Thanks, Gary. Yes, I'd agree that pretty much any coverage of millets is helpful, even if some minor things or even major things are not entirely correct. Each gives an opportunity to respond in a timely and informative manner. Yes also, that African and Asian uses of millets can add to our food culture. And are already on the margins. A lot of foods and manners of preparing them came with later arrivals, and this process continues. In 2017 I had an idea for a kind of festival in the Washington, DC area, inviting various restaurants or chefs that offered - or could prepare (based on the cuisines in which they specialize) - dishes with one or another millet to the public. Still an interesting idea, I think, altho it might achieve a wider selection in an urban area where such resources tend to be concentrated. (See, for example, https://preply.com/en/blog/cities-with-diverse-cuisine/#id-037f2642ce02f9313... During IWM 2023, Nate Blum had a similar idea for a North American Sorghum and Millets Culinary Experience in Grand Island, Nebraska, and got pretty far with it. The key challenge there was, as far as I understand, how to get a range of chefs to commit to traveling to Grand Iskand. An advantage was proximity to farm country where a couple of these grains in particular are grown (proso and sorghum). Anyway, back in 2017, I actually contacted the Smithsonian Institution about their annual summer Folklife Festival https://festival.si.edu/ to inquire how one might get such a millets component added somehow to the schedule - in the past, they had up to four different components to the summer event, and in 2005, had one on "Food Culture US." Anyway, it was an interesting but not encouraging conversation. I probably should have brought it up again in 2021, following the UNGA's declaration of IYM 2023, but their planning horizon tends to be longer than that. Certainly worth a discussion on putting together a proposal for an event to exhibit diverse uses of millets. We already know or know of several chefs with experience and commitment in this area. Don DO, EL, MI, US NAMA On Fri, Sep 27, 2024 at 11:28 PM Gary Wietgrefe via Collab < collab@lists.millets2023.space> wrote:
Forgiving lack of agronomic knowledge, New York Times exposed various millets (or near millets) providing the public with at least some knowledge that there is more than one millet. That is favorable press (and another contact for our eventual millet new releases). Heavy African tilt should be expected considering the native Ethiopian being interviewed. Many African and Asian-American uses of millet can add to the North American millet story.....Gary
On Fri, Sep 27, 2024 at 6:02 AM <collab-request@lists.millets2023.space> wrote:
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Today's Topics:
1. NYTimes essay mentioning fonio, pearl millet, & teff (Don Osborn)
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Message: 1 Date: Fri, 27 Sep 2024 00:58:11 -0400 From: Don Osborn <don@milletsalliance.org> To: collab@lists.millets2023.space Subject: [Collab] NYTimes essay mentioning fonio, pearl millet, & teff Message-ID: <CA+RHibUcnAzY6=rCO6s+Ae-WuM=3KmjeiBd1rOMNaj= kPqGpPg@mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
The New York Times on Wednesday (25 Sept. 2024) featured a guest essay by Marcus Samuelsson entitled "I?m a Chef. This Grain Should Be the Next Quinoa," in which three millets of Afrian origin were mentioned: fonio, pearl millet, and teff. (Thanks to David Brenner for sharing.)
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/25/opinion/millet-teff-fonio-quinoa.html?unl...
Chef Marcus Samuelsson is an Ethiopian-Swedish-American chef who owns the restaurants Hav & Mar and Metropolis in New York City, among others. In his essay he makes the case for more attention to African foods, and gives personal examples.
A couple of minor issues: First, I'm not sure pearl millet likes waterlogged soils. (Sorghum, in my understanding, does better in heavier soils and/or with temporary watlogging.) Second, regarding imports of teff to the US, some does come from Ethiopia, but my impression is that more comes from farms in the US. (Need some figures on that.)
Pearl millet, of course, is already imported from India, but I'm not aware of any in the US from Africa.
The comparison with quinoa is not new, but the article approaches it in a fresh way, and introduces us to another voice in support of millets
For more about Chef Marcus, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_Samuelsson
Don Osborn, PhD (East Lansing, MI, US) North American Millets Alliance - co-founder