Friday night I did something I never though I would do: I put on my dancing shoes, hopped on the subway, and went to a farm.
A momentous occasion on any day, but today was the official launch of FoodCycles, Toronto’s first urban farm – and it’s 14km from my house!

Here’s how they describe themselves on their website:

FoodCycles is a city farm not for profit based in the Greater Toronto Area that raises worms, produces nutritious, vibrant soil compost and grows food. Our vision is to create a just and ecological urban food system that encourages all people to come together to grow, learn about, and celebrate food in Toronto.

Now a farm in Toronto may not have been such a big deal, say, 100 years ago…but today, ironically, it represents the way of the future. Aside from growing a market garden, FoodCycles produces more than food: today it’s also a mid-scale composting site that strives to become a worm-bank for fellow urban composters, and plans are in place to incorporate aquaculture (i.e. Growing fish that are fed with the farm’s plants and then using their waste as a source of fertilizer for the land)…Talk about a cycle! And aside from growing high quality soil in an ever-eroding landscape, FoodCycles also grows community – an apt metaphor given the ever-eroding social landscape particularly marked in cities.

I arrived at Friday’s event in the pouring rain, and having had to wander about in the labyrinth that is Downsview Park for a little bit, I was a wee wet when I showed up. I appreciated the dry sanctuary offered by the greenhouse, as I entered into the space that was already hopping with funk tunes and cheerful conversation. I peeled off my jacket, pondering putting it on top of one of the compost piles, thinking that if it was doing its job, it would heat my coat up in no time. But it also might eat my coat up in no time so I thought better of it.

It was apparent immediately that the community I just mentioned was in full swing. I knew probably about half the people through either work or the myriad food projects people had dug into.  Food of course, was in no short supply. The FoodCycles team and laboured the day before preparing a local snack feast, from food grown not 10 metres away! Le menu included kale chips, vegan pesto, kale salad, and coleslaw served on cabbage leaves!

Soon, the lights dimmed, and my friend Ian, a founding member of FoodCycles, and his band The Group of Seven, played a fantastic set that had almost everyone dancing together under the pitter patter far forgotten.  Wait a minute…people dancing at a concert? Is this really Toronto?

At the end of the night everyone pitched in to clean up. I did my part by carting off a massive bag of leftover pesto that will now allow me to indulge freely in the stuff for a good year. (Thanks guys!) Good times and generosity will undoubtedly have me coming back, likely in the form a costumer in Toronto’s first TTC-accessible CSA next spring! And next time they decide to hold a party in the middle of an industrial park on a rainy Friday night? I’ll be there. With my dancing shoes on.