FOLLOW THE BACK ROADS around the Croton Reservoir in Mt. Kisco, head up a tree-lined hill and suddenly the view opens up to a bucolic landscape of estates and small farms that, from a red tailed hawk’s perspective, are neighbors of Target, strip malls and the Sawmill Parkway of Westchester County. There’s barely a hint that there’s a working farm here, but once Mimi Edelman and Luke, her vociferous Italian Spinone, arrive, the place comes alive. Edelman is a bundle of energy mixed with passion that wholly embraces everything and everyone that comes into her orbit.
– The Valley Table, 2013
If you’ve enjoyed African blue basil or stinging nettles in your dishes in past seasons at farm-to-table inspired restaurants such as Bedford Post or Restaurant North, there’s a good chance they started out in the fields of I & Me Farms in Bedford. Which means they got to your plate through the loving work of Mimi Edelman.
– Bedford2020, 2013
It’s easy to dismiss that as generic committee-speak — is Slow Food about eating well or saving the planet? — but for many, the two are impossible to separate. “Food should have an identity, plain and simple,” said Laura Luciano, an East End resident (and designer by trade) who in 2017 was appointed Slow Food’s New York State Governor. “When a food loses its identity, its cultural value is lost. At Slow Food, we’re good at storytelling, and being around the table and having conversations about food is a way of supporting the community. It’s about joy and pleasure and coming together.”
“At Mimi’s, chefs have the chance to come out and walk the farm,” Luciano continued. “They’re able to see what she’s growing, and if they want an unusual variety, they can work together. They are proud to walk the farm and proud to put those things on their menus.”
– The North Forker, 2018