Lots of people have opinions about food these days -- and they probably should.

As a former management consultant, community organizer, and community farmer, I think everyone is right on this one -- food and food production are central to much that's crucial to life now and in the next decade.

They are the site of the battles between large and small scale, high technology and low, industrial and alternative, corporation and community. -- Although, it's not so simple. Conventional agricultural practices are practically traditional by now. Organic and sustainable agriculture are an interesting combination of old and new, and can be local or industrial-size. And the tensions between top down and bottom up map perfectly on the sides of the arguments about the new green revolution in Africa.

Why do people care and what do they think is at stake in these battles is what I cover in interviews. Their words make a lot come to life -- how it feels to do certain jobs, to live in specific places, to have certain skills and passions.

What's For Dinner is peoples' stories about food and agriculture that flesh out battles for health, pleasure, the environment, and for control of land, money and power.

Please let me know what you think. I try to share voices and personal histories in ways that show how much there is to respect in the strength of convictions on all sides. I need you to help me know that you hear that, too.

Farmers go back a long time in my family on my mother's side -- they came to northeastrn Ohio from Connecticut in the early 1800s, and went to Wisconsin and Nebraska in the late 1800s. I have a Wharton MBA and am a Seminary graduate. I worked on environmental justice as a community organizer for a while before urban agriculture made me rediscove my farming roots. For the Episcopal Church's Committee on Science, Technology and Faith I developed resolutions concerned with GM food and food security. I helped save the 350 year old farm where I managed the raspberry field.

I really enjoy connecting the dots. That shows in What's for Dinner. When you listen to people talking about food and agriculture, you learn what makes some very interesting people tick as well as a lot more that makes things about today's world come clearer.

Follow What’s for Dinner and you can check out how food and agriculture underly international incidents and global warming, restoring the meaning in life, tumult in financial markets, and children's behavior problems in school.

I like meeting people at meetings and conferences. In 2010 I attended 2 of the 5 workshops exploring competition issues in agriculture (in Fort Collins, CO, and in Washington, D.C.) sponsored by the US Department of Agriculture and the Department of Justice. Also the US Social Forum in Detroit and the Community Food Security Coalition annual meeting in New Orleans. The Acres conference in December was on my list.

In early 2011 I hope to attend the CERES conference in LA and the Financial Times meeting on corporate social responsibility in Manhattan.

I like to eat and cook, have loved farmers' markets since going to the one in Philly in the 80s and Pike Place in the 70s. I've begun gleaning, like road trips.