Fresh Take: How Extreme Weather Impacts Our Food

Summertime sweat is here in New York City—and probably where you’re reading this, too. After the hottest week ever recorded, it’s looking like we are in for it this season. And it still could be one of the coolest summers of the rest of our lives, according to Vox.

Extreme heat impacts the workers across our food system the most—especially the folks picking fruit and produce in the fields, from apple orchards in Washington state to salad from Salinas, California. There’s also the ongoing stress on food production itself. Last year’s drought caused many cattle to be killed early because they didn’t have enough grass to eat or water to drink, and that led to a major drop in prices that will hurt the industry for years. Then there’s the extreme weather like flash floods—and the 1,000-year rain that hit the Northeast’s farming hub around New York’s Hudson Valley and Vermont earlier this week—that can wipe out an entire crop in a few days.

Getting fresh food to our plates isn’t easy. Appreciate it, and enjoy this summer weekend!

— Chloe Sorvino, Staff Writer

Order my book, Raw Deal: Hidden Corruption, Corporate Greed and the Fight for the Future of Meat, out now from Simon & Schuster’s Atria Books.

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What’s Fresh

The Future Of Fungi: Smallhold Sets New Standards For Farming With B Corp Certification

In 2017, Smallhold was born in a shipping container in Brooklyn that housed mushrooms grown by Andrew Carter and Adam DeMartino. They launched with one mission in mind: feed more Americans mushrooms. Six years later, Smallhold has macrofarms around the country, can be found at major grocery stores and well known restaurants, and they just announced their B Corporation certification.

Forbes contributor Christopher Marquis recently spoke with Andrew Carter, CEO and cofounder of Smallhold, about the market challenges and opportunties, the company’s growth and what’s ahead. Read the interview here.

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Record-Breaking High Temperatures: Here’s Where The U.S. Has Hit New Highs For 2023

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The Next Chipotle? Cava Stock Briefly Hits All-Time High As Wall Street Eyes Expansion

Cava shares surged again Thursday to a fresh all-time high, making the burgeoning Mediterranean fast-casual chain one of the most valuable restaurant groups in the world and drumming up dreams that it could follow Chipotle’s growth trajectory.

Field Notes

I hear it’s Tomato Girl Summer, and my garden is popping off! I love my South-facing terrace, where I grow hot peppers like scotch bonnets and jalapeños, shishitos, tomatoes, tomatillos, pole beans and herbs. My cherry tomato plant is doing particularly well, so I harvested nearly 100, my biggest haul ever, last night and made my first summer sauce of the season.

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Chloe Sorvino leads coverage of food and agriculture as a staff writer on the enterprise team at Forbes. Her book, Raw Deal: Hidden Corruption, Corporate Greed and the Fight for the Future of Meat, published on December 6, 2022, with Simon & Schuster’s Atria Books. Her nearly nine years of reporting at Forbes has brought her to In-N-Out Burger’s secret test kitchen, drought-ridden farms in California’s Central Valley, burnt-out national forests logged by a timber billionaire, a century-old slaughterhouse in Omaha and even a chocolate croissant factory designed like a medieval castle in northern France.