The South Philly Food Co-op isn't a brick and mortar community-centered food hub yet. But there are some great people, working very hard, to make it a reality sooner than later. Since moving (yep, we moved out of our dreamy double rowhouse in Center City) several blocks south, we landed in an entirely different neighborhood and we love it. I could probably hit DiBruno Bros. with a rock from our window to give you an idea of our new 'hood, but we dare not say South Philly since we're still north of Washington. With the move, I thought we should get involved in the co-op we had heard about last year and lucky for us, we got an email about the upcoming events and their recent great news of winning $1,000 at Ignite Philly 7 [on my birthday!]. Check out the winning presentation here.
So the SPFC had a little educational get together last night at the Philly Community Wellness Center (which would be harder to hit with a rock from our window) to talk about what's been happening behind the scenes and to help spread the word. There was a gathering last month [read about it here] where the gluten-free warrior, Genevieve Sherrow, was on hand to talk about all things gluten-free and about her new book, Gluten Free Warrior.
The topic for this month's meeting was peoples' favorite food writers: bloggers [that's us!], authors, columnists, whomever. Everyone brought an appetizer to share and copies of the recipe to hand out. Messy had to stay in and finish up an article, but I brought out some Thai cabbage salad. It's a friend's recipe and a crowd pleaser. Ten of us tucked into some good eats and talked away for 90 minutes and I learned about a newish blog: Reading Terminal Market. Favorite cookbooks were passed around and URLs were written on giant Post-It notes (post to come on the SPFC blog).
It was a really cool group of people and a few dozen more people volunteering a few hours a month will really help things out. I'm definitely on board to help out and bring a co-op to South Philly. West Philly has Mariposa [about to expand] and Weaver's Way now has three locations (West Oak Lane, Mt. Airy and Chestnut Hill), Kensington has one in the works, so why not South Philly!
For those living in the South Philly area (or just north of it, but far enough south to be ejected from the Center City area), there's a big Spring Community Forum coming up next month so mark it on your calendars. Monday March 21st! Learn about who's behind the SPFC, what they've been up thus far to and how to get involved. The meeting will be held at Neumann-Goretti High School on 11th St between Mifflin and Morris Streets at 7pm.
Keep up with the SPFC on the website, facebook, twitter and the mailing list. Filling out this quick survey will help the group determine what prospective members will want from the co-op.
Comment #9 [discounting the one from a vendor from the event] 
