we buy.  Almost every week during check out, shoppers (holding their small handful of goodies) look incredulously at our weekly bounty.    

In addition to what we spend at Natural Grocers we also buy $30-$40 worth of goods from Re:Vision’s Buying Club as part of our weekly grocery shopping.  We order from the Buying Club each Sunday some of the goods that we would otherwise buy at Natural Grocers like local organic meat, olive oil or beans.  The prices are even lower than what we pay at Natural Grocers and I know that the money I spend at the Buying Club is helping to create access to healthy food for residents in Denver’s food deserts.  It’s a win-win.  I get the same amazing food from the Buying Club that I would at Natural Grocers and I’m helping to create a local sustainable food system where everyone (not just people like me) can access healthy food.

It’s just the two of us, so why do we need all that food?  Don’t you waste a ton?  Nope! Before we head out to the grocery store, we put in a little time to plan the week’s meals and figure out what ingredients we need to buy to make those meals.   We have very little food waste, filling less than one 20-gallon trash bag per week and composting the veggie scraps or giving them to our chickens.   $175 for a pair may seem outrageous at first glance, but let’s break it out. That’s $87.50 per person per week,  $12.50 per day for each person, or a about $4.16 per meal.  More importantly to us, these $4 meals are made with 100% organic, healthy goods! 

One of the big motivators for me to write this blog is to address the shift in American food culture over the last 30 years.  Namely, Americans are spending less and less of their income on groceries and more on eating out.  As a nation, we spend less on food than any other county in the world.  Incredibly, this March the Commerce Department released data showing that for the first time in US history, sales at restaurants and bars surpassed spending at grocery stores! Jarrod and I budget $100 per month to spend on food and beverages outside the home.  This averages to about 1-2 meals at restaurants, 1-2 happy hours and the occasional coffee.  We work to be cognizant of our consumer habits.  We don’t feel deprived; we allow ourselves the occasional treat if we want to meet up with friends or need coffee to get us through a Monday.  The key phrase here is “occasional treat”.  We choose to make restaurant outings more of a fun experience rather than a regular habit.    

You can make significant cost savings if you shift more of your food budget from restaurants to groceries. On average, Americans eat between 4-5 meals out per week.  The average cost of a lunch out is $10 compared to a home-cooked lunch that only costs $4.   This means that if you eat out just one time less a week, you’ll save about $315 annually! And that’s just the savings from lunch.  This doesn’t take into account the typically more expensive dinner and happy hour spending. Cut one of those outings and you’re looking at much more significant savings.  Not to mention the fact that home cooked meals are usually healthier because you have control over the quality of ingredients and how much salt, sugar, and fat you add.   

“Wow, you guys must feel amazing!” the Natural Grocers cashier said as he took stock of our cart amassed with vegetables.  One of the toughest things about convincing friends and family to eat out less is that it’s nearly impossible to convey the benefits to your physical and mental wellbeing that cooking healthy food affords.   I’m afraid that the majority of people are accustomed to feeling like crap because of what they put in their body, and because they have no point of reference to know differently they don’t see the value in spending more on groceries.  They haven’t experienced how healthy eating can transform the way you feel—more energized, stronger, more alert, positive and focused.  

A phrase I often hear from friends and colleagues when I tell them about my eating and cooking habits is, “I don’t have the time or skill to cook at home.”  It will take some small behavioral changes and a little more time, but you can do it incrementally and eventually it will become second nature to you.  For example, try to set a goal of swapping one of the nights you typically eat out and plan to cook a meal at home.   Cooking is not hard.  Sure, it is harder than driving through Burger King, but there are a billion simple, quick and healthy recipes online that everyone is capable of doing.  You just have to give it a try and get creative about how you make time to cook.  I truly believe the time is out there for most of us, we just need to reexamine our priorities.  Instead of spending hours shopping at the mall or watching movies all night, distribute some of that time to planning and cooking some healthy meals that will ultimately raise the quality of your life.  My spouse and I spend about 20 minutes meal planning on Sundays to create the week’s menu. Most nights, we spend around 30 minutes making dinner and cook enough for our lunch the next day.  It’s likely that this is less time many people spend driving to different restaurants for lunch and dinner, parking, and waiting for their meal.  I also allot a couple weekend hours to make a meal or two to freeze for those weeks we’ll have late meetings and know we won’t feel like cooking when we get home.   

Cooking together is fun and relaxing.  I look forward to coming home and preparing and eating a meal with my partner; we use this time to debrief about our day and unwind.    This is a great time for families to spend together and revive the sacred time of preparing and sharing food that is integral to everyone’s wellbeing and cultivates a healthy relationship with food and family.  The way we eat is a lifestyle and is guided by our ideals and priorities.  We care deeply about the health of our bodies, earth and the ethical treatment of animals and people locally and globally.  If you care about these things too, I recommend cooking more meals at home and eating out less.  Thanks for reading!

 Sincerely,

Claire

P.S. Please check out this excellent article that includes an overview of why buying quality food matters:  http://www.motherjones.com/blue-marble/2012/01/america-food-spending-less

P.P.S.  I challenge you to try meal and grocery planning this week.  Sit down for 20 minutes before you go out to get groceries and plan some meals for the week and create a shopping list of ingredients you need to buy to make those meals. If you need some inspiration, check out this week's Buying Club list and put in your order today!

It Starts With The Soil

Life is a beautiful thing. 

It can be found everywhere - all around us. The massive mammals roaming the Earth, the countless species of birds with their feathers rustling through the breeze, the labyrinth of complexity that is the rainforest. Yet to me, the life I can’t see is the most inspiring. The most important, the most overlooked. Scientists say in one teaspoon of soil there are over 2 billion - read that again, b-illion!! - living organisms. Speak to any farmer and they’ll tell you soil is what determines how well their crops grow. Sure, weather and moisture play their parts, but without the nutrients, the minerals, the bacteria, fungi, the worms and so forth who all turn those nutrients and minerals into food for the plant roots, no amount of sun and water will make a seed become a productive, fruit-baring plant. 

So we started with the right soil - custom-mixed potting soil containing coconut coir, worm castings, and other micro-organism heaven stuff. We wanted the best to start 20,000 seedlings that would find their way to 400 families’ backyard gardens. The seedlings sprouted wonderfully, reaching out for the lights above and exploring deep into their tiny starter-cells for all the food their roots could find. They couldn’t have looked stronger and healthier. But just as life is beautiful, it is often fragile. Soon after potting up the first batch of tomatoes and peppers, spider mites struck - killing many plants, and our lack of infrastructure led many more to ‘dampen off’ from over watering. 

We started a seedling hospital, and today many look as though they might pull through, but we made the tough decision to cancel the seedling sale. We wanted to ensure we’d have enough plants for those 400 families who will be relying on them for a large percentage of their food come harvest time.

We’re bummed to have to pull back on the 3rd annual seedling sales, but we know its the right thing to do, and we’re excited about the response of our community of supporters so far. Already one gentleman has taken it upon himself to go around to nurseries and get donations of plants - what can you do to help us ensure we have the best possible plants for our families? Thank you for reading. Thank you for supporting. Thank you for donating.

Not Adios But Hasta Luego

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Do you know what is a hard thing to write?

A blog announcing to you all – my friends, my partners, and my heroes, that I am leaving Re:Vision.

It’s hard, because I think about a conversation I had with a backyard gardening family (in my broken Spanish), who explained to me how tough it is to both hold down a job and care for their sick daughter. But when they talked about their backyard garden, they smiled because, as they explained, they could finally feed their daughter healthy, affordable food.

It’s hard because I think about what it felt like to sit in a meeting recently with Paul Washington, Denver's Director of Economic Development, and hear him say that cooperative business models are one of the best strategies for narrowing the wealth gap in Denver. I glow knowing that Re:Vision’s work is pioneering that strategy.

It’s hard because I think about when I visited 3738 Morrison Road just a couple of weeks ago - five months after Re:Vision purchased the property. Instead of the junkyard it had been for the last few decades I saw a clean property with buildings gutted. The site is ready and waiting to become the home of the Westwood Food Cooperative and a much-needed gathering space for food, health, and community enterprise. I felt immediately that Re:Vision is on to something that will transform this community and Denver.

The most difficult part is that I know Re:Vision is going through a remarkable ground-breaking growth, packed full with real substance, and I won’t be here to see it every single day. Inspired by this place and these people, I am pursuing my lifelong dream of starting my own consulting business. There will still be many opportunities to work with Re:Vision, so it’s not a goodbye - not even close.

Re:Vision has changed me, the way I look at my work, and the way I look at community planning and development in general. We must start with the people who know their own problems best. We must equip them with the tools to leverage their own resources toward sustainable solutions. This type of community development takes a tremendous amount of patience and dedication, but it works.

No one can verify this more than Eric, Joseph and Patty, three of the most dedicated people I know. Eric and Joseph believe so wholeheartedly in what they're doing, that they moved into the Westwood area to be full-time members of the community. Patty, Re:Vision’s lead promotora, spends many weekends attending quincineras and weddings of Re:Farm families - out of the goodness of her heart, not because she’s getting paid. These three heroes live, eat and breathe Re:Vision's mission every moment of every day.

Even though leaving at this time is hard, there is no question that Re:Vision will continue to soar. And whoever takes over my role will be beyond lucky to have the opportunity to fly with this organization.

I hold this one particular thought for the future near and dear, an image in my mind that I know will be a reality soon:

It’s 2017, and I am shopping in the Westwood Food Co-op with my kids. We are members. We purchase vegetables grown on site, beef raised sustainably 60 minutes away, and jelly made by Westwood residents. We wave to a couple of Promotores who are teaching a class on canning and pickling. After we finish shopping, we head outside to the public plaza. Kids are playing in the plaza, with parents chatting nearby, enjoying a beautiful day. I see Eric and Joseph and hug them. I can’t stop beaming with pride.

A Fresh Look at the Buying Club

Friends! 

My name is Megan and I am the Food System Coordinator at Re:Vision. I am writing to you to introduce myself, and answer any and every question that you may have about the Buying club. It's my job to deliver the best local products I can find, and to support you and the incredible community here in Westwood as we launch the food co-op! 

So let's get started...what is the Buying Club exactly? And why do we keep telling you to sign up?! 

The Buying Club is a program where you can purchase local specialty items (like yogurt, cheese, and eggs!) online, and your order helps us offer the same food at low cost in Denver's food deserts. We want you to sign up, because in YOU - our friends and partners and members - we are laying the foundation for the coop. That's right. The Buying Club helps us establish our producer and distribution channels, and build a client base. That's the big picture. And in supporting the buying club, you are also helping us build these food systems for Westwood. It's very cool, and I am excited to have you become a part of it. So, in summary, by joining the Buying Club...

• You have access to a unique variety of locally sourced meats, dairy, eggs, and more.
• Your purchase gives the Westwood community the option to purchase healthier food for their families.
• You help strengthen the local food system as you encourage your own community to shop responsibly. 
• You are the building-block to help successfully launch and sustain the Westwood Food Co-op. 

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Want to help us build it? Tell us the kind of products that YOU would like to see!

Take two minutes to fill our our product survey here, and not only will you receive a code to get 10% off of your next order, but I personally will take all of your answers and do my best to go out and get the products that you want to see featured in the buying club!

Here are five NEW products that I'm excited about, and my new favorite recipe! 

Smoked Buffalo Bratwurst

Rocking W White Cheddar

Rocking W Pepper Jack

Royal Crest Butter

Boulder Natural Eggs

Smoked Buffalo Frittata 

Makes 8 servings 

Ingredients:

12 Boulder Natural Eggs
½ c. whole milk
¾ c. Rocking W White Cheddar or Pepper Jack
Salt & Pepper
2 Tablespoons Royal Crest Butter
½ medium onion, chopped
½ lb. Continental Bison Bratwurst links, casings removed
1 ½ - 2 c. local vegetable of choice  

Directions: 

Preheat broiler. Whisk eggs and milk in a medium bowl. Mix in ½ c. cheese and season with salt and pepper. Set aside.

Heat butter in large skillet, preferable cast iron, over medium heat. Add onion and chorizo and cook until sausage is brown, 6-8 min. Add vegetable of choice; season with salt and pepper, and cook until vegetables are tender. 

Reduce heat to low and pour egg mixture over vegetables. Cook, shaking pan occasionally, until edges are just set, 10-12 min. Top frittata w/ remaining ¼ c. cheddar; broil until top is golden and center is set, about 4 min longer. 

Serve for breakfast, lunch, or dinner with a green salad! 

 

Thanks for reading! If you would like these kinds of updated delivered to your inbox weekly, don't forget to sign up for the Buying Club, it's free!