Upcoming Slow Food Madera Events
Fig Fest 2008 - August 9, 2008 - Details coming soon...
Home on the Range - April 12, 2008 9:00am-2:00pm
SLOW FOOD MADERA is proud to again sponsor “HOME ON THE RANGE”
Saturday, April 12, 2008 8:30 am to about 2:00 pm
Be at the Vineyard Restaurant, Madera (hwy 99 & Hwy 145) by 8:30 am.
Have a cup of coffee and a breakfast pastry. Bus leaves 9:00 am SHARP! Enjoy a Madera Foothill bus tour and then a Grass Fed Beef meal at the Vineyard $55 per person. Buy tickets on-line at www.BrownPaperTickets.com
The Madera Convivium endeavors to give guests information about the local foods our farmers and ranchers grow in an entertaining way. This year you’ll learn about our local Madera County foothill grazing business, the history of the families entrusted with the land and the formation of the soils.
Whether on our air conditioned 47 passenger coach (with bathroom!) or off it, you’ll hear from well known local historian Bill Coate, who’ll give history lessons along our route. University of California Range Specialist Neil McDougald will tell you about the crops of grass our cow men and women cultivate and harvest using their cattle. Fresno City College soil scientist Roger Lukenbach will help us visualize how time, wind, rain and ice created the land we’ll traverse. Convivium board member Jim Merrill, a ranch real estate broker and consultant, will share his perspective on preservation of Madera County’s “Cattle Country”.
We’ll visit historical sites, large “spreads” and “transition” land on our 60 mile tour including the areas near Hensley Lake, Raymond and “Daulton”.
Convivium board members Chris Mariscotti (Vineyard Restaurant owner) Tom Willey (T&D Willey Farms organic vegetables) and Mike Blaylock (Quady wine maker) will share their culinary knowledge at the Vineyard for a grass-fed steak lunch with fresh seasonal vegetables and a new wine just out of the barrel.
Help us plan a great event. Get your doggies movin’ and ORDER YOUR TICKETS TODAY to avoid being “left off the bus”, literally!
Past Slow Food Events
Tomatoes' Night Out
Saturday September 29, 2007 at 5:00 PM
7th Annual “Tomatoes’ Night at
Lone Willow Ranch
11356 Road 5 ½
Firebaugh, CA 93622
We had a great time at the lovely Lone Willow Ranch, a wonderful evening filled with good friends, good music and good food as we celebrated the fruitful harvest from our local area.
5 pm – Tomato Tasting
6 pm – 1st course of many
Catering by Naked Catering Brenda Ostrom & Jen Meno, with help from Sharon Alexander. A feast that highlights heirloom tomatoes grown by farmer John M. Teixeira of Lone Willow Ranch. An interactive agricultural and culinary dining experience featuring mindfully prepared local and organic foods from the heart of Madera County
Slow Food Madera Members
John M. Teixeira 559-694-0017 or farmerjohn@organicheirlooms.com
Shelby Mayfield 559-352-1486 or shelby@organicheirlooms.com
Tickets $75.00 per person
— Fig Fest 2007- August 11, 2007
Saturday August 11, 2007 at 6:30pm: Fig Fest. A Celebration of a
Valley Treasure- As in the past the Fig Fest took place at The Vineyard
Farmer's Market from 9 to 12. That evening Slow Food Madera and The
California Fig Advisory Board hosted another fantastic Fig Feast.
This year's feast occured at The Chef's Table in Fig Garden Village.
Chef 
Malachi Harland prepared a wonderful meal with
the outstanding presentations of figs, local ingredients and local
wines. This year we enjoyed special Slow Food guests at the
dinner. Slow Food leaders from all of California, Slow Food staff
from New York and Alice Waters also came for the Fig
Fest and Fig Feast.
— Thursday, May 3, 2007 at 6:30pm - At the Vineyard Restaurant in Madera, CA:Join us for a release party for the new Quady Sherry. This sherry is the result of a 5 year collaboration between winemaker Mike Blaylock and farmer Gena Noninni's. It is made with her biodynamically grown grapes. For the event we will taste the new Sherry, Quady's Visio, a red table wine, and a Spanish Alberino (white) wine.
You will also be sampling a selection of Spanish-style Tapas to compliment these wines. Mike will discuss the challenges of making Sherry and Gena will talk about biodynamic farming. Seats are limited. We are telling you, Slow Food members, first to give you the first opportunity to reserve a seat. The event will be at The Vineyard Restaurant on May 3, 2007 at 6:30. You may reserve your seat buy calling 674-0923. Tickets costs $40 a person. This is a benefit for Slow Food Madera.
The Vineyard Restaurant 605 South I St in Madera.
It is on Highway 99 at the Highway 145 junction.
—Tomatoes Night Out - September 23, 2006 at the Lone Willow Ranch in Firebaugh
—Fig Fest 2006 - Celebrating a Valley Treasure - August 12, 2006 9:00AM to Noon at the Vineyard Farmers Market in Fresno, CA (Northwest corner or Blackstone & Shaw).
—Fig Fest Dinner 2006, Saturday August 12, 2006 at 7:00PM (Dinner Menu)(Review)
Recently unearthed in the Jordan Valley, from an early Neolithic village home, a handful of figs appear to be the oldest evidence of human agricultural activity on the planet dating from 11,300 years ago. The well-preserved fruit contain no seeds, nearly confirming they would have required human cultivation. Parthenocarpism, like our Thompson seedless grape, is a chance genetic mutation that allows a fruit to form without producing seeds.
Lacking seed, such a plant has no chance of reproducing another generation without a benefactor’s intervention. Researchers from Harvard and Israel’s Bar-Ilan University conclude early Neolithic hunter-gathers made cuttings from such a fig and planted them; an agricultural act.
The iconic fig played a starring role in Act I of the short history of our region’s farm culture as well. Late 19th century Fresno pioneers, George Roeding and J. C. Forkner promoted the fruit. Roeding imported an ingenious method of pollination from the Fertile Crescent securing success for the now prominent Calimyrna variety. Forkner developed Fig Garden, an early agricultural colony based on the production of said cultivar. As our fig orchards have been supplanted by homes over the last generation the fruit has become less appreciated and little celebrated.
Slow Food Madera and the Fig Advisory Board created Fig Fest in 2004 to return the ancient fruit to its honored place on our tables and in our hearts. Join us for the third edition of “all things fig” Saturday, August 12 at Fresno’s Vineyard Farmers Market on Blackstone and Shaw. For a populist price of $5.00 enjoy the gastronomic fig-art presented by fifteen chefs of the region’s finest restaurants. You may wish to purchase a tree and start your own fig farm.
Indulge yourself with a five course “Study in Figs”, by James Overbaugh of Erna’s Elderberry House al fresco, under the market arbor Saturday evening for $110.00 per person, including wines. Celebrate with us the noble Fig’s storied place in both local and all of human history. - Tom Willey
For dinner tickets: 1-800-838-3006
“Study in Figs” Menu
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