Chez Panisse at 40

They were out in force last weekend, the gourmet gurus from around the world as Alice Waters and Chez Panisse, the little restaurant where the organic food revolution began four decades ago, celebrated a well-deserved 40 year anniversary. Waters once called her creation a “simple little place where we could cook and talk politics.”

I have never eaten at the restaurant but Alice Waters is an inspiration to me. When I turned vegetarian in 1978 the only option on my diet was soy protein pieces that looked and smelt terrible. My mother and I bravely experimented with various sauces, but nothing covered that taste. I only stayed veggie because I wanted to date this political 13-year-old who had told me she would never date a guy who murdered and abused animals (or allowed others to). My desire to eat healthy outlasted my teenage crush.

Alice Waters - last weekend

The Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery will hang a photographic portrait of Waters. It is telling that Ms. Waters chose a photo not of the restaurant, but of the Edible Schoolyards in which students create and tend an organic garden as part of their school curriculum, that became her second passion.

My eldest son attends Martin Luther King Jr., Middle School in Berkeley, the scene of Water’s first Edible Schoolyard. I am extremely grateful to her for this initiative and her desire to share her vision with our youth while they are still at an impressionable age.

The weekend’s events  saw intimate dinners cooked in homes around the Bay Area by different chefs — Waters didn’t want a big gala event where she wouldn’t have an opportunity to talk with her guests  — doubled as fund-raisers for the Edible Schoolyard Project.

Thank you Ms. Waters for having a vision that will impact people from all walks of life and all socioeconomic levels.  Berkeley salutes you.

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Alon Shalev is the author of The Accidental Activist (now available on Kindle) and A Gardener’s Tale. He is the Executive Director of the San Francisco Hillel Foundation, a non-profit that provides spiritual and social justice opportunities to Jewish students in the Bay Area. More on Alon Shalev at http://www.alonshalev.com/and on Twitter (#alonshalevsf).

Black And White

Today is Martin Luther King Jr Day, the birthday of a man who had a vision of a society where race and color would add to an exciting web of egalitarian diversity. We have achieved much since he took up the struggle, but we still have a long way to go.

When the waters rose above the dysfunctional levees of New Orleans, when the storm hit, nature did not differentiate between black and white, Christian and Jew. But the reality is that the areas which have a high percentage of African-Americans, were the worst hit.

When the survivors share their stories, race is almost always in the background and often in the forefront. Many of the travesties recounted by black people who got caught in the storm, when not relating to the wrath of Mother Nature, focus on how they were treated by what they perceive as the white authorities.

I am working in the Lower Ninth Ward. I have been here every year but once, when our group was sent to nearby St. Bernard’s Parish. The Lower Ninth Ward saw the worst destruction and may never recover despite the best intentions.

The Lower Ninth Ward, though mired in poverty, boasts 95% home ownership and has the highest density of African-American home ownership in the country. Those of us who return year after year to volunteer should come regardless of the victim’s skin color. But I would be lying if, as a white Jew, I did not admit to being aware of the race element, and how it strengthens my desire to return and help rebuild these communities.

Martin Luther King Jr had a dream. We all need to help build that vision. There is a Jewish saying: It is not for us to finish the task, but neither are we free to desist from it.

Here is my offering for Martin Luther King Jr’s Day. Thank you to Janis Ian for a timeless song.

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Alon Shalev is the author of The Accidental Activist (now available on Kindle) and A Gardener’s Tale. He is the Executive Director of the San Francisco Hillel Foundation, a non-profit that provides spiritual and social justice opportunities to Jewish students in the Bay Area. More on Alon Shalev at www.alonshalev.com/