The pandemic could actually strengthen the U.S. food system

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

The shock to U.S. food chains from the coronavirus has been a boon to small- and mid-sized farms and distributors. Could it be the start of a new way to get food?

OMAR FLORES HOLDS up what appears to be a fluorescent green baseball sprouting a forest of leafy trees. Then he pulls a knife from the braided sheath at his belt and expertly cuts the vegetable into flat rounds.

The newest customer to visit G. Flores Produce on the sandy eastern Virginia peninsula known as the Northern Neck, Tom McDougall, chews the raw, crunchy kohlrabi with an expression of reverence. The plant, an exotic-looking German cousin of the cauliflower and cabbage, would fetch a good price in the cities of Washington, D.C., and Northern Virginia.

“Here's this thing that looks like an alien—and it turns out to grow particularly well in the mid-Atlantic?" McDougall says.

It’s also a bright green representative of the vast array of easily-grown, nutritious cultivars left out by an American food system built around just a few species—a symbol of the food system that was and might be again.

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2020/07/pandemic-could-strengthen-us-food-system/

A lot of the small farmers were selling direct to restaurants. Since the pandemic has closed many of them they've had to find other costumers.

[Phoenix61]

1. That sounds really good.

Tastes a bit like broccoli stems, but milder and slightly sweeter.

[TreasonousBastard]

2. We've been doing this for years here. Long Island gave up potatoes years ago to...

concentrate on higher value crops, many of which are sold directly to restaurants in NYC And the surroundings.

New Jersey's monicker "Garden State" has nothing to do with the roses and azaleas in your yard, but because of the huge number of "truck gardens" and farms bringing fresh produce into metro areas.