MJ's Brass Boppers lead a Mardi Gras Second Line to an Eat-In at CounterPULSE Theater. Photos: Van Nguyen-Stone of Jomi Jomi

Amara Tabor-Smith knows how to throw a party. I know this because I've taken her dance classes at Rhythm and Motion, housed now at the ODC Dance Commons in San Francisco, for almost 20 years. It might be early in the morning but there's a feel-good groove going on in that dance studio. The Oakland-based choreographer and performer has created a tight community, it's a bit like going to church, if church is a place where you shake your booty, swivel your hips, and stamp your feet. Tabor-Smith's energy, spirit, and modern dance moves have inspired legions of fans.

In the past year or so we've discovered a mutual interest in food. Tabor-Smith has hosted food parties and events, including "Visceral Feast" at La Pena Cultural Center in Berkeley and "Fresh From the Oven" at the Tenderloin National Forest in San Francisco, as she workshops a performance piece about food traditions inspired by her mother's family gumbo tradition, and recent trips to New Orleans, Senegal, and Congo (find more details on her blog.)

So it's no surprise then that Tabor-Smith hosted a soiree featuring movement, music, and food on Tuesday in honor of both the 100th anniversary of International Women's Day and Mardi Gras.

The event, dubbed an Eat-In, kicked off with a three-block Second Line featuring authenticly festive NOLA beats by MJ's Brass Boppers. The Second Line started at the corner of 8th and Mission Streets and snaked its way to CounterPULSE, a non-profit performance space for emerging artists and cultural innovators where Tabor-Smith is currently an artist-in-residence.

The meal was pot-luck and appropriately home-style. Rice, beans, salad, and Tabor-Smith's trademark Jamaican-style Coconut Cornbread, which features buttermilk and shredded coconut, accompanied her Recession Roots Stew. A fellow dance student, Claire Bobrow, had whipped up a pile of crepes in honor of Fat Tuesday and adults and children were happily slathering them with Nutella.

Among the attendees spreading the gospel of good food: Nikki Henderson, executive director of People's Grocery, and Dannae Washington, who helps runs the West Oakland food justice and education group's Grub Box program. Also on hand: Chef Bryant Terry, author of Vegan Soul Kitchen and co-author of Grub: Ideas for an Urban Organic Kitchen, whom Tabor-Smith collaborated with on "Visceral Feast." Chowing down in the crowd: Students from Mission High School and Pie Ranch youth worker Mary Ann Brooks, who helps these teens make healthy connections within the food system.

The Eat-In was part of a series of food-focused meet-ups culminating in a performance piece at CounterPULSE in April called "Our Daily Bread," a collaboration between Tabor-Smith's Deep Waters Dance Theater, director Ellen Sebastian Chang, and visual artist Lauren Elder.

"Our Daily Bread" is billed as a program of dance, text, and video that examines food traditions and how they're linked to cultural identity -- and impacted by industrialized agriculture, fast food culture, and the global food crisis. How do you, for instance, recreate your mother's gumbo when fish stocks are threatened and some species contain dangerously high levels of toxins?

And the thinking behind the community gatherings leading up to the performance premiere?

"These events are about sharing food, coming together, cooking together, and eating together, which is something most of us don't do enough of these days," says Tabor-Smith, who also teaches at UC Berkeley. "We're at a time when food has been exotified and people focus on restaurant dining. But there's nothing more beautiful than sharing a home-cooked meal together."

Event Details:

Our Daily Bread
April 14-24, Thursdays-Sundays, 8 p.m.
CounterPULSE
1310 Mission Street
San Francisco
Tickets $15-22 available at Brown Paper Tickets.

Scenes from the upcoming performance piece exploring food, "Our Daily Bread" features dancer Amara Tabor-Smith. Photos: Ana Teresa Fernandez, courtesy of CounterPULSE

One of the things that makes the Bay Area such an irresistibly lovely place to live is that, by and large, we're a buoyant lot. Let those on the other coast stomp slushily to the treadmill this morning to suffer for all their bacon-and-eggnog holiday excess. We'll be out here in the Pacific sunshine, picking Meyer lemons to squeeze into our green tea and visualizing abundance--not necessarily around our midriffs, but in our lives and others'.

Too often, it seems, gastronomic New Year's resolutions are all about "don'ts"--don't love the deep-dish at Little Star or the bacon cheeseburger at Marlowe so much; don't demolish half a loaf of Outerlands' bread in one sitting unless you've walked from Russian Hill and back to get it; don't spend more at Blue Bottle than you put in your savings account every month.

Instead of focusing on cutting things out (like the freebie salumi at Adesso's twice-daily aperitivi hour or the chocolate egg creams at Sidekick in the Ferry Building, to name just a few of my own local pleasures) this year, why not focus on adding things in? Things that are fun, things that last, things that do good for your community and for the beautiful and winter-greened land we all call home.

This year, why not resolve to:

Mural and compost at Free Farm

Get Dirty, Grow Locally

A community garden plot is a great place to start, but why not share your labor and get to know your neighbors? Volunteer at one of the numerous urban farms that have sprung up around the Bay Area. Willing hands are always needed, especially in the cold, rainy, tomato-less months. And not all the jobs require heavy lifting or complete mobility; I've spend many afternoons poking seeds into flats, transplanting seedlings, and making signs.

Dig, dine, and dance! Sign up for the monthly newsletter from Pie Ranch. The country outpost of Mission Pie, this small farm is located down the coast in Davenport, just north of Santa Cruz. On the 3rd Saturday of each month, the ranch hosts a community workday, followed by a potluck supper and a barn dance with a caller.

A fun outing for families is Marin Organic's Monday afternoon Glean Team. Each week, a different organic farm in Marin lets locals pick through their already-harvested fields for not-quite-as-pretty (but just as delicious) produce. The boxes of fresh, local veggies are distributed directly to schools in Marin. Afterward, gleaners can pick a round for themselves. (You'd be surprised what kids will eat when they've picked it themselves--especially if they've gotten good & muddy in the process.)

Strawberry Jam

Can It, Brine It, Carve It

Would-be urban homesteaders have a lot of choices these days. Longing to swap out the Heinz's for your own homemade ketchup and pickles? Then the folks at Happy Girl Kitchen have a workshop for you. (And for the truly serious among you, there's "Advanced Jam," prerequisite required.)

Charmed by winter's citrus, but afraid of ending up with sticky clementine soup or Meyer-lemon jello blocks? Put yourself in the knowledgeable hands of June Taylor, the British-born queen of marmalades. No one in the Bay Area takes fruit work as seriously (or finds it as fascinating) as Taylor does. At $200 per person, her small, hands-on classes are pricey, but her intelligent, carefully structured how-tos will forever take the guesswork out of your canning.

Prefer salami to jellies? The nose-to-tail classes in butchery and meat preservation at Fatted Calf will expose your sexy inner butcher. Get on their mailing list to sign up for a class; they sell out fast. (Classes are offered in both their Napa and their Hayes Valley locations.)

In Bernal Heights, Avedano's offers monthly "Butchery for Adults" and "Advanced Butchery" classes, as well as classes in trussing, carving, and curing.

...Then Talk About It

What do we talk about when we talk about food? Everything from the eco-sustainability of small-scale meat production to the history of heirloom apples has become food for thought lately. If you're curious as to what the Bay Area's farmers, writers, makers and thinkers are thinking about, check out the calendars at Kitchen Table Talks and 18 Reasons. Both offer an intriguing roster of thought-provoking events, talks, and panel discussions.

At Headlands Center for the Arts, performances, artists' presentations, and gallery talks are often preceded by a communal meal in the old mess hall. Sometimes, however, the meal itself is the event, as local or visiting artists and chefs come together to get inspired by the palette of the windswept, (supposedly) ghost-ridden landscape of the Marin Headlands, using mostly local and mostly organic produce, meats, and fish as their medium. Have more time than money? Volunteers are often needed to help in the kitchen, set up, serve, and clean up.

Elsewhere in Marin, the Marin Agricultural Land Trust (MALT), which works to preserve farmland in Marin while educating the public about conservation, is currently accepting volunteers for its two training sessions in January and February. The training will include trips to farmers, ranchers, and dairy farmers in the area.

...And Give Back

The holidays may be over, but the need at local food banks, soup kitchens, and food pantries remains just as strong. Find out when, where, and how to help, now that the Thanksgiving-to-Christmas volunteer crush has subsided.

On Tuesday, April 7 at 6pm, the Red Vic movie house hosts a benefit for Pie Ranch, the farm and urban youth education center that also runs the popular Mission Pie. On the bill is a showing of the documentary King Corn the story of two hapless city guys who enter the world of Midwestern commodity farmers by leasing and growing a single acre of Iowa corn. King Corn will be followed by a 12-minute video exploring Pie Ranch and the farm-to-school education programs that it's established with students from San Francisco's Mission High.

Popcorn grown at Pie Ranch will be available, of course, along with local brews from Magnolia Brewery and wine from Sutton Cellars. Beer in hand, you'll also be able to tour the newly planted kitchen garden of The Alembic next door. Snacks will come from The Alembic, including some using herbs and vegetables harvested right behind the restaurant.

Eight years ago, the Red Vic's staff took their smoke breaks in a weedy backyard growing nothing but clumps of wild fennel. Then theater volunteer Lee Pickett, looking for a space to garden, started trucking in better soil and digging in plants. Now, sneaky patches of mint push up around flowering perennials, bees hum from flower to flower, and a heavily laden lemon tree seems to call out for a hammock and a tall glass of iced tea.

The most recent addition to this secret garden is a collection of some two dozen donated wine barrels filled to their brims with organic soil and compost. Planted in February, the barrels are already nourishing a collection of robust edibles: red radishes shouldering out of the dirt, peppery arugula, spring onions, thumbelina carrots, tarragon, sorrel, oregano, sage, and more, all cared for by Pie Ranch intern (and Mission High student) Francisco Figueroa.

While production levels are limited by the amount of space and sunlight available, Alembic chef Jordan Grosser is already smitten by the harvest growing right outside his door. "I come out here every day," to check out the progress of the plants, he admits, adding that later in the summer he hopes to do a special dinner featuring their garden produce in every course.

Bar manager (and cocktail alchemist) Daniel Hyatt agrees. Already, Hyatt is infusing honey with the garden's lavender for the gin-based Bee's Knees, and livening up the gin, lime, and celery juice of the Southern Exposure with lots of freshly snipped mint. Says Hyatt, "The accessibility is what makes it great, to be able to come out and find some inspiration growing in a wine barrel."

Tickets for the benefit are $20-$100.