ART OF CULTURAL EVOLUTION

At A Glance

Location: 

Randolph, Vermont

Primary Issue Area:

  • Food
  • Environmental Health
  • Land & Water
  • Climate Change & Energy

Active since:

2010

Core volunteers:

6

Our Purpose

The idea with this project is to connect with communities in densified areas by using the Arepa Making process as the connector. I grew up eating Arepas in Colombia South America. Arepa is one of our staple dishes. After the Free Trade agreement, Colombia went from planting 1,000,000 hectares to 300,000 and started importing GMO corn from the US. So basically my generation has been feeding with GMO corn for the past 25 years. I came to Vermont 2 years ago to visit a friend and I saw how farmers were growing so much corn, but for animal consumption. And I had been trying to find the right place to grow some heirloom, open pollinated corn to make Arepas. So I decided to embark on this journey and  moved to Vermont and started growing corn, last season we planted a 90 days Mandan Bride Corn  which did really well and the taste was amazing and a 120 days white dent corn which I had to pick early because a bear came one night and knocked half of the field down. We have a little food  trailer equipped to cook Arepas and empanadas with its toppings. I presented a proposal to bring the trailer to schools twice a month and educate children about different ethnic foods in a Farm to table format. My big vision is to create a workforce around sustainable food and use corn to connect with different communities. We are in need to get a few components for the trailer, so any help would be greatly appreciated.  Thank you