After the Super Committee's failed process last fall, Congress faces a new critical deadline: they must take action on the current farm bill before its expiration on September 30, 2012 or risk reverting to the 1949 farm law - the fallback law for the farm bill. More

Have you noticed a jump in the price of organic milk at the market? Or empty shelves in the organic dairy section?

The New York Times reports that the rising cost of organic cattle feed and increasing demand for organic dairy products has led to a nationwide shortage, particularly on the East Coast. More

Several years ago, we posted Dan Barber's amazing TED talk about how he witnessed a more humane way to produce the delicious but controversial fatted goose liver called foie gras. The talk is classic Dan Barber, full of self-deprecating humor and his clearly passionate relationship to food. After his discovery of this more humane method, which eschews gavage, or force feeding, Barber (sort of) vows to never serve conventional foie gras in his restaurants again.

Barber is the chef and co-owner of the well-known Blue Hill at Stone Barns in Pocantico Hills, New York which is a part of an organic, sustainably run working farm. Can he duplicate this method on his farm and once again serve this favorite ingredient? More

Even though we know better, it's hard for many of us city and suburban people to remember the daily labor and enormous risk that a small farmer takes to grow our food. This latest episode from The Perennial Plate is a powerful reminder of how quickly a farmer can be brought to ruin and what we can do to help.

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Did you know that oats, peas, beans, and barley grow in the microgravity of outer space? Indeed they do, and these astronaut crops are having some very interesting effects on earthbound farming as well. NASA researchers are taking the things they've learned about extreme farming in outer space (no natural light, no water source, no pollinators, very limited space) and applying them to farming challenges right here, planetside. More

Think big city cooks are far removed from milking cows and gathering eggs? Not the ones who go to Farm Camp. Now you can be a camper, too!

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Put away your pruners and get out your fishing rods. According to a recent article in Financial Times, backyard fish ponds may be the organic vegetable plots of tomorrow, an easy way for families to sustainably produce their own food.

But first the West needs to get over its aversion to eating carp.

Jimmie Hepburn, organic aquaculture proponent and a one-man carp PR team, points out: More

2009 was the year that issues like local food, sustainable food systems, and agriculture reform went mainstream, and we expect this national conversation to intensify in 2010. Unfortunately, much of the time it looks less like dialogue and more like, as LA Times food editor Russ Parsons writes, "two armed camps deeply suspicious of one another shouting past each other." How can "hard-line aggies" and "know-nothing urbanites" create meaningful discussion and change? More

In the world of cheese lingo, the term farmstead is becoming as popularized as ever. I'd even predict that it'll soon be thrown around as frequently and with as much comfort as grass-fed and free range. But hopefully, by nature of its narrowly defined meaning, the word won't be just another marketing term to exploit that doesn't necessarily mean much at all. More

I wish I could say the most peculiar food I've ever eaten was something fabulous like bugs from a rotting log, or Tofu that smells like a gym locker. Although I've tried plenty of off beat things like squirrel and alligator, I wouldn't call them particularly exotic anymore. But I will tell you the rarest food I've ever partaken of was so delicious, it makes me wish I had a farm in the middle of Nebraska... More