As a civic institution, New Amsterdam Market will be our region’s permanent, indoor forum for sustainable food production, creating new bonds between the producers, purveyors, and consumers who take part in this emerging food system. It will also complement the city’s Greenmarket system, building upon its success and providing an additional sales outlet for regional food producers.
Market sponsored activities will include work and study visits on local farms; lessons in ingredient selection and meal preparation; guided food tastings; and youth apprentice programs with professional butchers, mongers, bakers and other purveyors. Farmers and producers will benefit from a network of purveyors and consumers who understand their needs and will not only support them economically by purchasing their products but also advocate, as a group, on their behalf.
A Market Meal will be held daily within the market hall. Prepared by everyday New Yorkers in the market’s kitchen, making use of the season’s bounty, and structured to be affordable to all, this communal feast will serve as an enduring legacy, both teaching and reminding its partakers of the meaning of community. As stated recently by Alice Waters:
At the table we learn moderation, conversation, tolerance, generosity and conviviality; these are civic virtues. The pleasures of the table also beget responsibilities—to one another, to the animals we eat, to the land and to the people who work it…when we have relearned the real rewards of eating, we will have laid a foundation for not just a healthier food system but a healthier twenty-first century democracy.
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