For over 18 years, Food Dance has touted their commitment to farm-to-table freshness. They are now prepared to put their pitchfork where their mouth is.

 

Food Dance is partnering with local farmers, Mark Schieber & Misty Klotz, to start a collaboration of businesses that further support locally-produced foods that will make their way onto Food Dance’s menu. The first of these partnerships is a small-scale farm, hopefully in the Kalamazoo area.

 

“Hopefully” because the first step is finding good, tillable 20-40 acres to farm.

 

“Ideally, we’re looking for a farmer or land owner who wants to see their land continue to be farmed or returned to agriculture,” says Julie Stanley, owner of Food Dance, “This could be an active farm or fallow fields that can be returned to active use.”

 

Julie, Mark and Misty are hoping to get the word out to these potential farmers and land owners to talk about creating a sustainable food source.

 

“It’s important for us to identify some potential individuals and talk to them about our vision of fresh, local food,” says Schieber, “We’re fully committed to sustaining the land, the community and the farm as a business.”

 

Education is a key component of the venture. Stanley says there are plans for an Edible Schoolyard children’s program to teach kids about farming and where food comes from. There will also be adult agriculture and cooking classes as well as a CSA (crop sharing) program for local residents to benefit from the bounty. Luckily, the food experts at Food Dance will have great cooking tips and recipes to share with all participants.

 

“We want to stress how locally-produced foods help to sustain our community,” says Stanley, “Not only is it important, but it’s fascinating to see the food cycle – from seeds to a completely-prepared meal.”

 

Farmers or landowners interested in discussing the opportunity are encouraged to contact Julie Stanley at 269-382-1888.

 

For more information about Food Dance and their commitment to local, sustainable agriculture, visit www.fooddance.net.

1. What does being a member of The Butcher’s Guild mean to you? Community is important in keeping any trade strong. Having a guild of any kind insures techniques, and resources will not be lost through neglect. It also keeps us connected with butchers across the country to assist with common issues, such as sourcing, government regulations, marketing, ect…

 

2. How long have you been a butcher and where did you get your start? Have you been working with “sustainable” meats the whole time and if not, what precipitated your shift in practices? I would call myself more of a whole animal taker downer enthusiast, rather than a butcher. I by no means have the skill or knowledge that many of the other members do, but I do have a passion for breaking an animal down from whole to plate. I have for the last 8 years worked exclusively with humanly and sustainably raised meat. The move was driven by the plethora of great farms that surround us here in western Michigan. We have every thing from Scottish Highland beef to truly pastured chicken, from duroc hogs to Icelandic lamb. We love our relationship with the amazing community of family farms we have. Relationships build communities, and without community we could never have a restaurant like Food Dance.

3. What do you think about the current media hype and attention on butchery, butchers and meat in general? I guess it doesn’t matter how the flock gets there as long as they arrive.

4. What do you believe is the role butchers in the movement for a sustainable food system and what do you see as the biggest impediment to a truly sustainable meat industry? Animals are the most enviromentally destructive source of nutrition in the current food chain. A conscious effort to make that sustainable by the individuals who are the direct supplier to the end consumer is the best place to affect change of a communities consumption.

5. Your absolute favorite cut and preparation method/recipe? Top but tri-tip. One of the only cuts that braises as well as it grills

 

The Butcher's Guild

http://www.thebutchersguild.org

I have never felt as welcomed in another country as I do in Ireland. Traveling to southern Ireland again this fall was a reminder of all that I love about that country. Wonderful friendly kind people, rich lush green landscape with cows and sheep welcomed across our paths, artfully stacked rocks separating pastures and vibrant colored hedges of hydrangeas and fuchsia that brushed our rented car.

 

But it is truly the food that I love. From well cared for animals comes so many cheeses with so much flavor, the Cashel Blue, St. Tola goat cheese, Gubbeen or Vintage Cheddar.  I wish I could of brought back some of the 10 lbs I purchased at the Cork market, we carried it with us for most of 5 days as we traveled to the west coast and back to Dublin munching happily on our way but alias we consumed it all!

 

This St. Patty’s day the celebration on of authentic Irish food begins Thursday and continues on through Saturday (when the parade comes to downtown) and onto Sunday -come celebrate with us at Food Dance as we offer you some great traditional Irish foods… all day long.

 

 

-Julie
Food Dance Founder

 

Over the past 17 years I've been asked that dozens of times. In our new staff orientation we talk about it so the new hires can answer THE question 'Food Dance. Where's the dancing?'

 

I really wish I had a better story. I have thought about just making something up, but over the past decade people have come up with their own stories, or theories, about what the name, Food Dance, means and where it came from.

 

I've heard 'food dances on your tongue' which was once quoted in a review, 'because there is this big dance floor somewhere in the building,' or my favorite 'there's a special dance the staff does if you ask'. All are theories I've heard over the years. None of which are true but I'll give them points for creativity.

 

Just this past weekend I heard a true story from guests. They were telling me about how their adult children were coming to visit them in Kalamazoo, and that these children live in some urban city where they can choose from 1,000s of great restaurants but that when their children know they will be coming to Kalamazoo for a visit they start doing the "Food Dance Dance." That's how excited they are to eat here. The mother, who was telling me this story, then imitated her daughter by putting her hands in the air and kind of swaying and rockin' her hips from side to side and smiling said in a singsong voice, "I'm doing the Food Dance" all while seated at our bar. That topped them all. I think I will use this story from now on to answer the question, "What's up with the name Food Dance?"

 

Oh, you really want to know the real story-forgot about that part for a minute... So here it is. As I was getting ready to sign the lease for our original location at 161 East Michigan Ave., only a couple blocks from where we are now, I had to, of course, have a name. My friends and I threw around names with historic links like Haymarket CafÄ, Ghosts of Restaurants Past but nothing felt right. Then my ever so dear and highly creative friend, Chris, pipes in, "Food Dance." I don't know... it felt right, so it stuck.

 

I would love to hear your stories about Food Dance and it doesn't have to be about the name, since we've solved that mystery.

—Julie

 Food Dance founder & owner

   

There are many women who have influenced my life of food: Alice Waters, Madeline Kamman, Julia Child, Sheila Lukins, Judy Rogers, Odessa Piper, my friend Chris Morgan and now Gabrielle Hamilton author of Blood, Bones, and Butter: The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef. Gabrielle owns Prune, a very successful small restaurant in NYC’s East Village. She is, as well, a damn good writer!

I am in a book group. Well it is fair to say it is part book group, part food sharing, part renewing friendships (some new, some very old) all woven into the best sort of new millennium “support group” you can imagine. However, Gabrielle’s book wasn’t on our list to read. Every time I read a book that I can’t put down I tell everyone I know: friends, customers, my staff and my husband, “You should really read ________; it is so fantastic!” Blood, Bones, and Butter is no exception. I love to read books about women who are passionate about food; those women also being a bit offbeat and successful is just a bonus. I related so much to this book. Not to the crazy family she comes from (mine wasn’t that colorful) but to Gabrielle’s journey to her current life, her business of cooking for and sharing meals with her community. She, like myself, wants to cook simply using real food. She writes of her newly dreamed of restaurant “there would be no foam, and no ‘conceptual’ or ‘intellectual’ food, just the salty, sweet, starchy, brothy, crispy things that one craves when one is actually hungry.”  Throw in the pure pleasure of feeding people and I am there.

Hamilton writes, “I had no idea how to open a restaurant. I had the work ethic and that nearly strange mania for cleaning and organizing kitchens.”  That mirrors my own journey to where I am now.  I highly recommend you pick up this book now available in our Market and carve out some time to savor the passion that exudes from the pages.

In contrast to Gabrielle’s book, I also just finished reading Grant Achatz’s book Life on the Line: A Chef’s Story of Chasing Greatness, Facing Death, and Redefining the Way We Eat. Grant is the ultra driven, risk taking, visionary chef that is part owner of Alinea restaurant in Chicago. In 2002 the James Beard Foundation named Grant “Rising Star Chef”and in 2005 Gourmet declared Alinea the best restaurant in America. Then 2007 Grant was diagnosed with stage four squamous cell carcinoma of the mouth–tongue cancer. Yes, the irony is too much to bear. In 2008 The James Beard Foundation awarded him Outstanding Chef in America, the highest honor for a chef.

In this curious memoir, Chef Grant Achatz and his business partner, Nick Kokonas tell of their Chicago restaurant, Alinea, as well as Grant’s cancer diagnosis and recovery. I found the frank honesty of Grant’s journey intensely personal, interesting and inspiring. He shares his family, his schooling and the time he spent with his mentor Thomas Keller. A legend in his own right, Keller is Chef and owner of The French Laundry, a Napa Valley icon, and one of the most humble, creative and talented chefs of our time. All of the intimate details of working in the kitchen of such a legend painted a picture for me that allowed me ‘to feel’ what it was like to be a part of it. There are parts that are almost too painful to read about during Grant’s long illness. Those parts I wanted to hurry through in order to know how it is now for Grant. Having Nick’s voice telling the story of his friend and business partner gave the book a richness and depth that can be at times be lacking in first person memoirs.

I have yet to experience the privilege of eating at Prune, Alinea or The French Laundry but through theses books I am one step closer.


—Julie Stanley

Food Dance's executive chef Robb Hammond will be going toe to toe with 24 other local chefs in the 6th Annual Gumbo Cook Off.

Sunday March 6th
Louie’s Trophy House and Grill, 440 E. North St., Kalamazoo.
3 to 7 p.m. (winner will be announced at 5 p.m.).
$15 in advance; $20 at the door.

Tickets can be bought at several locations, just look for the Got Okra? poster on the door.

Chefs from Mangia Mangia, Food Dance, Louie’s Trophy House Grill, Fandango, Old Burdicks and many more will offer their variations on the Cajun stews. Read more here

The Mattawan Artisan Creamery is part of Kal Carbon Acres in Mattawan Michigan. Their mission, to deliver quality natural farm products at a fair price, and they do this without the use chemical fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides. MAC employs an integrated, natural approach to farming. The farm is owned and operated by Anne and Steve Cavanagh, with a little help from their donkeys Clifford and Bo, who watch over the La Mancha goats protecting them from wondering coyotes. All the goats, doelings and bucklings were born and raised on the farm. All animals on the farm graze naturally and are fed untreated grain. MAC takes pride in natural sustainable farming and top quality dairy products.

The milk used for the yogurt comes from the grass fed Jersey cows at Moonique Dairy, a family farm in Vandalia Michigan. The milk is delivered in the evening to our on-farm dairy in Mattawan, where Ty (Moonique owner) helps load the pasteurizer. The milk is pasteurized then cultured overnight. In the morning, Steve drains whey from the yogurt and pours the yogurt from the drain bags into the containers for delivery to us. The whey goes back to Ty on his next trip and is a high protein treat for their pigs.

Compare the ingredients to store bought yogurt.  MAC’s has only milk and culture. The delicious taste, just like everything at Food Dance, comes from high quality ingredients.


For more information you can follow the links below.

Mattawan Artisan Creamery

Moonique Dairy

Julie will be speaking on the Local Branding Heroes panel/discussion. We all know the "big brands" but this program will offer a rare inside look at successful brand-building, on a personal, local level.

Over the past 16 years we've make some great food. Working with the best ingredients is part one, part two is the talent we have attracted. I am not bragging just observing.

This New Year's Eve the menu that Chef Robb and his team put together was hands down, some of the best tasting and well thought out menu we have offered. Sometimes when you see the food being prepared, talk about it over and over, then serve hundreds of guests that food, you don't really want to eat it- it’s an industry hazard. This menu was different for me.  As I sat down at the end of the night and truly tasted the flavors and talent shine through the plates I felt so appreciative of what we do here.

For those of you who dined with us that night, I heard a lot of comments to the same. I personally know how much work went into each dish, from the house cured Coppa from Dave's happy pigs they butchered in house, to the amazing variety of radishes on the perfectly balanced goat cheese salad with California Olive oil and Italian Truffles, to the spinach Fazzoletti pasta (big squares of pasta folded around the Ragu) that Robb handmade with the Lamb Ragu I could of eating it for days.

Then was the sweet ending of the Upside Down Cranberry Cake with orange Szechuan peppercorn ice cream and candied fruit. Just the right amount of fruit and amazing ice cream they made. I look forward to many more great dinners in my life and hope you too will continue to support the great talent we have here at Food Dance.

Julie - yes the owner

Community Event, Saturday January 15th 2011
“Rising to the Challenges- Local Farmers, Local Food, Local Pride!"

Food Dance owner Julie Stanley will be co-speaking about buying from local farms as a restaurant. The Michigan Family Farms Conference is a forum for beginning, small-scale, and culturally diverse farmers to network, learn and build sustainable family farms.

Join us for the 8th annual Michigan Family Farms Conference on Saturday, January 15, 2011 at Lakeview High School in Battle Creek to discuss challenges and growth opportunities for family farms. Connect with other growers and great resources, network, and learn about organic certification, hoophouses, agritourism and local markets, urban school gardening, food safety, niche marketing, alternative energy, CSAs and much more!

 

more information can be found here