Stories

In fall 2012, a food security meeting in the small Town of Wendell helped generate an idea to renovate the Wendell Town Hall kitchen, sitting idle and unusable next to Wendell’s Good Neighbors food pantry. Finished in summer 2015, the Wendell Community Kitchen models best practices for establishing a shared-used commercial kitchen. The fully-accessible facility […]

Six million oysters might sound like a lot, but this amount which is currently being landed in Wellfleet is 90% less than what Wellfleet once landed. This decrease is linked to overfishing and habitat degradation. In an effort to increase oyster populations and related benefits, Wellfleet’s Comprehensive Wastewater Committee Shellfish Department and Department of Public […]

Bug Hill Farm in Ashfield grows uncommon small fruit, hosts educational workshops and farm to table luncheons, and actively manages fields and woodlands to enhance wildlife habitat including native pollinators. When Kate Kerivan wanted to expand the certified-organic operation in 2010, she turned to the Carrot Project – a nonprofit organization that facilitates access to […]

Jane Janovsky makes and markets artisanal jams, made primarily from fruit she harvests from local farms in the Pioneer Valley. She’s certified by the state as a safe food handler, pays her town a fee each year in order to be permitted to cook her jams in her commercially certified home kitchen, and then has […]

Ed Caron runs Caron Farm, producing maple syrup and operating a small sawmill, in the Town of Leyden. He’s been making syrup for “forever” – just about all of his 75 years. “I’ve been doing this since I was a boy and my folks did it before.” In 2014, Ed worked with MDAR’s Farm Energy […]

A promising approach to reducing non-point water pollution is being piloted for lands along the Palmer and Narragansett Rivers in southeastern Massachusetts and Rhode Island. This collaborative approach includes USDA-NRCS, the local conservation district, MDAR, and Mass DEP. The approach is designed to provide focused planning and support for farmers to implement best management practices […]

Tropical Foods is more than a supermarket – it’s a community institution. An independent grocery store that has been family run for more than 50 years, Tropical Foods is a bedrock in the transitioning community of Dudley Square – employing 100 local people, some for over 14 years, with continued training and growth opportunities. Tropical […]

FoodWorks is a culinary training program that offers unemployed and underemployed individuals job training in the culinary field. Designed to work with people with barriers to employment, the mission of the program is to empower, educate, train, and provide nutritious meals to people in need through the free lunch program at Kate’s Kitchen, a program […]

An exciting idea related to re-introducing home economics as a way for children to learn more about food has been implemented by Hawlemont Elementary School in Charlemont, in the form of a farm- and food-focused curriculum. Strengthening students’ connection to food and their knowledge of food preparation is all part of the school’s plan. It’s […]

Entering the kitchen, your senses might first be filled with the spiced aroma of Fresh Food Generation’s jerk chicken sauce. But at CommonWealth Kitchen (CWK) it’s not just about the food – it’s also about the people. As foods are chopped, cooked, baked, and canned, CWK is hatching and growing culinary businesses and jobs, working […]