BLOG

The Five Ps

Its been a busy couple of weeks.

First off we had a party. We scheduled it a month in advance with visions of sunshine and spring. When the day arrived, it was in the 30s and overcast. I had made (with the help of my friends Peder and Brandon) 150 individual balls of pizza dough that were rising — I wondered what we would do with all of it. But after foraging for ramps and nettles, cooking down last year’s canned tomatoes, tapping the keg and stoking the pizza oven… people began to show up — despite the cold. It was very fun for me to be making pizzas outside while saying hello to the friends, family and strangers that made it out. A few little kids recognized me from the computer, a friend came for only a minute to give me her lucky $2 bill and at the end of the night, a young boy proclaimed that this was the best party ever! (because he got to make his own pizza)! Similar to the amazingness of the Kickstarter campaign – the party was just as awe-inspiring. Thank you to all who came and thank you to all those who donated their time, products or services:

Summit Brewing Company, Roma di Luna, Spaghetti Western String Co. Boys n the barrels, OMT, 4onthefloor, Spirits of the Red City, Powderhorn365 Photographers, Heart of the Beast Theatre, Dogwood Coffee, Sweets Bakeshop, The Salty Tart, Rustica Bakery, Dinner on the Farm, Kitchen in the Market, Bikram Yoga, Esse Reusable Bags, Minneapolis – St. Paul Magazine, Loon Organics, WEI, Thousand Hills Cattle, Bryant Lake Bowl, Birchwood, Red Stag, Common Roots, Levain, Poor Nobodys, Clara Emma Pottery, The Wedge, Bibelot Shops, Freewheel Bike, Dragsmith Farm, Swany Flour, Whole Grain Milling Co. Crave Brothers, The Ukeladies, Jill Gruenwald, Siri Knutson, Lisa Ringer, Two Pony Gardens, Green Career Tracks, Do it Green! Minnesota, Sewtropolis, Egg | Plant Urban Farm Supply, I Like You, and NiceRideMN

Shortly after the party, we moved out of our house. I always forget how much it sucks to move. And this time, we weren’t moving from one house to another, but from one house to a car. Needless to say we couldn’t fit everything in the car, so there was a lot of craigslisting going on (Mirra did it all – I was just sunning myself).

And then of course planning, this is the most exciting part – I don’t really want to divulge too much as I think it’ll be fun to reveal the episodes as we travel, but there’s a lot of incredible stuff going on in the US. We made 52 episodes in Minnesota, so we could probably do 52 shows in every state, but in most places we have to choose just one or two stories.

Finally we have been wrapping up deals with three sponsors. Strongertogether.coop (NCGA), Toyota and The Family Dinner. We are extremely excited about all three of them.

NCGA (National Cooperative Grocer’s Asscociation) is the overarching organization behind all the great Co-ops in the country. If you aren’t familiar with Co-ops, you should be — their stores are hubs for good food and community. We’ll be stopping at 10 of them across the country doing cooking demos, dinners, film screenings and probably some shopping for trail mix. I’ll also be posting blog entries and recipes on their website. We had been looking for sponsors and couldn’t have found a better fit, we’re very proud to be working with them.

Toyota – I had been feeling bad about taking a gas guzzling car around the county (all wheel drive subaru). Here we were making films about sustainable food systems, while driving 15,000 miles with a car that only gets 20 miles to the gallon… Enter Toyota. Driving a Prius was always the hope, we’d save a lot of money on gas, have a safer car (Mirra’s mom was worried) and do a little less damage along the way. We’re very happy to say that our dreams came true, Toyota is giving us a Prius for the 6 months. There are no obligations to show the car a certain number of times, or praise its wonderfulness, we just have to put their name in the credits and on the sponsor page.  Say what you will about  having a car company sponsor us – we are happy to be reducing our environmental impact.

The Family Dinner – A fantastic book by a truly inspiring person. Written by the \Producer of An Inconvenient Truth, Laurie David loves The Perennial Plate and is getting behind the project in a big way… look for more on this soon!

So there you have it, the Five Ps: Planning, Pizza, Packing, Partnership and a Prius. We leave in a week – I can’t believe it. Oh yeah – we were nominated for SAVEUR magazine best video blog, vote for us HERE.

Thanks again… we’ll see you on the road.