Thanks to Rabbi Eliav Bock, Director of Ramah Outdoor Adventure (Ramah Outdoors) for sharing these thoughts related to Passover, his community in Colorado and the work of the Jewish Food Movement. Read on for his Ten Plagues Facing Our Modern Way of Eating and Relating to Food and the complimentary Dayenu that you can adapt for your own seders…
It is the month of Nissan and spring is in the air. If I was living on a farm here in Colorado, I would be plowing the fields, spreading manure, and getting ready to plant our first spring vegetables. Sadly I do not live in such close proximity with the land. Instead, I live in a house in Metro Denver and would not be able to fit a tractor through the door that leads to my back yard.
No, this time of year is a time when many of us living urban lives do not even stop and appreciate the effort that farmers throughout the country and throughout the northern hemisphere are making to ensure that we in America have delicious food to eat. (In a future post, I will write about the farmer with whom we are contracting to bring fresh local food to camp. She did spend last week preparing her fields. But more on that in a week or two. . . .)
Global Hunger Shabbat is just around the corner! Join AJWS this Shabbat, March 19-20, for a nationwide day of solidarity, education, reflection and activism to raise awareness about global hunger.
Over 100 synagogues, 31 universities and scores of individuals, Moishe Houses and independent minyanim across the country and in Canada, New Zealand, India, Cape Verde, Uganda, Kenya, Cambodia and Thailand have already signed up to host Global Hunger Shabbat events in their communities.
It’s easy to plan a Global Hunger Shabbat event of your own or find an event at a location near you. Please visit www.ajws.org/hungershabbat for more information and to download activities, resources and suggestions for taking action.
Many people are using Passover as a chance to think about hunger and food security.
Just this week activists gathered in Jerusalem to protest the government’s failure to provide thousands of children who live below the poverty line with hot school lunches or ensuring ‘food security’ for all its citizens. Click here to read the whole story.
In Los Angeles, many of Hazon’s friends are involved with a Hunger Seder on March 24th. The community seder will take place at Valley Beth Shalom in Encino.
Thanks to Bobbi Rubinstein for sharing this update about the garden at Valley Beth Shalom in Encino, CA. Bobbi is a publicist, journalist and green activist. She’s chair of the Valley Beth Shalom Green Team and co-founder of Netiya: The Los Angeles Jewish Coalition on Food and Environmental Justice Issues.
I am excited to share some news with the Hazon kehillah. My shul, Valley Beth Shalom, has broken ground on an urban garden called the Gan Tzedek Initiative. We’re growing food to donate to local food pantries and creating educational opportunities around Torah and environmental study. And perhaps most importantly, we’re building community across all age levels since this is a team effort among all the schools, teachers, parents, administrative staff and clergy.
These days, it seems everyone is talking about “going green.” Never has such a simple sounding term had so much meaning. For nonprofit overnight Jewish camps, their staff and lay leaders, this means changing old habits, teaching campers about how and why to make changes, and ensuring a vibrant future for their camps.
Many camps have begun to implement green practices, taking action to decrease their carbon footprint, and impart a positive environmental message to their campers. Steps have included forgoing paper, plastic, and Styrofoam in favor of using reusable tableware and reducing non-biodegradable waste, using solar power for heating, providing campers and staff with environmentally friendly water bottles, changing light bulbs to reduce carbon emissions, and more! Several camps have also planted gardens and are teaching their campers about healthy cooking and organics.
Huge mazal tov to Rabbi Eliav Bock, author of this guest post and Director of Ramah Outdoor Adventure, on the birth of his son last week!
Today is the first of periodic blog posts about food at Ramah Outdoor Adventure. Because the food we eat at camp will play such an integral part in supporting the overall mission of the camp, I thought it appropriate to focus some of the blog posts leading up to camp on the use of food.
For those who missed the announcement the other day, The First Lady, Michelle Obama, launched the “Let’s Move” campaign. She has correctly singled out childhood obesity as a major epidemic facing America. Her campaign aims to get kids off the couch, away from video games, and eating more wholesome food. For anyone who has been aware of the growing food movement in America these past few years, nothing that she said yesterday is too surprising. It is an indisputable fact that as a society, our children today are less healthy than they were a generation ago. Anywhere from 25%-30% of American children are overweight. As Mrs. Obama pointed out, today’s children are the first generation whose life expectancy is shorter than that of their parents.
Check out this amazing article about our first ever Jewish Food Education Network pre-conference track from Hazon’s supporters at The Covenant Foundation.
This year The Covenant Foundation made it possible for all members of our Jewish Food Education Network, JFEN, to attend the entire Food Conference, including a special pre-conference track designed specifically for those involved and interested in the field of Jewish Food Education.
“I feel really positive about the energy and engagement here,” said [star educator Vicky] Kelman, who presented a session on the centrality of family mealtime in Jewish culture and consciousness. “There is tremendous commitment and passion around JFEN and Jewish food education.
KOL Foods, LLC puts kosher meat and ethics on the same plate so consumers can feel good about the meat they eat. KOL Foods sources and sells grass-fed, non-industrial, healthy lamb and beef and pastured poultry directly to individuals. Since its foundation in 2007, the interest in KOL Foods’ products has grown rapidly, and, consequently, they are now available in the East Coast and the Midwest primarily through our website. As demand is increasing KOL Foods is seeking to expand in the Eastern United States and, in the near future, nationwide.
KOL Foods is unique as it operates differently from industrial kosher meat businesses. As a values-based business, our mission is to produce food that is in harmony with nature, neighbors and tradition – all the way from farm to fork. For further information on KOL Foods, please go to: www.kolfoods.com .
The Climate Change Bus Tour, a joint project of The Teva Learning Center and Hazon, is now in its final leg of the their cross-country tour!
It has been an incredible journey so far. Hundreds of Jewish students, teachers, and families have engaged with environmental education programs and activities. Many have also signed the Jewish Climate Change pledge committing themselves to sustainable action and advocacy.
Check out the latest video of the bus tour’s Chanukah out west and the latest press in The Jewish Exponent.
Thanks so much to Aryeh Pelcovitz of Uri L’Tzedek for this great guest post.
In July of 2009, Uri L’Tzedek began a small project in New York to change the way the (Orthodox / Jewish) community approached its food. Modeled after Israel’s Tav Chevrati, the Tav Hayosher, ethical seal, would certify that a kosher eating establishment was meeting legal and ethical standards in the way it treats its employees. Uri L’Tzedek granted the Tav to kosher restaurants and supermarkets after confirming that their employees were paid at least minimum wage, overtime, were granted appropriate breaks, and work in a healthy and safe environment.
FROM THE BAY TO THE GULF – Do you live in the California Bay area, are in your 20’s or 30’s and interested in important food issues? Take your social justice passion down to New Orleans. Join Jewish Funds for Justice (JFSJ) and the Progressive Jewish Alliance (PJA) for a week of service, learning, and activism.
You will travel to New Orleans from Jan. 13-18, 2010 to work with The School at Blair Grocery. Participants will learn about issues around food and sustainability and explore the connection between local Bay Area concerns and local New Orleans concerns.
Did you know that twenty-five thousand people die of malnutrition each day? It’s true and it’s unconscionable. Our world’s so-called “food crisis” is not, in fact, the result of food shortage. Rather, it stems from a deep flaw in our global economy that prevents food from reaching everyone — what we call a food insecurity crisis. How can we fix this?
American Jewish World Service (AJWS) recently launched Fighting Hunger from the Ground Up, a campaignto mobilize the Jewish community to help end global hunger.
The other night we had a most unusual guest in our sukkah — a three-inch-long praying mantis. We didn’t know they even thrived in our eastern part of the United States. It landed on the cornucopia my husband had placed on the table and it was moving its mouth like it was praying (or most likely, chewing its prey). It was very appropriate for our Chinese sukkah, as the praying mantis is prominent in Chinese folklore and martial arts. For us, the praying mantis and the Biblical Yitzhak were among the ushpizin (guests) for the second night of Sukkot.
Before the onset of Sukkot, I’d attended the Pennsylvania HIAS’s annual luncheon billed, “A Matter of Faith: Embracing Immigrants and Refugees.” HIAS was established over 126 years ago as the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society and it has an illustrious history of assisting Jewish refugees from all over the world. In recent years, HIAS has merged with the Council Migration Services and their clients are now refugees fleeing political or religious persecution from places such as Myanmar (formerly known as Burma) and Eritrea.
Hazon’s friends and partners in Food Justice, Uri L’Tzedek, have been busy. They’ve just launched a new website Utzedek.org. You can find Torah sources and articles, activist resources, hundreds of volunteer and campaign opportunities, social justice events, opportunities to contribute, and much more!
Among Uri L’Tzedek’s important work is the Tav HaYosher (ethical seal) – a local, grassroots initiative to bring workers, restaurant owners and community members together to create just workplaces in kosher restaurants.
Check out this 
