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February 16, 2025

Calling for Help: How Do You Farm Without Land?

It’s as close to a real-life miracle.

Words by
David Cook
Photos by
Sarah Unger

A farmer, his herd and the heartache of liminal space.

dig in
It’s as close to a real-life miracle.

Randall Tomlinson

Circle S Farm
February 9, 2025

We're All Writing Love Letters Together

It all rolls back to love.

This is our Valentine's to you.
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Chattanooga Food Coalition
February 2, 2025

Where is the Plan for our Regional Food Plan?

We can create a regional food plan.

Heavens-to-Betsy. Am I the only one confused here?
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Chef Antonio Tate
January 26, 2025

The Look-Good, Taste-Good Style of Antonio Tate, the Sneakerhead Chef

"I'm a creative, so I'm big on style."

Meet Chattanooga's Sneakerhead Chef
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Daniella Garcia and Tres Leches
January 19, 2025

All the Light Possible: Dani García's Tres Leches Cake

One cake contains struggle, dreams and sweetness.

The story of four generations of women and one Tres Leches cake.
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Bohemian Village + Silas Luster
January 12, 2025

Freedom Is: the Bohemian Village story

Step inside east Chattanooga's most authentic, loving juice bar.

Silas Luster, representation and the meaning of freedom.
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Leftovers

We take a little from here and there for our regular Wednesday column. Leftovers aren't the main course, but still deserve a place at the table.

DIG IN
January 5, 2025

Peach or Barf? We Need a Small Favor, Please

(We'd love to be your Third Best Media Friend.)

Isn’t it funny what life - and 2025 - will bring?
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Imbibe Chattanooga
December 29, 2024

Romance, story and stars: a New Year's Eve invitation

Let the bottle find you.

Wine tells a story. Can we listen?
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Welcome Home
December 22, 2024

Something Bigger: a Welcome Home Christmas Story

Where do you go when you're homeless and dying?

"You know the story about the Grinch whose heart shrinks three sizes too small? I feel like mine has grown three sizes so large."
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Main Street Meats
December 15, 2024

Grace and Letting Go: My First Burger Since 2002

After 20 years of one thing, there was grace to find another.

What did it taste like? My first burger since W. was president?
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NewTerra Compost
December 8, 2024

Farm to Table is not the Full Story

We need a circle, not a straight line.

Farm-to-table. It's our beloved phrase. But it doesn't tell the whole story.
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Gratefull Lunch 2024
December 1, 2024

The Most Beautiful Meal of the Year

Welcome to the 2024 Gratefull Lunch

All the great parts of life were there, all compressed in a few hours' of warm food, generosity and community.
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A Food as a Verb exclusive report
November 24, 2024

The ship has sailed: the inside story of TDA and LFPA Plus.

An exclusive Food as a Verb report

In February 2024, the CEO of a Tennessee food bank emailed a high-ranking Tennessee Department of Agriculture (TDA) employee from her iPhone. The subject line? LFPA Plus.
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Bill Hull, Pruett's Market
November 17, 2024

Meet Bill the Wine Guy and the Willamette Valley

There's nobody like him - or his 60-foot aisle of Pruett's Market wine - in Chattanooga.

Bill Hull is the in-house wine expert - "the wine guy" - at Pruett's Market, the Signal Mountain grocery store.
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Niedlovs, Chattanooga, TN
November 10, 2024

How to Bake a Post-Election Loaf

A poem for uncertain times.

When your heart breaks its leash, Let it go. Let it run.
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Smith-Perry Berries Farm, Ooltewah, Tennessee
November 3, 2024

Without them, we don't eat: a few thoughts on labor.

These are loud days. Two farmers offer perspective.

Roy and his daughter Rebecca run their 1100-acre Jones Farm in north Alabama. Their main crop? Fruit, with some vegetables, grown on 15 acres. During prime season, they need a dozen workers, sometimes more.
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Jersey cow, Bear Creek Farm, Williamson County, Tenn.
October 27, 2024

Know Your Burger: a true farm-to-table story

Meet your local butcher, farmer, processor and cow in this special Food as a Verb presentation.

Our story spotlights a wholesome, intentional relationship between farmers, processors, butchers, animals and restaurant owners. In life and death, these relationships are built on respect. They benefit all involved.
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Southern Squeeze, Riverview, Tenn.
October 20, 2024

Help Heal the System: the Southern Squeeze story

They lined up outside her college apartment. Now, it's Riverview. Kelsey Vasileff's life - and recipes - make others healthy.

Standing tall in a family of meat-eaters, Kelsey Vasileff was 10 when she made her announcement: I'm going vegetarian.
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Alco Cox, Robin Fazio, wheat threshing, contributed photo (Robin Fazio)
October 13, 2024

"Ain't No Power in Paint"

Memories and wisdom from a long-ago wheat threshing.

Today's feature is written by Dr. Robin Fazio, long-time farmer, educator and founder of Baylor School's gardening program and Mechanics' Club.This is a story of authenticity and confidence, not shiny bluster.
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Boyd Buchanan, Chattanooga, Tenn.
October 6, 2024

The Ground Beneath Us: Boyd Buchanan Teaches Agriculture for the 21st century

"It's my favorite part of school."

It is a mid-morning Monday on the 65-acre Boyd Buchanan campus and a dozen students in Melissa Owens's Agriscience class are planting yellow onion sets, moving zinnia transplants to the greenhouse, checking on - really, cuddling - the lop-eared bunny, tilling new beds, making plans for a fall flower sale.
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Farmland, Hamilton County, Tennessee
September 29, 2024

Hamilton County's agrarian crisis: only 1,274 acres of cropland remain.

Hamilton County's lost 5,000 acres of farmland since 2001. And you can't farm without land and money. Where are our county leaders?

What do you need to know in order to farm?That's the question being asked by Southeast Tennessee Young Farmers and Crabtree Farms, who are planning to offer free, farmer-led workshops on sustainable-ag topics next year.
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Judging Table, Sprodeo, CMSCo, Red Bank, TN
September 22, 2024

Welcome to Sprodeo: a love letter to Chattanooga coffee

What happens when Chattanooga's best baristas compete?

On Thursday evening, as Smash Boyz served last-call burgers from the grill and folks downed their second or third drink - Coors in a can, peach LaCroix, 16 oz. Liquid Death - while kicked back on folding chairs inside a Red Bank garage, Tyler Sowrey stepped out from behind the silver-sexy Slayer espresso machine and carried forward two cortados - half steamed milk, half espresso - poured into small, snow-white cups.
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Lupis, Broad Street, Chattanooga, TN
September 15, 2024

Welcome to Lupi's: a story of the simple things.

There was a time you couldn't get a good slice + beer in this town. Dorris Shober changed that.

We are strolling through Flying Turtle Farm, the 68 acres in Cloudland, Georgia, where Dorris Shober and husband John care for pigs, Brangus cattle, a spiral garden, vegetables and flowers - like celosia and zinnias, which Dorris gently talks about like they're dear friends - when this one question almost jumps out of my mouth.
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Amanda and Erik Niel, Little Coyote, St. Elmo, Tennessee
September 8, 2024

Tall boys, $9 burgers and life-changing hospitality:

An honest conversation with 
Erik and Amanda Niel

Since 2005, Erik and Amanda Niel have been exquisitely intentional about taking care of Chattanoogans, building their restaurant careers here on this very premise."We've made them feel comfortable," Amanda said. "If you're really good at it, people have an emotional connection."
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Dave Roberts, Ft. Payne, Alabama
September 1, 2024

Our Labor Day edition:

Easy like Sunday morning

Today? We're exhaling, non-laboring for Labor Day and hope you will, too.
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Alex DeHart, Rudy Bohannon, David Cook, Sarah Unger
August 25, 2024

Happy Birthday, Food as a Verb friends

Our party is your party, too.

For our one-year birthday, we welcome to our new website home. We hope you love it. We sure do.
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