Welcome Foodshed, Greens and Goslings!

A quick photo of the region's new food co-op, with story to follow tomorrow.

I traveled to and from Woodstock — the north-central Illinois city that is about 60 miles from our Chicago home base — with friends from the Chicago Market co-op project to attend the long-awaited open of the FOODshed co-operative grocery store. There was beautiful weather and a celebratory atmosphere outside the lovely purpose-built store.

I’ll have a full report in Thursday’s newsletter, but I just wanted to share a photo and my congratulations to the team that worked so hard to bring this project to fruition.

Greens, Greens, It’s Greens They Say

We’re waiting on most of the peak season local produce here in the Chicago area, but there are plenty of greens such as lettuce and spinach, plus root vegetables whose green tops carry lots of flavor and nutrition.

The lastest entry from our friends at University of Illinois Extension and UI Health — part of their Eat.Move.Save program on healthy and affordable eating — is all about how you can grow your own greens and how to prepare them. Thanks, as always, to Bianca Bautista of UI Extension Cook County for these excellent features.

Bob’s World, and Welcome to It: Walk in the Parks 3

This week I’ve been doing a series about communing with the local fauna and flora during the beautiful weather last Saturday. In yesterday’s installment, I shared photos of our first duckling sighting this spring at Lincoln Park’s North Pond, but expressed some concern that the usual throngs of goslings didn’t make an immediate appearance.

We continued to circumnavigate the pond, though, as we saw some adult geese on the other side. As we turned the corner, we came upon this single goose (photo above) that appeared to be on sentry duty, suggesting that goslings might be close. Then we saw a gaggle of humans, and as we headed toward them, we saw this…