Congratulations to our newly elected members of the Greene Hill Food Co-op Board of Directors: Allison Stewart, Jeannie Hamilton, William Laviano, and returning board member DK Holland! We can't wait to see the great work that they will do on behalf of the whole membership. Welcome!

Officers Election at October General Meeting

We will be holding the official vote to elect Officers at the October General Meeting. The online ballot will be available to the membership from Wednesday, October 15th, through 6pm on Wednesday October 29th. Please vote either online or in person at the GM to help decide on the board leadership for the Co-op.

Win-Win-Win Spotlight: Olea Taverna

Never Before Seen: An Empty Olea!

The Win-Win-Win Program supports local businesses that support the Co-op. This month, we're excited to feature Olea, a Mediterranean oasis on Lafayette and Adelphi in Fort Greene. Olea has been a friend of the Co-op since the beginning, and continues to spread the love by donating three $50 gift certificates which we've raffled off to new members at the last two Open Shopping Days. Opened in 2005, Olea offers a pan-Mediterranean menu with inspirations from Spain, Greece, Italy and more. Stop in for a meal, a drink and an inviting atmosphere. Just show your membership fob to receive 10% off your entire order!

Fall Celebration 2014 a Community Success

Members new and old, neighbors, co-op vendors, and many happy kids came out on Saturday, September 27th for Greene Hill’s third-annual Fall Celebration! The back yard was once again converted to a community gathering place where familiar faces welcomed scores of locals interested in learning more about the store, its products, and how the Co-op works.

Also that day, the third non-member “open shopping” day of 2014 was held, giving potential members a glimpse of our store’s goods. Non-members were welcomed to come outside under the beautiful blue sky, where partner vendors shared samples from Equal Exchange, The Piggery, Narda’s Ginger Punch, Brooklyn Cured, La Mies Bakery, and other Co-op delights.

Fall Celebration attendees got to enjoy an outdoor yoga session from Co-op member Shannon Sodano, a bouncy house, puppet friends from Yellow Sneaker Productions, and lessons about managing compost. Awesome Brooklyn DJs Cosmo D and ddotto kept the crowd moving with music throughout the day. And new members Rachel Wint and Jenn Potter, who joined Greene Hill Food Co-op at the Celebration, each won $50 gift certificates to Fort Greene’s Olea Restaurant.

Barbara Turk, Director of Food Policy from the Mayor’s Office dropped in to check out the action. The Fall Celebration wrapped up with arrival of the Atlantic Action Community Walk sponsored by Transportation Alternatives, which highlighted community-safety issues along and around Atlantic Avenue.

Here at the Co-op we have a comparatively limited range of salty snacks for sale, but they are carefully chosen. One of our favorites is North Fork Potato Chips. Made by the Sidor family from potatoes that they grow at their farm in Cutchogue on the North Fork of Long Island, they are fried in high-quality safflower oil for a light but hearty crunch. The Sidors have been farming the land on Long Island since Martin’s grandfather arrived in the North Fork from Poland in the 1910s, and they turned to making potato chips to compete with the larger potato factory farms out West. The chips come in a variety of flavors: original, salt and vinegar, sour cream and onion, barbecue, rosemary and garlic, and sweet potato. Their rosemary and garlic chips won Fitness magazine’s “Healthy Food” award, which praised it for delivering “a ‘big, smoky taste’ but has about a third less fat than regular potato chips”.

Not only are the chips delicious, they’re also good for our planet. A few years ago, the Sidors switched from oil to bio-diesel (made from used safflower oil!) to power their irrigation system and other machinery, and they’ve received a grant from the New York department of agriculture to certify them as biodiesel producers.

Serves 3-4, total cost: $5.80.

Ingredients:

• 1 large sweet potato ($1.31)
• 1 large beet ($0.95)
• 2 turnips (not at the coop at the moment, but can be purchased from key Food for $1.98)
• 1 onion ($0.46)
• 1 teaspoon rosemary, minced ($0.03)
• 1 tablespoon garlic, minced ($0.34)
• 2 tablespoon coconut oil ($0.73)

How to:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Chop vegetables into half-inch chunks.
2. Coat vegetables with coconut oil.
3. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and spread evenly. Sprinkle with salt, pepper, and rosemary.
4. After 25 minutes, add garlic, stir, and roast for an additional 10 minutes.

This month’s Q&A is with Alix Fellman, who is chair of the Outreach Committee. Alix is currently spearheading the very new and exciting Win Win Win program, which supports businesses that support the Co-op. Here she is, above, very excited to be at the Co-op as she sets up the Fall Festival!

Q: Where are you from, and what do you do?

A: I’m originally from North Carolina and I’ve been in New York for 11 years. I went to NYU and stayed here. My professional background is in nonprofit fundraising and outreach.

Q: What brought you to the Co-op?

A: My boyfriend is a member (he helps purchase meat!), and since food is a big part of both of our lives, I joined too.

Q: What is your role at the Co-op?

A: I am chair of the Outreach Committee. If you don’t know about us, the outreach team oversees Co-op events like the Fall Celebration and our quarterly Open Shopping days. We organize the ‘Open Shopping’ days so that people who aren’t members can shop here once every three months. We manage tabling - sending members out into the community to tell people about the Co-op. We also address issues of food justice and food access in and around the Co-op.

We’re also working on the Win Win Win program, which rewards Co-op members with discounts at certain participating businesses. Going forward, we want to focus on programs and events that will draw in new members, like Open Shopping days and incentives like this new program. It’s so rewarding working on something like this, where you can take an idea and run with it. The results are exciting - eight businesses have already pledged their participation!

Q: How can members help out with the Win Win Win program?

A: Well, we always need new businesses to add to the program! If Co-op members work, own, or love a local business then they should reach out to me or the Outreach Committee and help us expand it!

Q: What one item from the Co-op would you not be able to live without?

A: Apple Snits - soft, dried apples. They come in sweet and tart flavors, but sweet are my favorites. They’re usually at the top of the shelf that has dried fruits and nuts. I’m also a huge fan of The Piggery’s porkchops!

Q: Where do you see the Co-op in five years?

A: I want the Co-op to be a place where people are really engaged and shop regularly. Once we have a little more time under our belts and become more established, I think it could be a place where people come to meet others and discuss the community and the small businesses that they support. It would also be amazing to see us have a storefont on Fulton Avenue and have even more exposure.

Our committee does outreach, but there’s also what I like to call ‘in-reach’ that we need to do. The Co-op is a community, and it’s our job to make sure that our community is working and healthy and thriving and happy!

Membership Committee Seeks Co-chairs

This is an opportunity for at least two members to join a third and help collectively chair our vibrant membership committee for a given amount of time. The Committee leads several key areas, and it would be great to have at least three members lead each area. For those interested, there would be a transition time available now through mid December with Nick. Please email membership@ with your questions or for more information. It will be very important to fill these roles as soon as possible.

Board of Directors Seeks a Secretary

Have you been a member of the Co-op for over a year? Are you looking to get more involved in the leadership of the organization? The Co-op is looking for a new Secretary. The Secretary is responsible for ensuring that minutes are taken at the monthly general meetings and at board meetings, and ensuring that they are kept in a safe, accessible repository, and posted on the Co-op’s website. The Secretary is not required to attend every monthly meeting and board meeting, however, s/he is responsible for delegating the task of minute-taking to another individual s/he cannot be present. To be the Secretary you must be a member in good standing with the Co-op. Interested? Send an email to governance@greenehillfood.coop for details!

URGENT NEED for Governance Committee Members

The Co-op cannot survive without a long-term plan and sustainable practices that abide by government rules and regulations. The Governance Committee is urgently in need of participating members to help us stay on top of licensing issues, regulatory compliance and safety codes.

As a member of governance you will have flexibility in your work schedule as most of our work is permitting/ license research and requests. We also participate heavily in the annual election, as well as monthly Board meetings to ensure that the board and membership are constantly in compliance with the bylaws.

Please consider joining this committee. You will have the opportunity to learn about local, state and federal laws as they apply to Co-ops like ours, as well as help our organization stay successful and compliant in a world of complex laws and regulations. Please email governance@greenehillfood.coop to join the committee!

Help Build Our Financial Infrastructure

The Finance Committee needs more members with financial experience, and with interest in helping build our business. We need members interested in working more than the minimum two hours every four weeks. Our start-up business still requires a lot of work, as we build up our accounting, budgeting, financial control and forecasting systems. If you'd like to help us build Greene Hill's ‘financial infrastructure,’ please email finance@greenehillfood.coop.

Office Work Available

Interested in doing some office work at the store? One of our members is a professional bookkeeper who has stepped up to coordinate accounting at the Co-op. He's organized bookkeeping tasks at the store into easy, well-structured steps: handling invoices, entering data into our accounting software, and so on. You'd get all the training and guidance you need, while working at a dedicated Finance desk and computer. And you'd be helping the Co-op produce financial statements on a regular basis. You can set your own hours! Please email finance@greenehillfood.coop if you'd like to join us.

Seeking IT Committee Members

The IT Committee is looking for new members for both in and out of store tasks. We are looking for IT individuals who are willing to work in the store, to troubleshoot new and existing challenges with the POS machines and network. Individuals that have experience with LAMP (Linux/Apache/MySql/PHP) applications, Drupal, CiviCRM, Wordpress, Linux server administration, or network setup and administration would also be an asset to the Committee. If you are interested or have questions please send them to: IT@greenehillfood.coop.

Join the Price Crowdsourcing Project Task Force

The Marketing and Outreach Committees are scoping an exciting new project to crowdsource food prices from neighborhood stores in order to create a price comparison tool for the Co-op. We’re seeking designers, data scientists, and food justice advocates. If you’re interested in joining this task force, email marketing@greenehillfood.coop.

Credits: recipe and sweet potato hash photo by Jill Hoffman, North Fork chips photo by Amy Nazer, Fall Celebration photo by Kelsy Chauvin, and Olea photos by Dan Demarti.

The Greene Hill Food Co-op Newsletter is edited and published by (in alphabetical order) Anna Avrekh, Carola Burroughs, Roxanne Earley, Sonia Garbesputzel, Debbie Grossman, Alexandra Miller, and Amy Nazer. Contact us with any feedback, suggestions, or requests at newsletter@greenehillfood.coop.

Join or follow the Greene Hill Food Co-op!

Interested in joining the Greene Hill Food Co-op? Check out our website to learn about membership, like us on Facebook, or stop by our store at 18 Putnam Ave. (off Grand Ave.) with any questions!