This Sunday I’m excited to be part of the Spring Fling and Pesto Competition to raise funds for Chefs for the Marcellus. It’s happening at Ger-Nis Culinary and Herb Center in Park Slope.

Come spend a relaxing afternoon with me tasting pesto and listening to live jazz, while I take a break from book writing for a few hours. You’ll meet some interesting folks in the local food world including Cathy Erway, Jimmy Carbone, Hilary Baum, Matt Timms, and Tamar Adler. We’ll all be there to support Chefs for the Marcellus, a non-profit started by some caring people in the food business to help protect a large swath of our foodshed from fracking. In the words of the organization,

Chefs for the Marcellus is a group of chefs, restaurateurs, and other food professionals who have come together to protect our regional foodshed from the dangers of hydraulic fracturing for natural gas (fracking).  This highly industrialized form of drilling is already in widespread use in 34 states, including Pennsylvania, where it is wreaking havoc with farms and the water supply.  Unless we say no right now, Governor Cuomo is poised to allow fracking in vast areas of the Marcellus Shale, a geologic formation that covers a large area of the mid-Atlantic region, including much of New York’s southern tier — an area of pristine waters; produce, dairy and livestock farms; and breweries and wineries.

You can read extensively about what fracking does to our earth, air, and water, on the Food and Water Watch website.

I don’t know exactly what kind of pesto I’ll be making yet, I’ll let the Saturday Union Square Greenmarket inspire me. Whatever it is I guarantee it will be delicious! Hope to see you Sunday!

Buy tix: Spring Fling Pesto Competition, A Benefit for the Chefs for the Marcellus:

April 29, 2012 12-4 pm, $25, Ger-Nis Culinary & Herb Center, 540 President St Suite 2E, Brooklyn, NY, United States, 11215, 347-422-0337