This video is a compilation of my harvests in the agroturismos of Italy, the desert of Argentina, and the sunshine of northern California. The music is one of my favorite songs of all time, it’s called Voyageur by Enigma. I moved out to California a year ago with a bottle of GrapeThinking, a bottle of ideas I guess you could say, that started filling up 5 years ago with conversation between myself, Jacob Bohall, Ruarri Rogan, Meghan O’Malley, and many others. Over the past year, those ideas have delightfully fermented, and the time has finally come for us to have a taste…

~circuit to cell, web to water, mind to vine~

The essence of this movement lies in increasing the ease and convenience for people to grow their own food, and thus their own energy. This will be what drives the greater connectedness and expansion of consciousness that so many believe to be at the core of the sustainable revolution. This can be through the use of personal gardens or more practically, through the shared space in an urban garden or biotower.

This is amazing work that feels solid and dense. Urban farming doesn’t feel flaky and granola like so many other things “green.” It is literally bringing nature to the grid. Green roofs are already starting to gain traction as they have functional purposes, such as better thermoregulation for buildings and rainwater capture. Urban gardens are accelerating especially in sustainably minded cities like San Francisco, and the concept of biotowers is becoming more practical (click photo below). The room for architectural innovation with urban farms is seemingly endless.

Again, the essence of this movement is inspiring people and making it easy for them to begin to grow their own food. Taking the innovations of the industrial and technological revolutions, connecting them to the land and agriculture, and thereby sparking the sustainable revolution. This very well could be the most powerful shift our world has seen.

Check out www.farmerd.com and his consulting practices. He is doing awesome things with school gardens and inspiring people to grow their own food. He’s also beginning some very interesting urban development projects. Stay tuned…

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Welcome to the first taste palace

Finally found one after two months in this country

Ill hit you with the pomengranates right off the bat… boom

Apricots, japanese medlar, peaches, pears, plums… apples down there

Vegetable garden, sangiovese vineyard, olive trees

They make their own wine, they make their own oil. They grow all their own vegetables

Cabbage, carrots, onions, tomatoes, squash, zucchini, peppers…herbs, basil, salvia, thyme, rosemary

Pretty much got it all nailed

Thats Antonio, he’s the son that owns the place

We’re right aside of Siena, everbody knows Siena, I’ll show it to ya real quick

There’s Siena… haha… this is it… there’s Siena

But again, so we’ve got wine, we’ve got olive oil, we’ve got every fruit you can imagine, even pomegranate. Vegetables, herbs.

The only thing missing is what? Energy, right? Solar

Generate all this produce to sell back to the grid, generate energy to sell back to the grid. Bring people here… tourism. And not some pretentious bullshit where they come here and say… it’s spiritual… you’re gonna feel it, and feel god, and all that.

Come here and just eat the food, just eat it. See the energy and see the money they make… because it’s alot.

That’s it… this is, this is it.

You start bringing these places, creating these praces, growing these places all over the world, and you’ve got a taste economy. You’ve got a transcendence from materialism back to a connection to nature becuase it makes people feel better, it makes them have more fun, it makes them more money, it makes the world healthier.

And it’s land too, so there’s all this space to generate energy from that thing (sun). So weird how this camera makes the center black. Anyways, there’s a lot of energy coming from that down into all this stuff (vines).

That’s it. The taste palace

Welcome… to taste

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I ended up using a couple of different services to try to manage our grocery grocery shopping lists, especially since prices are really varied and we have to shop at Whole Foods, Weaver Street Market, and Trader Joes, depending upon which items we want to get…  FYI Trader Joes has the best prices on Raw Organic Crunchy Almond Butter ($5 vs. everyone elses $11).   I wasn’t happy with the functionality in many of the services, but found that List2Shop was a pretty good service, as they allow you to organize your shopping lists by the store that you want to shop.

You can easily create a shopping list and print without signing up, but if you create an account, you can save your lists, and if you have an iPhone, login to your account and view the list while you are in the store.  What type of shopping list services do you use, and why do you think it would be better than List2Shop?

I personally love smoothies and protein shakes. They give me almost everything my body needs. I get vitamins, anti-oxidants, and amino acids (whey protein concentrate and/or whey isolate protein), all of which are the key building blocks to growth, energy and vibrant health. Lol, add in a little metamucil and carbs, and I’m good to go.

However, this new way of eating would obviously take away one of life’s greatest pleasures, that of the taste experience. There’s really nothing better than eating a fresh piece of salmon or some creamy italian gelatto… it’s the texture variety mixed with the blend of tastes. Regardless, I have my juicer and I love my smoothies and  whey shakes. I could definitely see my diet moving more and more to liquid energy as the days go buy. Better for evolution? That’s for you to decide.

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One pairing I’ve never had that I’m excited to try is wine andchristmas cookies. A nice cab with a spicy ginger cookie or a chilled riesling with an iced sugar snap. Definitely would serve as a nice treat. Here’s a cool site that gives great christmas cookie recipes. Mom’s Who Think… you gotta love it. You’ll find every imaginable cookie recipe under the sun. Wouldn’t it be cool to be able to pair different wines with different types of cookies instead of just having the boring ‘dessert wine’ category.

If you have a moment go through the recipes and make some cookies for your family this holiday season. I think I’m going to try out the German Chocolate Bars and pair it with a Dornfelder, an obscure but popular red grape from Germany. Looking for that inspiration to develop our own portfolio of delectable delicious Tastevine elixirs.

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I love the artisan producers that they’re working with too. Their alpha producers are Seth Ellis Chocalatier and Boulder Popcorn from Boulder, Co as well as The Dough Nut from Greensboro, NC and Teatulia Teas from Denver, Co.  Shows they see the organic food movement building and how its coming out of these small producers that focus on quality, health, and offer at a reasonable price when connected to consumers through a portal like Foodzie. And with the aggregation strategy, Foodzie will gain great search rankings and bring attention to these small producers who would otherwise never be found.

Here’s Frank Gruber’s interview with the Foodzie team a few months ago at Tech Stars. They seem really sharp and balanced. I’m looking forward to seeing what they can do.

Foodzie: Online Gourmet Food Marketplace from Frank Gruber on Vimeo.

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We’ve been following the organic movement across the world, as consumers begin to understand the level of toxins, chemicals, pesticieds, preservatives, etc.. that are injected, grown, sprayed, or bred into the things we eat and drink.  In an effort to encourage  you to more closely scrutinize those items that you put in your body, we present “The Mouth Revolution” by Free Range Studios.. the same group that brought us, “The Story of Stuff”

Mouth Revolution hones in on the fact that we need to be more considerate of what we put into our bodies, and need to promote a culture of health within our communities.  By being more conscious of those items that are harmful.. The “Mouthifesto” or “Declaration of Indegestion” is a great starting point for understanding those items you should always avoid.  

In all of its humor, we really respect the team at Free Range Studios for their creative efforts in raising awareness about these major issues that we must all face in order to better our race.  We share a similar passion for connective todays fast paced lifestyles with an understanding of our responsibilities to the planet.  

In case you missed it last time, you can read our post on “The Story of Stuff” here.

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Wow, what an excellent conference! A game changer. I have to thank my friends over at Village Green Energy for hooking me up with a free pass. I’ve been so passionate about this movement as long as I can remember… ever since 6th grade when I messed around with electromagenetic fields and plants. Early education for me was all about ecology and environment, and that followed with rigorous economics in college, which I didn’t quite understand about myself until now. Having not gone into banking with my degree and now seeing the state of the economy I was like shit… but David Suzuki put it so clearly… it’s (eco)nomics. I can’t believe I never recognized that. I automatically associated economics with the greedy, short-sighted mentality of Wall Street that focuses solely on the bottom line and exploiting the market for cash and egoic status. Yet you realize the bottom line is not the statement of cash flows or the balance sheet… it’s the fuckin planet. Ecology + Economics = Sustainability. This conference was absolutely buzzing! People were feeling alive and connecting and touching each other like I’ve never seen in my life. We all knew the green revolution is ready and about to change the world in a big way.

The keynotes were superb with Al Gore, Jerrry Brown, and David Suzuki really leaving a moving impact on me. Nobody was afraid to go deep. Sure there was plenty of talk about clean tech innovations or green building or policy changes.. but more so people were incredibly open about spiritual and conciousness based changes that are going to take place around the world to solve this crisis. Sarah Susanka even brought the crowd to tears with her moving presentation. It’s so much bigger than green or solar or oil… it’s about enlightening the human race that we are one and we share the same spirit with each other and with the world as a whole. I found it to be quite the religious experience to be at this conference. A few others being recently when I went into the wild of Alaska for a few weeks and when I saw the Dalai Lama speak in Bethlehem, Pa.

Aside from the heavy stuff, there were tons of innovative companies doing everything from cutting edge solar installs, to green acrhitecture consulting, to new age battery storage, smart grid stuff, efficiency software, New Resource Bank (which is exploding with business during this banking crisis… lol gotta love it!) and sooo much more. You had builders, utility reps, entrepreneurs, mad scientists, engineers, and everyone was so open and loving and connecting. I was blown away… it took me 3 full days to digest it all.

There were also brilliant seminars and panels, the best one for me being the State of Investing in Clean Tech, where partners from KPCB, Foundation, Sigma, and DFJ (all the big Menlo Park firms) talked about what companies they’re investing in and what technology is working… and yet something was different. These are VCs and of course money is there first concern, but with this clean green movement we are finally going to enter into a phase of social… or better yet eco-capitalism… where we benefit the environment and the social welfare of all while making a shitload of money and creating a shitload of jobs. This is an unprecendented opportunity in economic human history. Create a concentrically cyclical supply chain and pass the prosperity around the world. I was inspired by the VCs stories of how they’re going green in their own lives and their deep personal commitment.

A few themes from the conference to leave you with:

1) Nature to the grid baby – energy, health, architecture

2) Ecology + Economics = Sustainability (Eco-Capitalism)

3) Sky power will fuel the earth

4) The only thing special about humans is our foresight… our ability to see and shape the future. So lets use it.

5) A new connected conciousness is emerging that will limit the individual ego that has evolved and scorched our earth with fragmented, disjointed, greedy agendas. The only chance at eternal life is if we live together as one.

6) Be the change you want to see in the world!

In my humble opinion, these are unprecedented and magical times in the history of our race and our planet. There’s no better place to be then right here, and right now.

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Clear, clean, light pale-straw

Nose: candy, sherbert, fresh, lime-minerality, tinned-peaches, honey

A lot fuller – more dimension to it, broader on the entry, much fuller mouth feel, more bracing finish… would stand up to food a lot better than the Riesling-Kabinet. A bit more graceful – certainly not as lively but certainly better rounded.

Serve with: shell-fish (scallops pan-seared in chilli-infused olive oil)

or – with Thai-green curries/ Chicken Korma with pineapple and coconut

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