Berkeley, California and The Edible Schoolyard

It was a pleasant March day, and I was glad to have the chance to amble about a place I enjoyed but had little chance to visit in the past few years. For those readers who don’t know the area, it is a transitional to upscale neighborhood. It is characterized by pretty little bungalows (the purely upscale neighborhoods of Berkeley having more imposing homes), many with semi-arid wild gardens, and stylish but homey restaurants and food shops. The area includes the gourmet ghetto and Chez Panisse, considered the birthplace of California cuisine. While my walk that day did not take me to Chez Panisse, it did bring me to an important relation of that world-famous restaurant, Martin Luther King, Jr. Middle School.

Alice Waters, the proprietor of Chez Panisse, is a high-profile proponent of the local food and slow food (as opposed to fast food) movements. And while her approach to food and lifestyle is often thought to result largely in wonderful gourmet foods for the rich (it does that, hence Chez Panisse), its aims are larger than that.The teachers and administrators of King Middle School, along with Ms. Waters, established the Edible Schoolyard on the grounds of that school in 1994. The website of the Edible Schoolyard states:

The mission of the Edible Schoolyard at Martin Luther King, Jr. Middle School is to create and sustain an organic garden and landscape that is wholly integrated into the school's curriculum and lunch program. It involves the students in all aspects of farming the garden – along with preparing, serving and eating the food – as a means of awakening their senses and encouraging awareness and appreciation of the transformative values of nourishment, community, and stewardship of the land.

The organic garden at the heart of the Edible Schoolyard is on a sideplot adjacent to the main campus of the school. Fortunately for people like me, the caretakers of the Edible Schoolyard (many of who are students) don’t mind well-mannered strangers walking about the garden, as long as they stay out of the main campus. As it was early spring, most of the garden was being prepared for vegetable plantings, though rows of fragrant herbs and young citrus trees could be seen and smelled. A stone hearth provided an earthy weight to the place. Near the back of the garden was something new since my last visit—chickens milling about their coop, feeding on kitchen waste.

The Edible Schoolyard provides young people with an alternative to the efficiency, uniformity and globalism valorized by industrial agriculture.