This is Rubbish

On Sunday the 11th of April, This is Rubbish, Pangolin's Ark and The Arcola Theatre curated and delivered a sustainable food marathon as part of the Arcola's Green Sunday program.

There were free food events, workshops and talks during the day with a range of experts, artists and collaborators making the program diverse, informative and creative. In the day, guest speakers included Kelvin Chung Director of Food Cycle, Lisa Stockton, manager of Happy Kitchens, Anna Jones from Greenpeace, Part time Carnivore and Rebecca Temple from SOAS food coop. We also had artists running workshops including edible poetry from Talia Randall, the mobile dining table from Alex Parry and chocolate sculptures from Tabitha Gravener and Will Vanwyngaarden who created a satirical food advertisement. Down to Earth were donated a range of vegetable and salad seeds by Sutton's that were given out to be planted during the day and at the evenings feast. We hope that many seeds will be planted and the harvest digested in the near future.

The evenings feast Dining Down to Earth was a delicious mix of food, arts, and education. The three course menu consisted of food that otherwise would've been wasted, sourced with help from Foodcycle from Sainsbury's and a large London fruit and veg wholesale market. Other ingredients that could not be sourced as surplus were kindly donated by Abel and Cole. The feast also included bread baked by organic Homerton baker Ben MacKinnon of East London Bakehouse, and tasters of Freedom, a frozen fruit smoothie delivered by the Freedom Project, made from ingredients that otherwise would've been wasted handed round at dessert. This is Rubbish would like to say a big thank you to Foodcycle, Sainsbury's, Abel and Cole,  our Wholesale market links The Freedom Project and Ben Mackinnon for providing This is Rubbish with the surplus and sustainably sourced ingredients. The plates were provided by The Whole Leaf company, and the compost caddies that stored the freshly chopped fruit were kindly donated by British Bins. A huge thank you to all organisations that supported the realisation of Dining Down to Earth.

The event was produced on an entirely voluntary basis, including all This is Rubbish project workers and Pangolin's Ark crew. Without our hoards of kitchen (we prepared our food at the fantastic Happy Kitchens) and divine deity volunteers all chipping in, the event simply would not have happened, so an enormous thank you to everyone who helped out cooking on Saturday and Sunday, and all the divine bodies who dressed up as international dirt deities to serve the food in a celebratory, theatrical and enriching manner!

Dining Down to Earth was a feast modelled on the medieval feasting ceremonies, where communities came together to share food, entertainment and ideas in a celebratory and theatrical manner. Wonderful music was played to the tables by Plaster of Paris and Theo Bard and friends, which set a relaxed and evocative tone to the evening. Frannie Donohue and Diego danced an ode to the earth, bringing a stillness to the feast, profoundly exploring the idea of physical connections to the earth through striking and emotional choreography. An informative and educational aspect was added to the feast with insightful and informative speeches given by Tristram Stuart, author of Waste; Uncovering the global food scandal, Richard Reynolds the founder of Guerrilla Gardening and Seb Mayfield from Capital Growth. Collective food preparation was not off the menu, with a large scale fruit salad toss taking place in the street. Feasters and deities tossed chopped fruit in a large tarpaulin that was served up from a shovel! This is Rubbish would like to say a huge thank you to all musicians, artists, key note speakers and feasters for contributing to the inter disciplinary sustainable social feast that was Dining Down to Earth.

Dining Down to Earth was an exciting and exhilarating project to work on, and many links have been established through the realisation of the first This is Rubbish sustainable feast. There are plans afoot to pursue our interest in using the medium of the feast to engage audiences and communities in sustainable food issues while raising awareness about food waste, and proposing political individual and industry solutions. We hope to deliver another food waste feast sometime in the year ahead!

Do visit our facebook page and flickr account for the first batch of photos from the Down to Earth event.