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Jesse Hirsch Queena Kim

Alice Waters Throws Picnic in Union Square Alley

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By , |August 24, 2011 5:08 p.m. |In Food
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Alice Waters went a little corporate today, co-hosting a boxed lunch event with Levi Strauss & Co. at San Francisco’s Maiden Lane. Amidst a string of daintily decorated picnic tables, a food booth from the Lucy Van Pelt school of design, and fresh garden produce strewn about the courtyard, you could almost forget you were lunching among the designer boutiques of Union Square.
Almost.

When Waters took the stage alongside Levi’s President Robert Hanson, touting the partnership between her Edible Schoolyard Project charity and the monolithic clothing company, the country picnic illusion all but dissipated. Waters quizzed the assembled masses: “What could be more universal than blue jeans and edible education?!” We thought of a few responses, but didn’t think it was the time or place.

After all, this event was in honor of Edible Schoolyard, which has made some undeniably great strides in improving food and food education in public schools. On the almost-eve of Chez Panisse’s 40th birthday, Waters staged this lunch both to raise awareness of her charity’s mission as well as to announce a new line of Levi’s-made Edible Schoolyard t-shirts. Running $30 a pop, these saucy little numbers were designed by David Byrne and Sofia Coppola, among other glitterati.

The box lunches were like precious tiny still-lifes: figs, grapes, radishes and lightly pickled cucumbers strewn about meat (pulled chicken, grilled young shallot, tomatoes, mustard greens, harissa and aoli) and veggie (lemon thyme pistou with butter bean mash, tomatoes, pickled veggies and mustard greens) baguette sandwiches. For only $5 a pop, these boxes were an aspirational take on what school lunches could be, should Edible Schoolyard/Jamie Oliver/etc. continue to win over hearts and minds.

They were also wildly popular, and within an hour all 450 lunches were gone. The line appeared to stretch around the corner, but David Prior, communications director of the Chez Panisse Foundation, said in an email, “I actually think we got everyone fed or at least tried our very best!”
Jesse Hirsch
Jesse Hirsch is a food writer in San Francisco. His work has appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, SF Weekly and the Village Voice. He is the former editor ... View Profile
Queena Kim
Queena comes to the Bay Citizen from 89.3-KPCC, Southern California’s leading NPR-affiliate, where she helped start-up its highly-successful arts and culture show Off-Ramp. As a reporter and co-producer of the show, Queena has done hundreds ... View Profile
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