Last year, in late January, I attended the second Edible Institute conference. I posted that I would be going, and why, here.
Well, the organizers seem to have decided that hosting in late January is a misery, because it’s been moved to March. This upcoming weekend, in fact.
I appreciate this, as last year I got stuck for an extra day in California due to a huge January/February blizzard in Chicago.
Just as I was last year, I’m very excited to be going this year. I’m going to see a few friends I made last year. I’m very much looking forward hearing Mirra Fine and Daniel Klein of The Perennial Plate speak1. I’m hoping I’ll get a chance to meet them2.
Even more than Fine and Klein, though, I’m looking forward to hearing Brian Halweil speak. As I mentioned early last year (in the above linked post), Halweil was instrumental in my thinking about how my food is moved, and what I want to be eating. I even said, in last year’s post, that I was disappointed he was not speaking last year. I lucked out though, because I did briefly meet him again, and thank him for getting me thinking. I didn’t expect that.
Gary Nabhan is speaking again. I’m intensely curious about that. Halweil was the catalyst for changing the way I thought about food, but Nabhan was the seed. So, when I read that he’d quit Slow Food USA over the organization’s $5 challenge, I was a bit taken aback. I have some more reading to do about this (I found some links while looking for this link for you guys), but I’m curious if he touches on this more.
I don’t know if I’ll have ‘net access beyond my phone while I’m gone. I will do my best to update you while I’m there, or not too long after I come home.
As always, I’ll tweet about it from my phone, if nothing else. My feed can be found here. Even if you don’t use twitter, everything’s public, so you can follow along via the web.
fn1. Bill and I partially funded the Kickstarter campaign Fine & Klein had to finance their second season. I love reading their blog posts, but I honestly have a hard time sitting still for a video anyone does, even folks like this.
fn2. We actually met them both, individually & very briefly, while they were filming at The Publican in Chicago. They did a special dinner there, and we went and had it. Klein cooked & Fine filmed. Some of the best food I’ve ever had. YUM.