A Celebration of Growth

Last Saturday the Farm hosted "A Celebration of Growth", a fundraiser dinner cooked by the one and only Chris Becker. The fundraiser drew many new supporters to the farm and the proceeds benefited the urban gardening programs that the farm is spearheading in Waco.

It was a four course dinner and the menu included:

Local tomato, cucumber and basil salad
with Moroccan extra virgin olive oil, '07 vintage

Handmade zucchini panzotti
with golden butter, meyer lemon preserve and pecorino secco

Grass-finished World Hunger Relief beef
with red potatoes and liana beans

Spiced poached pear
with homemade vanilla ice cream

Chris was in his element and we watched in amazement as he cooked every dish and timed every course to perfection. We now know why he spent all those weeks toiling in the barn to refurbish the commercial stove known as "Lazarus". Rusty, gross and non-functional, Lazarus was saved from the scrap heap by the Farm and sat in the barn until Chris arrived as a new volunteer. Given up on by so many others, only Chris was able to restore the stove to working order and wield it to create an unbelievable evening of food.

And with the interns and volunteers receiving 20 minutes of waiter training, we had some pretty decent service to go along with the food. Only one steak was dropped. And luckily it was dropped on the floor and not on a donor. The only other crisis was that the ice was melting too quickly in the iced tea. So all in all - a very successful night.

The best part about it was the leftovers. Yes, we enjoy the all vegetarian meals that are served on the farm, but I think we all savored the luxury of the steak and sparkling water at the after-party meal...and the after-after-party meal.

There was a lot of care, skill and love that went into the meal. Chris' cooking ability and organization is obvious, but probably most of the people eating the meal did not know the persistence and patience it took to clean and repair Lazarus. Not to mention the labor and sweat poured into growing the produce in the garden or raising a grass-finished cow. The next time you scoff at the price of a piece of local, organic food, take my advice to get to know an organic farmer and experience what they do. I guarantee, you'll never scoff again and you'll gladly plunk down the money for something you KNOW is good.