032 Grist and Toll, an Urban Flour Mill

In episode 32 of the Root Simple Podcast I talk with Nan Kohler, owner and miller at Grist & Toll, a mill in Pasadena, California–and the first mill to operate in the L.A. area in the last one hundred years. We discuss varieties of wheat, the health benefits of whole grains, how to work with them and why flavor is important. Kelly is not on this episode but will return to the podcast next week. Links Ruth Reichl visits baker Richard Bertinet in E...

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Forager and Humanurist Nancy Klehm in Los Angeles

...le Urbanforage Walk Saturday February 16 4 to 6 pm. February, is the ideal time to forage Los Angeles! Nance Klehm will be leading this urbanforage. On this walk, we will learn to identify edible and medicinal plants, hear their botanical histories and stories of their use and share tastes of what we find. The urbanforage will start with an herbal beverage and end with a simple herbal food shared over discussion of the experiences and questions ge...

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Let’s Pedal Together in this New Year

...positive for COVID. In the past week my great desire was to get back to my urban homesteading/appropriate technology lane. A journalist called me on Tuesday to interview me for an article on urban homesteading in a pandemic. She asked me what I thought of as the most important activity in the homesteading tool basket. I said that it’s not growing vegetables or canning things it’s getting to know your neighbors and forming communities of mutual sup...

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24/7: Late Capitalism and the Ends of Sleep

...Our beat on this blog has been appropriate technology, gardening and urban homesteading (whatever that means!). Ironically, Kelly and I have had to spend a lot of time in front of screens researching and writing about these very analog subjects that, for the most part, involve an off-line engagement with the natural world. We’ve done this at a time of the explosive growth of social media. Early on there was a line of thought that social media coul...

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A Love Supreme

...te developers. I’m also sticking my neck out because I’ve seen some in the urban homesteading movement drift towards what I’d call a fascist and/or alt-right adjacent ideology and I want to distance myself from that contingent. More on that in another post. I believe that the way we treat the environment, our bodies and our households is on a continuum with the way we take care of all people. Everyone has a right to health care, housing and educat...

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