Tenement Talks Presents: Eat the City!

Robin Shulman became interested in food at age 17, when she witnessed how a garden transformed her own community on 4th Street in Manhattan. Once a destination for heroin addicts, the corner of Shulman’s street became “a small working farm” after her neighbors fenced off the area and planted vegetables and herbs. This renovation was part of a larger, long-established trend of urban gardening, and Shulman wanted to learn more. Her research on local food and its production comes together in Eat the City: A Tale of the Fishers, Foragers, Butchers, Farmers, Poultry Minders, Sugar Refiners, Cane Cutters, Beekeepers, Winemakers, and Brewers Who Built New York, which explores the rich history and innovative present of local food growers in New York City.


On July 19th, Schulman will host a group of local food producers for a  Tenement Talk titled "Eat the City: Taste and Talk with Robin Shulman". And of course, we'll be tasting some of the foods we talk about.  To save your spot at the Talk, you can reserve tickets here.

This panel, represents a small but diverse cross-section of New York’s rapidly expanding local food scene.  Here’s a little background on each of the event's participants:



Image courtesy the New York Times

Andrew Cote is  a fourth-generation beekeeper who has dedicated himself to spreading his enthusiasm for beekeeping and local honey in New York and around the world. His signature product, Andrew’s Taste-Bud Bursting Local Wildflower Honey, is available at Greenmarkets around the city.  He also runs Silvermine Apiary in Connecticut.



Image courtesy Serious Eats

Kelly Taylor first began brewing beer in his college dorm room.  He's now the brewmaster at Heartland Brewery and the founder of Kelso of Brooklyn.  He has been known to experiment with nontraditional ingredients, including ancho peppers, licorice, and chocolate cake.

Image courtesy ITVS

Imran Uddin is the butcher at Madani Halal, a shop that was founded by his father in Queens (halal is Islamic dietary law.)  Madani is somewhat unique: the entire butchering process takes place in full view, thus customers have the opportunity to witness their poultry or cow be slaughtered.  Madani has been profiled by Serious Eats and was featured in the Independent Lens documentary A Son’s Sacrifice.

Image of Ian Marvy courtesy the Red Hook CSA

In the summer of 2003, Ian Marvy and Michael Hurwitz (now the director of GreenMarkets) decided to transform an abandoned baseball field into an urban garden. Thus the Red Hook Community Farm was born, with the support of Added Value, an organization that has worked to combat issues of food justice in Red Hook for over a decade. The farm is a center for neighborhood and youth involvement, education, service-learning, and, of course, locally grown fruits and vegetables.

-- Posted by Natalie Fine