Foreword

I have visited the Occidental Arts and Ecology Center

many times over the years since its founding, but
every time I sit down to share a meal there, I am
astonished anew by the beauty of their salads. Each
one is dazzling: filled with an incredible variety
of fresh organic greens plucked from the earth
moments before, starred with edible flowers like borage, chervil, or forget-me-nots, and simply dressed
so that the textures and flavors of the ingredients are
allowed to shine. No two salads are alike, but each
of them is a work of art, capturing the essence of
the particular season and place, and celebrating the
bounty of the garden and the aliveness of the food.
I have always been a believer in feeding people
ideas; when you engage all your senses, as you do
when you grow, harvest, and prepare your own
food, you absorb the lessons of the land effortlessly.
It is a testament to the remarkable biodiversity
of the Occidental Arts and Ecology Center that
something as ostensibly simple as a green salad can
be such a revelation. But a revelation it is: Whether
it is someones first encounter with purslane or
Andean oca leaves, mache rosettes or mizuna, there
is always something new and surprising and delicious for the eater to discover. The OAEC has been
at the forefront of seed saving, heritage food crop

preservation, and stewardship since long before

those terms developed the sort of cachet they have
todayand you can see the ethos of the place in
every dish in this book.
These dishes represent the sort of hearty,
nourishing, unpretentious fare that brings family
and friends together at the table; I love that the
recipes are scaled so that you can feed 4 peopleor
30, should you so choose! But more than just
being a collection of delicious recipes, these pages
capture a way of life for a whole community,
whose values of ecological research, sustainable
farming, and environmental advocacy are so vitally
important. Happily, the OAEC has made a powerful
commitment to education, and through their many
workshops, plant sales, and outreach programs,
countless people have been taught about gardening
and living in a way that is connected to the land.
This book is a beautiful extension of that education,
empowering the reader to draw inspiration from
the garden and cook with intention, and showing
how the love, warmth, and generosity of the land
inform the generosity of the community.
Al ic e Wat er s
2015