Slow Food Charlotte (Read Me)

I posted from the future so that it becomes a "sticky." I never thought you'd be a Senator, Andy! har,har *cough* I mean harumph,harumph

This is the realm where we, SuperFoodies one and all, can enjoy unlimited gastronomical powers! We will be unfettered by the tasteless, unswayed by mass produced rubbish, undaunted by strange new cuisine! Yay, we shall uphold all that is salivaceous, delectable and most importantly, over 30,000 Scoville units! Ahem, *clears throat* *sip water glass* I got off track there, sorry.

This is intended to be an open no-holds-barred free-for-all (I'm partial to the figure-four); and copius posting of ideas is highly encouraged! And, unlike emails which can degrade into a snafu of mile long replies and cross-replies, the blog format will allow us to present clear ideas and comment on them, individually, as we see fit. What is great is that collectively, we cover a gorgeously varied and diverse skill set that will prove to be invaluable before we even know it.

I also suppose we should have a little fun and and get everyone to post a short SF bio of themselves.


Viva la cuisine lente!
Noll

I said whoa-oh-who-oh-whoa, Domino

I've been working away furiously on our new house, so I haven't had much time to concoct new and inventive ways to pester you Super Foodies! You heard me right; and that means its high time for another meet-up.

We can always convene any Saturday at a farmers market, maybe we could come up with a travelling farmer market brigade, like the Travelling Willbury's except with wholesome produce...

Chomp on it and come up with some options, we should do it next week. We still have a lot of ground to cover if we want to hold our August 1st launch date!

Viva la cuisine lente!
Noll


PS> Why has no one bothered with their "bio?" Y'all need to lighten up some, take that chastity belt out a notch or two!

FLASHMOB

The word on the street is that a flashmob/meetup is coming!

****************************************
** When: Saturday, June 17 **
** Where: Matthews Farmer's Market **
** Time: 8AM, sharp!!! **
****************************************


http://www.matthewsfarmersmarket.com/

Adopt-A-Food

Hi Everybody,

I ran across these recently and thought of Slow Food:

www.nudo-italia.com/
www.sthelenawinery.com/adopt.html

Not to be "un-Slow Food," but Noll, I have absolutely NO interest in killing chickens this Sunday. Please don't eject me :)

Peas,

Beth

Some more interesting things...

I've been tracking down various things that have piqued my interest lately, so I'll just toss them out on the table for discussion:

• Real Milk a "true dairy" source, but no Charlotte chapter. Can we [slowfood] absorb this as a sub-committee? Or at least incubate it's birth into reality? This site also dispells a lot of the rubbish you hear concerning unpasturized dairy products.
• Local Harvest an offsite directory that is similar to what we desire, a Slow-cator (ha, I just made that up) that uses metadata to create some sort of mashup with what we want to promote (restaurants, farms, stores, etc)
• Southern Exposure Seed Exchange Something for the home gardeners out there. I'd like to see some "backyard gardener" component become an intergral part of the Charlotte Convivia. A lot of the neighborhood groups typically have plant swaps, etc. but you don't really see this for the gardens. I remember stories from my childhood when my grandfather and my neighbors used to trade from their backyard gardens all the time - tomato seeds, onions, garlic, grafting vine stock for grapes & currants.
  
• It looks like I'm going to go kill some chickens with Michael Sison next Monday. Anybody care to join?

As always, chime in with your thoughts. There is a comments section for every post you know ;^)

We also should be thinking about a place and time for our next meetup. I'll volunteer our brand spanking new front porch (well, new to Josie and me) if no one comes up with a place.

Viva la cuisine lente!
Noll

Website template news

Here's an excerpt of an email exchange that Andy and I had regarding the site and its components. It is what we have been discussing all along, so there shouldn't be any big surprises. Questions? Comments?

For the future design, it might be best to keep it as simple as possible with some real minor template modifications (like getting a logo or maybe header graphic in there) but to not mess with the underlying CSS and whatnot. Then once the group has local momentum you can have someone lead up a conversion, take it to one of many inexpensive (relative) skin shops and have Josie or whoever, work together with a site skinner and build us something custom. Right now thought there aren't enough cycles in the day I think to hammer on all fronts w/o making this a paid job.

Roles/ACL's.. Right now we have these type of roles:
(I created the taxonomy so if we need something different we can do it if the system can allow for it)

Anonymous
Authenticated User
Member
Contributing Member
Event Coordinator
Editorial
Web Developer

Roles are additive in rights.

• Anonymous: pretty much can't do anything. In the future we can restrict anon to a page describing the group and gets them to register.
• Authenticated User: Just that, they have an account this granting them basic read rights for forums and such.
• Member: Member's can create forum posts, do some basic contacting, sign up for events. Generally can't cause harm but can participate.
• Contributing Member: A member that is able to write their own blog entries and stories. Blog entries are not editorialized and get posted to the system (not front page) immediately, while stories are front page material and require editorial approval.
• Event Coordinator: Can create and edit Events and in the future other Event Types. They also have signup admin authority.
• Editorial: Can approve contributions and write and approve their own. Editorial is a clearing house of approval, anything needing moderation this group can do.
• Web Developer: Basically an administrator of the system. Can do anything.

Alright.. enough babbling.. right now I've figured out enough to make forums and basic events work. I thought I had a review module but I don't like it.. we can make static pages and a number of dynamic boxes based off site content.. I'll quantify this more and bring a bunch of print outs to go over.

Some interesting things I found...

Did you know that May is "eat local" month? And why the hell I am posting this on May 31st? Because it matters every day silly, not just the month of May!

Disturbing facts & trends are happening alongside of the good things we're trying so hard to re-establish: like finding out the average packaged food product has journeyed 1500 miles to reach your table. How Wal-mart plans to carry organic food; this will no doubt simultaneously amaze & frustrate me - like the Jerry Springer Show...

Hop over to these local-centric sites and do some perusing:
The Locavores
The eat local challenge

This brings up the question for our website: should we have a weekly editorial as a sidebar or something similar? Like those current events reports we had to do in middle school. We could pass the torch aroud every week...

Viva la cuisine lente!
Noll

Welcome SuperFoodies

Andy Ciordia, Lell Trogden and I got together today for a cupping-turned-lunch at Mac's and we got to forge ahead with some of the ideas born out of the Wednesday get together.

Highlights are:

• Andy got a breakdown of the website parameters and will come up with sustainable framework for the website within 1 week (tick, tick).



• We discussed what, how and if there should be any stewardship aspect to what we are germinating. It was [generally] accepted as a great idea that we will have the opportunity/wherewithal to enable, empower and nurture our cause beyond any individual's financial means. We were aware that this topic will require serious exploration to acheive in an effective yet fair and impartial way.



• I offered up a concept/thought/category of an "IN" and "OUT," delineating potential differences between what we [all] do IN-side, e.g. in our kitchens, entertaining in our homes, procuring goods for our larders, etc; and OUT-side, e.g. socials, meetups, field trips, classes, etc. It seems to me that some contributors/organizers will have a propensity for one or the other. Or that it might be the first step for members with a want or need. Just a high-level concept to think about...

Viva la cuisine lente!
Noll

Initial meeting at Salute!

Our first meetup was at Salute! on Providence Road. The introductions were plesant, the banter was witty; and the food was top notch.

With the task at hand being to flesh out the website requirements, we did not hesitate and got right to it:

Website roles

---

1. Josie will take on graphics/architecture


2. Andy will take on framework/architecture/hosting


3. Beth will take on editorial/copywriting


4. All will contribute content as if we were cramming for finals

Website content

---

1. Timeline & history
   Information about events in the past,present & future
   REF:3


2. Information/membership/contact/"about us" page


3. Calendar of events
   What's in the works
   REF:1,7


4. Offsite links
   Slow Food main site,


5. Authoring
   To moderate reviews, articles, comments, etc.


6. Farms/Markets
   We discussed engaging the local farming community, providing reviews/info/ratings thereof. Similar to what NC farm fresh is, but according to our adgenda


7. Evite-like invitation engine
   To save our sanity!
   This will most likely be our only interaction with money on the site. It will probably be a Paypal link.
   REF:4


8. Local gatherings & get togethers (Convigations?)
   formats, gathering tips, ideas, etc
   REF:9,10


9. Flash Mobs
   Restaurant swarming, I love it!
   REF:8,10


10. Mashups
    Our interactive map of places that are Slow Food approved/recognized
    REF:8,9

Miscellaneous

---

1. Discussed setting up this blog as a temporary communication tool


2. An org chart will need to be created


3. Setup Blog & invite people

Viva la cuisine lente!
Noll

Noll:Gastroneer

The foodie engineer. Cold, like the garde manger. Calculating, likes conversion tables.



SuperFoodiePowers:

Right hand pours super colloidial microfoam and performs Stockfleth maneuver

Left hand extracts sub-atomic ristrettos that can wake the dead

Nose projects olfactory tractor beam, scents are powerless once in its grasp

Meditates on Japanese waterstones to stay sharp