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Eastside food hub project evolves into Harvest Community Foods

Whether in a single-serving bowl or a week's worth in a box, Chef Andrea Carlson connects communities through garden-fresh food.

Chef Andrea Carlson and one of her creations
Chef Andrea Carlson of Burdock & Co. is at the helm of a community food hub.

What started as a community project is now a combination noodle house and green grocers with a well-known chef at the helm.

Harvest Community Foods, situated in the demographically-shifting Chinatown-Strathcona neighbourhood, first took root as This Space, after a public vote decided that the best use of the site was as a local foods grocery.

Chef Andrea Carlson, of Burdock & Co. is extending that neighbourhood amenity by serving up bowls of hot ramen noodles and stocking shelves with locally made products, artisan foods and fresh seasonal produce.

"To me, Harvest is an excellent opportunity to extend the options for Vancouverites to access local food seven days a week through both our ramen and Noodle Bowl offerings,” says Carlson, “but also as a local food grocery, offering local products that can often only be found at farm markets."

Residents in the Chinatown-Strathcona neighbourhood regularly drop by the food hub for Harvest’s signature noodle soups, made with a variety of fresh, locally available veggies and meats. Harvest also offers Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) shares for boxes of produce available year-round as a single purchase, multiple weeks or an entire season.

 "We offer urban produce, small production vegan and local foods, and our CSA/Harvest boxes of bi-weekly farm produce,” says Carlson, who has recently partnered with the Hua Foundation to create Chinese character signage for our menus to be more inclusive to the historic Chinatown neighbourhood.

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