Dinner for 1,050

Lotta talk about sustainable farming - from about every third person I talk to here.

I have no idea what the word really means, so I ask the food maven, Sonya Dagovitz Kugler, the Chicagoan who organizes the catering and concessions for Farm Aid.

She pauses, before saying:

Not taking out more than you put back.

She gives an example:

While we prefer organic, it's not always about organic. If you're eating an organic strawberry in winter from Chile, that is not sustainable. That is using a lot of energy, a lot of calories to fly something in.

Musicians are famous for insisting on little indulgences back stage, and riders to their contracts spell out things as the brand of bottled water, the colors of M & Ms they find objectionable.

There are no special orders at Farm Aid, she said. The artists understand they there are too many of them, and having seasonal, local and organic food are priorities.

It's just good, nutritious, wholesome food, she said.

For example, dinner for the bands, roadies, crew, etc...  was:

Salad bar and 1,050 servings of roasted herb chicken, smoked pork chops with apple compote, wood-smoked salmon, Asian stir fry, herb-roasted red potatoes, yellow rice with black beans, grilled asparagus and corn on the cob.

Farm Aid's director, Carolyn Mugar, said artists "don't want to cause us any problems. The riders we get are very non-fussy."