10th Annual Melon Forum | April 12, 2023

On April 12, 2023, from 5:00 – 7:00 P.M., the Yale Sustainable Food Program hosted its tenth annual Melon Forum at St. Anthony Hall, where ten Yale seniors presented senior theses relating to food and agriculture: Gavrielle Welbel, Meredith Ryan, Kayleigh Larsen, Brianna Jefferson, Ben Christensen, Catherine Webb, Caroline Beit, and Lucie Warga, majoring in subjects from Environmental Studies to Economics. Raphael Berz and Michael Min contributed their prospectuses to our 2023 Melon Forum brochure. Virginia Davis ’23 planned and led the event. The students’ projects ranged across disciplines, methodologies, and theories, utilizing novel approaches to tackling wicked problems in food systems. To view the Melon Forum brochure, please visit this link.

Lucie Warga ’22 began the event with her presentation, assessing the socio-political climate influencing school nutrition standards in the last decade. Drawing from archival research and discussing cultural norms, Warga engaged in an interdisciplinary exploration of food standards for students in U.S. schools.

Following Warga, Meredith Ryan ’22 explained how she used remote sensing and Google Earth Engine to analyze how the Russia-Ukraine war impacted agricultural production in Ukraine. Ryan used sensing technologies to analyze different types of wavelengths absorbed and reflected by chlorophyll in regions of interest to determine the impact of the war on agricultural yields. 

Presentations focused not only on fluctuations in geography, but also on their shifting relationships with the people and environments around them. Catherine Webb ’22 highlighted the Shinnecock Kelp Farmers, a collective of six Shinnecock women  who work to steward the land amidst “social geographies of antagonists and potential allies,” she wrote. Their ancestral relationship with kelp guides their present-day work in kelp farming. Themes of protection, spirituality, and connection imbued Catherine’s thoughtful presentation. 

“You can’t talk about hunger without talking about race,” said Kayleigh Larsen ’22. Larsen’s presentation explored American food politics, activism, and power from 1964 – 1973. Through three case studies—one of which highlighted the Black Panther Party’s free breakfast program—she examined how grassroots organizers used food systems to contest values of an oppressive society. 

Next, Gavrielle Welbel ’22 presented their long-term research on rock weathering in agricultural settings through analyzing carbon dioxide removal, crop yields, and soil pH. In conjunction with a team of researchers and farmers, Welbel studies rock weathering at Zumwalt Acres, a farm which they co-steward in Sheldon, IL.

Next, Brianna Jefferson ’22—advised by YSFP Director Mark Bomford—presented on the intersections of hydroponics and environmental justice. Through interviews with companies in the Northeast and Florida, Jefferson investigated large hydroponic companies’ purported commitment to environmental justice and local communities. She found that while the companies’ commitments were largely opaque, they did at times positively impact communities by providing job opportunities in underserved areas. 

Jefferson’s presentation was followed by Caroline Beit ’22, whose project on the history of breastfeeding in American prisons tracked court cases and political visions of breastfeeding. Studying the racialized double-standards of white and Black women breastfeeding their children, Beit analyzed the effects of court decisions that have affected the accessibility and legality of breastfeeding in carceral settings. While breastfeeding has been repeatedly criminalized, other court decisions have elevated breastfeeding as a constitutional right. 

Finally, Ben Christenen ’22 presented a graph-theoretical project on human population clusters as a function of geography. “People tend to live where they can grow food,” he said. Christensen  used computational methods to explore the geographic conditions conducive to supporting large populations, and considered if natural geographic clusters correlated with canonical ideas of “regions.” 

Around forty students gathered to watch these seniors present their culminatingYale academic works. The YSFP provided wine, a variety of cheeses, and sweet treats. We hope you’ll join us next year at our 11th annual Melon Forum. 

To view photos from the event, please follow this link. Photos by Reese Neal ’25. 

All Pib Slow Play: A sedimentation of history and sound | Friday, April 15th

On April 15th, 2022, from 3:00-5:00 P.M., the YSFP hosted a workday followed by an event called “All Pib Slow Play: A sedimentation of history and sound,” organized by  MFA student Miguel Gaydosh, SOA ‘22, which featured pibil style cooking. In the early afternoon, volunteers started off the workday by preparing for and planting strawberries. They used “flamethrowers” to cut perfectly shaped holes in a black tarp, laid the tarps over a lower field, and planted strawberries in the circular openings. Using silver rods, they pushed the yellowed, spindly roots of the nascent strawberries into the dirt and packed them in with their fingers into the wet mud, careful to leave the fragile web of roots intact and buried deep in the dirt, but the green bud at the top exposed to the sunlight. Long-time  and first-time workday participants squatted side by side over the bunched tarps and planted three rows of strawberries; conversation sprouted between graduate students at the School of  the Environment, farm managers, and first-years meeting each other for the first time. 

At 4:00 PM, volunteers migrated upwards to the Lazarus Pavilion, where the culinary events team had been hard at work preparing food for the event, alongside Guatemalan chef Sandra of La Cocina de Sandra, her husband, and her son. The family slow-cooked some truly spectacular food for the undergrads and many School of Art students in attendance. Throughout the event, Sandra stood supervising several large silver pots with an array of bowls full of chopped and diced vegetables, steam billowing out; she was working on preparing pupusas and tamales. In front of the Farm’s brick oven, culinary events managers heated up a silver tray full of cilantro and lime rice, slowly stirred a basin of beans, and cooked Guatemalan-style chow mein. At the wooden picnic tables, Catherine Rutherfurd ’22 mashed coconut rice pudding she made in a tray with gloved hands. Underneath our chalk sign sat a few pots of agua de jamaica (hibicus water). As all this culinary goodness unfolded, Miguel and his fellow students soundtracked the event with slowed Xumbia and ambient music, reflecting the slow cooking which was happening in the pib. 

Back behind all the action under the Lazarus Pavilion was the star of the event: the pib. Before the event began, culinary events managers took turns digging into the hardened earth to create a 3-feet-wide by 3-feet-deep pit. Once it was dug, the pit was lined with rings of stones stacked atop each other. The team then lit a fire at the bottom of the pib, which heated the stones for several hours and created tons of hot coals. Attendees dropped in sweet potatoes, wrapped in banana leaves and tinfoil, directly over the coals and rocks. Miguel and others then worked together to cover the potatoes with the soil, leaving them to cook underground for an hour. After digging up part of the pit and finding they weren’t yet fully cooked, we re-covered the potatoes with soil for another hour or so, letting them bake underground in the slow cooking pibil style. When the potatoes were finished, they were smothered in honey butter with Cobanero chili and lime. The event was a beautiful fulfillment of Miguel’s vision, which intended in part to teach, practice, and evolve a tradition long held by his Guatemalan family.

Big thank you to Miguel; Sandra and her family; Geo Barrios, who helped organize this event; and everyone who turned out to make this event such a beautifully unique and meaningful evening on the Farm. 

Photographs by Reese Neal ‘25. To view all the photos, please follow this link.

Post by Sarah Feng ‘25.

Moonlight Stories on the Farm

Under a full moon on November 18th, YSFP students Kayley Estoesta ’21 and Ally Soong ’22 hosted a night of spoken word poetry and music on the Farm. With the theme of moonlight stories to guide them, students came together to share their work, perform for each other, and enjoy some bubbling apple crumble during a chilly evening of community. We hope to turn this event—co-hosted with the Jook Songs—into an annual celebration on the Farm. Photos by Reese Neal ’25.

Andi Murphy: Indigenous Foodways & Storytelling

In celebration of Native American Heritage Month, the YSFP joined the Native American Cultural Center (NACC) in welcoming Andi Murphy, Navajo journalist and creator of the Toasted Sister podcast, for a two-part online event, featuring a cooking demo and a conversation that explored indigenous food sovereignty.

A video of the cooking demo can be found below. Follow along to learn how to make one of her favorite dishes, a Wild Rice and Bison Stuffed Poblano Pepper with Pumpkin Seed Sauce.

Art Show: Opening Reception

Ulam: Main Dish

A Film Screening and Conversation with Alexandra Cuerdo

The 6th Annual Melon Forum: senior essays on food and agriculture

A History of SPAM Workshop

Photography by Logan Howard '21.

Asian America is in the Food

Photography by Erwin Li.

Vegetable Kingdom with Bryant Terry

Photography by Noa Hines '21.

American Breads Before 1850

Maria Trumpler, Director of the Office of LGBTQ Resources, kicked off our spring semester knead 2 know series with a special interactive presentation titled, “American Breads Before 1850.” Starting at noon, participants made amaranth crackers from Sean Sherman’s “Sioux Chef Indigenous Kitchen”, as well as “hoe” cakes, rustic corn bread, and beaten biscuits inspired by Michael Twitty’s “The Cooking Gene.”

Maria reflected with audience members on what breads across U.S. history tell us about the deep connections between grain and social life. But more importantly, she noted, these staples help us center the people that history has too often marginalized, such as women, enslaved people, and indigenous tribes. When combined with embodied practice, what we eat then, offers more than an understanding of the past, but honors the ways in which people have shaped our present.

Photography by Sol Thompson '21.

Food & Urban Empowerment with Erik Clemons

In honor of 2020 Martin Luther King Jr. Weekend, the YSFP hosted a conversation with Erik Clemons, founding CEO and President of the Connecticut Center for Arts and Technology (ConnCAT). Based in New Haven, ConnCAT hosts after-school job, arts, and culinary programming to advance the careers of unemployed or under-employed adults and at-risk youth. In a public conversation at Pierson College, Erik shared with students and New Haven community members about his working relationship with Yale, ongoing development projects in Dixwell, and how ConnCAT’s programming has led to meaningful employment and equity in the New Haven community.

This Chewing the Fat event was co-sponsored by Pierson College and the Yale Center for the Study of Race, Indigeneity, and Transnational Migration.

Photography by Logan Howard '21.

Indigenizing the Local Food Movement with Elizabeth Hoover

Indigenous communities around the U.S. have long sustained their unique relationships to culture, land, and one another through food. As part of our Chewing the Fat series, the YSFP invited Dr. Elizabeth Hoover, Associate Professor at Brown University, to speak more about her research on indigenous foodways.

After recording a podcast with YSFP student Amy Zhang ’21, we hosted Dr. Hoover for lunch on the Yale Farm with Yale students and staff (thank you to Sanctuary Kitchen for catering!). The group gathered also to workshop a chapter from her forthcoming book, From “Garden Warriors” to Good Seeds: Indigenizing the Local Food Movement (University of Minnesota Press). In particular, students explored the relationship between food and gender norms through terms like “rematriation”, and asked questions on how climate change affects indigenous food systems and ways of living.

That afternoon, Dr. Hoover began her widely attended public lecture with stories of road trips; for years, she’d driven around the U.S. to meet with various native tribes and communities. Through these travels, she’d documented their seedsaving, farming and other cultural practices, explaining how stewarding seeds has transformative implications for food sovereignty. Seeds, after all, were gifts: they offered both biological and spiritual nourishment to people. YSFP Deja Chappell ’21 moderated the conversation that followed.

The Native American Cultural Center (NACC) hosted Dr. Hoover for a dinner with NACC students and community members. Along with other NACC student staff, YSFP-NACC liaison Catherine Webb ‘22 prepared buffalo creek squash soup, a hominy-bean salad, and sunflower seed cookies. The recipes were inspired by chef Sean Sherman’s Sioux Chef cookbook.

Elizabeth’s visit was co-sponsored by the Native American Cultural Center and the Yale Center for the Study of Race, Indigeneity, and Transnational Migration.

Photography by Addee Kim ‘22.