Timothy's Blog

Welcome to my blog.

My intention is to present helpful information around a variety of topics from Green Living, Cooking, Organic Food, Sustainable Agriculture, along with the policy and politics that these categories tend to swim. You'll even find a few postings that touch upon some of life's philosophical quesitons. Feel free to suggest topics or add comments (I take offense to nothing). As always I'm open to ideas. Enjoy.

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Video Recipe: Pumpkin Pancakes with Apple Preserves and Maple Syrup

29 January 2009

I recently appeared on Chefs of Northern Michigan on 9&10 News and Michigan This Morning on Fox 33 to give my recipe for Pumpkin Pancakes with Apple Preserves and Maple Syrup. If you missed it (or just want to see it again to make sure you got all of the ingredients right), you can view it now in our Recipes section. There's a list of ingredients and instructions that you can save in your recipe box.

Timothy will be a judge at the World Mustard Competition

29 January 2009

I'll be a judge at the World Mustard Competition in Mt. Horeb, Wisconsin on January 31st. The winners in 19 categories, from Sweet Hot to Classic Dijon, will receive awards at The Awards at Black Stallion Winery in Napa on March 13. The Competition garnered more than 300 entries from seven countries in 2008.

Timothy on WJR Detroit's Come to the Table

6 January 2009

Timothy Young talks about organics, Fair Trade and the philosophical foundation of Food For Thought as a guest on Come to the Table hosted by Stephen Stewart on WJR in Detroit.

Small Gestures That Make a Big Difference

4 January 2009

As we move through life, many of us touch other people in little ways that, unknown to us, have a truly profound impact on their lives. It can go both ways in terms of positive or negative impact, but the point is they are little gestures that are often insignificant and soon forgotten by the provider, but can be turning points in the lives of the recipient. I've often tried to find ways to get this message through to my children. Well, thanks to FaceBook, a person I don't even remember from my teen years contacted me to say she's been wanting to thank me for a small gesture I offered her when she was a vulnerable 14-year-old feeling some peer pressure from some of my friends. It certainly infused me with some feel-good energy, but also caused me to think about how many times I may have not done the right thing and had an equally profound impact on someone. Her contact inspired me to both seek out others and thank them for their small gestures or apologize to any I may have hurt. In the course of a few hours I had exchanges with old friends and acquaintances that inspired me and my kids. I hope you find this exchange inspiring and motivating as well. Here's how it went.

(Full disclosure: I've edited very little for brevity only and changed the names to protect the innocent as well as the guilty).

Small Gestures That Make a Big Difference

To Timothy, From Tina:

You may not remember me, but I used to hang around the pool with your friends Gary and Kyle. I'm really glad to find you on FaceBook because I have wanted to thank you for something for years. It was something small that, again, you probably don't remember, so this may sound weird, but...when I was fourteen, as I said, I used to hang out at the pool almost every day and was friends with the Gary and Kyle. They (you guys) were older, and I was pretty innocent. They were always trying to get me to do things I shouldn't. One day, they were all trying to convince me to go to some secret place and smoke pot with them. It would have been one 14-year-old girl getting high with a bunch of high school boys. Even then I was smart enough to know it wasn't a good idea, but I didn't have the confidence to say so. I hemmed and hawed, but didn't say no. Then I got up and left the club.

As I was walking out, you came out by yourself and stopped me. I don't remember ever talking to you before. All you said to me was (yes, I do still remember the exact words), "You don't have to do anything you don't want to do. I just wanted you to know that."

I was surprised (to tell the truth, you were a few years older and I thought you were cute and way too cool for me!). I never forgot it.

Not only did that one gesture by you save me from doing something I'm sure I would have regretted then, but also many times in the future. You affirmed my self worth when I was vulnerable.

I teach high school now, so I'm around teenagers a lot. I knew then that what you did was unusual, but now I know HOW unusual! You must have been only 16 or 17, and I have no idea what gave a teenage boy not only the compassion to see I was torn, but also the fortitude to act. I have a 14-year-old daughter now, and I pray that if she were ever in a situation like that, there may be someone like you there to give her that assurance, too.

I'm sorry this is so long, but I have thought of you many times over the years. I'm really I glad I got a chance to say thank you. You were little more than a stranger, but I can honestly say you changed my life.

So, thank you and may God bless you and your family!

- Tina

My Reply:

Wow! That's a heartwarming story. I honestly don't remember that, but it sure is nice to know that a gesture so small that one can't remember it can be so important to another person's life. I always try to teach my children that little things can make big differences in the lives of others and now you've given me a perfect story to share with them. The other half of the story I want to instill in my kids is that a negative gesture can be equally destructive to another person's life. Just as compassion can be powerful, so can selfishness. It makes me wonder for all the times I may have done the right thing, how many times was I the kid applying the peer pressure?

So while I can't honestly say I knew you well, I do feel I know you now.

- Timothy

That inspired me to contact someone I had only been reconnected with a few days earlier on FaceBook.

From Timothy to Denny:

I hope this doesn't come off too corny, but what the hell. All in the past few hours I've had some incredible exchanges with some people from my past that has my head spinning. I don't know if you remember Tina? I do not remember her. However, she shared a story with me that I'd like to share with you. Basically she told me of an instance when we were teens when I apparently did the right thing and spared her some shame in a situation where she was feeling a great deal of peer pressure. She called it life changing. Who wouldn't love to hear such a nice story? So Tina's story and my conversation with my kids inspired me to seek out anyone in my life I need to thank or even apologize to since even small gestures cut both ways.

So are you seeing where I'm going? I have to say that I always admired your ability to take the brunt of our adolescent taunting and be the butt of a joke with such grace and poise. I have no question in my mind that apologies are in order from me in the event that any of my antics, while they may have seemed small to me at the time, may have been bigger in your life. So if I haven't said it directly, I'm sorry if I was the cause of any lasting pain in your life.

As we look back at our adolescent antics from the lens of adulthood, it's clear to most of us now why some kids tease and others are teased. You were an exceptional person then as I'm sure you are now. I can't think of much else to say on the subject for fear of boring you to death or being too self-indulgent.

- Timothy

Reply from Denny:

Wow, Tim. I genuinely appreciate this note - it's one of the nicest gestures I can think of, and I admire you for having the impulse to write it.

I think in some ways we grew up in a different time and environment than you find in today's schools. I happened to be in Flint for the 10th class reunion and attended at the last minute, where I ran into Johnny Smith - remember Johnny? Well, after telling me all his success and how good he finally felt about his life, he went on for twenty minutes about how much he appreciated the fact that I was one of the very few 'popular' kids who hadn't picked on him. I was stunned. I hadn't done anything particularly outstanding; I had just treated him decently, said hello when I saw him and occasionally asked what he was up to - and ten years later there he was shaking my hand and thanking me over and over, saying "God bless you, Denny." I've told the story dozens of times since then. It felt good that I had done something that someone appreciated so much... I happened to be nice to Johnny, but I wonder how many people I might have hurt along the way without ever realizing it.

...I do appreciate your apology - I admire it - and you've gone very quickly in my mind from "a guy I knew in high school who occasionally gave me shit" to "a guy I knew in school who's found a passion for organic farming and making amazing sounding cherry preserves who was cool enough to apologize for occasionally making me the butt of jokes in high school that really were no big deal."

Now I've gone on too long - enough said. Glad we crossed paths again as well. Happy New Year!

- Denny

Do you have a "small gesture" story to share. Please do.

On Green Wal-Marts and Factory-Scale Organic Farms

3 November 2008

While speaking on consumer trends in the green economy, I'm often asked what I think of the "corporate takeover" of the organic industry. The questions are often posed in the context that factory-scale farms are compromising the spirit organic or that Wal-Mart, while going green, is could never be truly green. There's some truth to this, and while I once shared those concerns, I'm not losing sleep over it. What is clear is that the current revolution in green is not following a black and white script.

There's no doubt that green, be it in the form of local, organic, sustainable or socially-just consumer goods, is HOT. Even considering the lack of confidence in our national economy, the number of people willing to pay more for organic, and an entire array of green "values" products has grown from about 2% when I started my business in 1995 to over 30% today. That is revolutionary and likely faster growth than any other market segment I'm aware of. What has changed was that the green market was clearly bottom up and grassroots, driven by very committed individuals on a social mission. Today, the growth is top down and driven from corporate boardrooms responding to market forces and devoid of "authentic" social missions. Labeling this good or bad over simplifies the complexities of social change.

Let's take organic food, where we're seeing the most growth. Statistically we can't deny that consumer demands are outstripping supply of US produced organic fruits and vegetables. That's been the case for years. Whether we like it or not, if you are eating organic, it is very likely that you are eating foods from across the planet. With increasing frequency our "local at any cost" purchasing policy at my company does not always meet our needs. There isn't always an organic local option. For example, outside of little plastic fresh pack containers at Whole Foods or your local food co-op, you cannot buy raspberries or blackberries in the US market right now; not at any cost. And trends are only heading that way. However, from my experience, corporate entry into organic has brought a beneficial scale to the growth of local and organic micro-economies here in northern Michigan. When Food For Thought started in 1995, there were very few organic farms in our area. Soon representatives of Gerber and Eden Foods started going door-to-door meeting with farmers to encourage them to make the change, while offering to buy 100% of their crop if they were organic or in transition to organic. It was their scale that allowed them to do this and stimulated an organic supply that my small company could not have done. Today, there are a number of family scale farms in our community that would not be organic had not one of these entities been willing to buy their crop while it was still on the trees. And due to that stimulus, we've been buying organic pears, apples and cherries from our local family farms ever since.

There is a clear pattern of sustainable product adoption.
Data provided by The Hartman Group, Inc.

As I write this I'm attending the Corporate Leadership and Sustainability Conference in Traverse City. Our first speaker was Dr. Chris Laszo, Co-founder, Sustainable Value Partners and author of: Sustainable Value: How the World's Leading. He consults many global corporations on how to green their companies. As a consultant to Wal-Mart, he spoke to the positive impact they are having on the planet. It only makes sense that if Wal-Mart puts a solar panel array on the roof of every store, the cost of those panels would plummet for the rest of us and seed that industry with huge stimulus. The greening of Wal-Mart also serves a big role in bringing new ideas and green products and thinking to consumers that otherwise may not have exposure to such products. Furthermore, consumer research shows that when exposed to green or values products, consumers start down a path that moves them further into that market. (See chart) And given human nature, it's a whole lot easier to bring the organic to the Wal-Mart shopper, than to get the Wal-Mart shopper to the farmer's market.

What Dr. Laszo did not talk about is the unsustainable nature of the Wal-Mart business model. Retrofitting their 7,500 truck fleet to increase gas mileage, installing motion sensitive lighting in all their stores, and stocking their shelves with organic and green products has a huge impact on energy consumption and much more. However, the question is, should we be procuring our needs from a company that has 7,500 trucks on the road? It's clearly not sustainable to ship millions of tons of cradle to grave products from around the planet to be consumed and dumped in our landfills here at home. Coffee and bananas are one thing, but do we really need organic yoga outfits made in China when they can be made closer to home? Even if Wal-Mart's products are becoming more green, it's not a sustainable model. Along with factory-scale farming and other global business models, the negatives will continue to include higher energy consumption, low wage jobs, sprawl, breakdown of, and loss of revenue in local communities and more.

Lays billboard in Michigan.

Like most issues, this is not black and white for anyone. While I would neither buy my organic products at Wal-Mart, nor encourage anyone to do so, I see the beneficial role they play as a safe point of entry for many consumers who would otherwise not be exposed to such choices. Furthermore, we're bound to see more conversion of factory farming to organic as long as the growth in demand continues at this pace. So rather than lament the fact that the corporate world is devaluing "values" products, we will be better served by raising the bar. We can do that through education around the value of local organic and local green economies. Now that organic is a household word, lets continue to talk about social justice in the entire chain of products as is the case in Fair Trade and especially Domestic Fair Trade. Let us not demonize the Wal-Mart Shopper, but lovingly raise their awareness around areas of common concern. In the end I believe we better serve long term sustainable progression by accepting that we may need to green the way things are done today and simultaneously work to change the way those things will be done tomorrow.

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