ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Bryant Terry is an eco chef, food justice activist, and author. For the past eight years he has worked to build a more just and sustainable food system and has used cook-sustainable food system and has used cooking as a tool to illuminate the intersections between poverty, structural racism, and food insecurity. His interest in cooking, farming, and community health can be traced back to his childhood in Memphis, Tennessee, where his grandparents inspired him to grow, prepare, and appreciate good food.
Bryant is currently a fellow of the Food and Society Policy Fellows Program, a national project of the W. K. Kellogg Foundation and the Fair Food Foundation. He has garnered many honors and awards for his work including receiving the inaugural Natural Gourmet Institute Award for Excellence in Health-Supportive Food Education and being selected as one of the 2008 Hot 20 under 40 in the San Francisco Bay Area by 7x7 magazine. Bryants first book (coauthored with Anna Lapp), Grub: Ideas for an Urban Organic Kitchen, won a 2007 Nautilus Award for Social Change.
Bryant contributes essays and recipes to a number of online and print outlets, and his work has been featured in Gourmet, Food and Wine, the New York Times Magazine, the San Francisco Chronicle, Vibe, Domino, and many other publications. Bryant has a regular columnEco-Soul Kitchenon theroot.com. He has made dozens of national radio and television appearances (Fox, NBC, PBS, BET, and Sundance), including making a guest appearance on the eco-reality series Marios Green House and being a host on The Endless Feast, a thirteen-episode series that explores the connection between the earth and the food on our plates.
In 2001, Bryant founded b-healthy! (Build Healthy Eating and Lifestyles to Help Youth), a four-year initiative designed to empower youth to be active in creating a more just and sustainable food system. Along with Ludie Minaya, Elizabeth Johnson, and Latham Thomas, Bryant helped illuminate the importance of cooking as a tool for organizing and base building for the food justice movement.
Bryant completed the Chefs Training Program at the Natural Gourmet Institute for Health and Culinary Arts in New York City. He holds an M.A. in American History from New York University and a B.A. with honors in English from Xavier University of Louisiana.
He lives and creates in Oakland with his brilliant, beautiful, and bout it-bout it fiance, Jidan Koon, and their bird, Kiwi.
www.bryant-terry.com
BIG UPS
To the one, my angels, and my ancestors (upon your shoulders I stand) for your guidance.
To my parents, Beatrice and Booker Terry, and my sister Jamelah Terry, M.D. (proud of you Jay Jay), for your unwavering belief in and support of me. Always. Youre my foundation.
To all my extended family membersthe Bryants and the Terrys. Major props to Uncle Don for writing the prayer-song to open this book.
To my brilliant, beautiful, and bout itbout it fiance, Jidan Koon, for showing me that the revolution is LOVE. We are doing it bigand for forever!!!!!
To Marilyn Wong and Wang-Sang Koon for all of your love and support.
To Danfeng, Jando, and Chencho for leading by example.
To all the extended Wong family for your support.
To the late Edna Lewis, Peter Berley, Annemarie Colbin, Jessica B. Harris, Jamie Oliver, Melvin Van Peebles, and Alice Waters for in spiration.
To all my teachers and mentors for your wisdom and guidance.
To my literary agent Danielle Svetcov for believing in me and this project from day one, providing expert editing, and giving sagacious advice on many fronts.
To Jim Levine, Arielle Eckstut, Monika Verma, and the whole Levine-Greenberg team for your hard work and support.
To my editor Rene Sedliar for seeing and supporting my vision from our first hour-long conversation in the summer of 2007 til now and for constantly pointing me in the right direction. I look forward to makin BIG THANGS happen.
To John Radziewicz, Matthew Lore, and the whole team at Da Capo/Perseus for your support and for publishing bomb-ass books.
To Myra Kornfeld for offering to support this project based upon a paragraph description.
To Yanna Flemming for creating my fly Web sites, helping me manage my brand identity, and being a down friend.
To the amazingly brilliant Sara Remington for always being up for going on an adventure and making beautiful art. Were takin over, sun.
To Keba Konte for taking a beautiful photograph of the youth.
To the youths: Assata, Fela, Indigo, Mkai, and Mbire for being down for the cause (and thanks to their parents).
To Rebecca Stevens and Lori Camille for kitchen assistance.
To my kick-butt assistant Shayna Mar-mar for all your hard work (thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you so much).
To my accountant Joe Cornwall for going above and beyond duty.
To my colleagues at the Food and Society Policy Fellows Program for your inspiration and support.
To the Fair Food Foundation and Oran Hesterman for financial support.
To AEPOCH and Laura Loescher for financial support and friendship.
To Peter Barnes and The Common Counsel Foundation for providing a beautiful space for writers to retreat.
To Youth for Environmental Sanity (YES!) and the Robbins family for all the support you have shown me over the years.
To Bioneers and Arty Mangan for your support.
To the staff and faculty at the Natural Gourmet Institute for Health and the Culinary Arts for your support.
To Lynette Clemetson, Terry Samuel, and the rest of the team at theroot.com for giving me a platform.
To Bruce Cole and Bonnie Powell at Edible San Francisco for your support (thanks for the cover!).
To Added Value, Peoples Grocery, Farm Fresh Choice, Oakland Food Connection, the Food Project, Growing Power, Community Services Unlimited, RIC, and all the food justice organizations holdin it down across the nation.
To Anna Lapp for always dreaming big with me.
To Mike Molina for always pushing me to be great.
To Michelle Rhone-Collins, Joseph Collins, Marla Teyolia, and Will Power for supporting me from the beginning.
To my sisters Ludie Minaya, Elizabeth Johnson, and Latham Thomas for being on my team.
To Ferentz Lafargue for always being down for reading my essays and offering suggestions for improvements.
To my fellow Mesa Refuge writers, Linda Faillace and Josh Kun for your feedback, great advice, and company.
To Curt Kurzenhauser for providing me with a ridiculously beautiful home in San Francisco to rest, write, and test recipes for seven months.
To Savannah Shange and Greg Cluster for opening up the house to me in the summer of 2007 and beyond.
To all my folks in Memphis, New Orleans, New York, the Bay Area, Los Angeles, Santa Fe, Atlanta, Baltimore, and everywhere in between for your support.
BOOKS I LIKE
Allen, Patricia. Together at the Table: Sustainability and Sustenance in the American Agrifood System. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2004.
Berley, Peter. Fresh Food Fast. New York: Regan Books, 2004.
. The Modern Vegetarian Kitchen. New York: Regan Books, 2004.
Colbin, Annemarie. Food and Healing. New York: Ballantine Books, 1986.
Edge, John T. The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture, Vol. 7: Foodways. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2007.
Harris, Jessica B. The Welcome Table: African-American Heritage Cooking