Enjoying the patio and sun at FarmsReach's Farmer-Chef Mixer

Farmers wake with the dawn chorus and sleep at sundown. Chefs are creatures of the night who live by their kitchens. While they might show up bleary-eyed, coffee-in-hand at the market to check out the latest produce, the two seldom find time to hang out. They both want to connect, but like ill-fated lovers in a vampire romance, getting them together is tough.

Connecting farmers and chefs is one of the reasons we built FarmsReach. But we figured we’d do something a bit more direct to celebrate the summer harvest and the growing local food community. So this past Saturday, we held our first Farmer-Chef Mixer at Americano near the Ferry Building market.

We held it at the farm/chef witching hour — that slice of time when the market’s done, but table service hasn’t started yet. It was an afternoon full of fresh, local food and drinks where farmers could meet the people who put their food on tables, and chefs could sample new offerings and meet new producers.

Thanks to some of the people who helped make it such a successful afternoon!

• Paul Arenstam, Gail Corrado, and Darren Abel at Americano graciously donated their time, patio, drinks, and scrumptious hors d’oeuvres and house-made ice cream.
• Brian Kenny at Hearst Ranch donated tasty grassfed, grass-finished mini-burgers.
• Debbie Zachareas at Ferry Plaza Wine Merchant provided some thirst-quenching wine.
• Twilight Greenaway from Civil Eats who later wrote about the event.

We’re grateful to all the chefs and farmers who spent their respective twilights together and took a chance to connect. We’re looking forward to another event in the coming months to savor the fall harvest.