Lisa Green reports from Sheffield. Barbara Zheutlin, executive director of Berkshire Grown, leads me to the menu posted at the entrance of the brunch on Sunday, Aug. 27, catered by The Old Inn on the Green and The Southfield Store. “Read, and prioritize,” she advises. “Peter Platt has outdone himself.” And indeed he has, providing a home-grown feast under the shade trees at the home of Hester Velmans and Peter Cherneff, with food and drink supplied by local farmers and beverage makers. It all just underscored the purpose of the event: Berkshire Grown’s championing of the local food economy in the Berkshires, and whetted the guests’ appetites for the after-brunch conversation, “Food, Farming and our Future.” Although one of the speakers, columnist and Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman was unable to make the event due to a family emergency, Dan Barber held the audience’s attention with his views on where the farm-to-table movement is heading. “We’re just beginning,” said the author, chef and co-owner of Blue Hill New York and Blue Hill at Stone Barns. “For farm-to-table 2.0 we need to look beyond what is passive or easy, and develop hyper-regional cuisines.” While his talk left guests wanting more, each was rewarded on the way out with a copy of Letters to a Young Farmer: On Food, Farming and Our Future, compiled by the Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture. [Above: The two men of the hour(s): Chef Peter Platt and Dan Barber.]
Ellen House, who is assistant to cosmetics company owner Jane Iredale, and Geoffrey House; Doug McTavish and Linda Saul-Sena.
Steve Sagarin of the Berkshire Waldorf High School,Janis Martinson, advancement director at The Mahaiwe, Chris Weld, owner of Berkshire Mountain Distillers, Berkshire Grown's Barbara Zheutlin, and Tyler Weld.
The farmers and other vendors who contributed to the brunch; Anna Oliver, Stephan Klein, Bonnie Rosenberg and Susan Bubenas.
Blue Q graphic designer Silka Glanzman,Susan Engel, a professor at Williams College, and Emily Bronson of the Berkshire Taconic Community Foundation.
Jewelry designer Dai Ban, Robin Ban, Jessica Velmans and artist Jorge Silveira.
Restaurateur Mark Firth, owner of Prairie Whale, joins the sausage-grilling team Hope Millham, Jake Levin of Jacuterie,Brian Heck, and Sean Stanton of Blue Hill Farm.
Guests head to the barn to hear Dan Barber's talk.
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Matteline deVries-Dilling, founder of Lite Brite Neon, one of the evening's honoree of this year's Upstate Benefit adresses the gala from the Caboose's caboose.
- Karen Pearson. Courtesy Art Omi.
Olana senior vice president and landscape curatorMark Prezorski, president Sean Sawyer, The evenings honoree Kristin Gamble and New York State Assemblymember Didi Barrett.
- Oxygen House Photo
