News

‘Nutrition per acre’ –
a new measure of success
Towards the end of last year, whilst listening to an episode of the Regenerative Agriculture podcast, I was fascinated to learn about a prototype handheld spectrometer being developed by the Bionutrient Food Association in the US, which uses the signature of reflected light from food samples to give a potential indication of their nutritional density.

The go-to vegetable grower’s manual for the 21st century
After growers have taken our two-day Principles of Biological Systems course, they frequently ask me if there’s a single book out there that encompasses all that they just learned in the weekend workshop, a book that summarizes the practices and insights which they could dig into and refer to later. This is that book. Coming

Growing food for nutrition
Imagine a future where your food’s nutritional profile was available at your fingertips. Not via a simplified, back-of-pack label, but a real-time snapshot of the nutrient density within the vegetable in your hands. It’s a future where our understanding of what is in our food can tell us how well it’s been grown. Most of

Empirical nutrient testing
I’ve been waiting a decade to write this column. I’m always squeamish about touting something too early. Like friend and fellow pastured poultry enthusiast Andy Lee always said: “I don’t want to hear ‘I’m gonna;’ I want to hear ‘I did.’” How many times have businesses or well-spoken visionaries described “gonna” and everything falls off

We can solve these problems
The Bionutrient Food Association is working with producers to establish growing practices that yield more nutritious crops, while developing a standard for nutrient-dense foods and a handheld tool to measure those nutrient levels. The idea behind the tool is to use existing technology, like the camera in a Smartphone, to scan produce right in the

The Groundwork for Health
Drive up to Kittredge Farm in central Massachusetts, and you’ll find a restored farmhouse with a post-and-beam porch, long hoop houses growing an abundance of seasonal produce and a farmer feeding a herd of beef cows with the help of his 2-year-old son. It’s a classic, pastoral scene of a hardworking farm family. Stay awhile,

Growing super food
An inquisitive second-generation organic farmer named Dan Kittredge, 34, advocates moving beyond organic. He has put together and is popularizing a system for “Bionutrient-Rich Crop Production,” often abbreviated as “nutrient-dense farming.” His method strives to give plants all the nourishment they need to reach their full potential, a premise that makes sense intuitively, scientifically and