{"id":18518,"date":"2015-03-25T14:53:45","date_gmt":"2015-03-25T18:53:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wordpress-367309-1145705.cloudwaysapps.com\/?p=18518"},"modified":"2015-03-25T14:53:45","modified_gmt":"2015-03-25T18:53:45","slug":"foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/","title":{"rendered":"Foraging, Fermentation, And A Food Forest: Old Tree Brewery’s Ecosystem Of Good"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"old<\/a>
Photo credit: Shutterstock<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

We’ve featured a number of restaurants and food producers<\/a> focused on “rescuing” ingredients that would otherwise go to the landfill. While the use of food that would otherwise go to waste sets these establishments apart, so does the fact that they’ve got to be flexible with their offerings – no one knows what ingredients they’ll have to work with tomorrow or next week. This kind of focus and flexibility also applies to Brighton, UK-based Old Tree Brewery<\/a>, a venture that makes both fermented and soft drinks from whatever produce comes their way.<\/p>\n

While the notion of turning excess food into drinks was enough to catch my eye, I wanted to share this story because founders\u00a0Nick Godshaw and Tom Daniell have created an ecosystem of sorts to “feed” their own passions. Not only do these twenty-somethings want to keep edible food out of “the skips,” but they also want to use these efforts to fund the establishment and maintenance of an 18-acre food forest<\/a>. Essentially, they’re following nature’s model of turning waste into food… mostly metaphorically, but, at some levels, also literally.<\/p>\n

On the input side, Godshaw told Michael Segalov at Munchies<\/a><\/em> that “We get fruit from a whole load of places. We\u2019ve struck a deal with a greengrocer who supplies stores in Brighton and London…\u00a0At the end of the week, we get his surplus stock that otherwise would end up in the bin.” Other opportunities pop up more irregularly: “One weekend a supplier called us up, and asked if we wanted 1500 over-ripe mangos, for next to nothing.” Whatever ingredients reach them are turned into bottled drinks: their current offerings include “…classic ginger beers and pink lemonades, as well as green tea kombucha, nettle iced tea and elderflower cider.” The mangos became “juices, preserves, and mango wine.”<\/p>\n

Fermenting Food Waste into a Forest Ecosystem<\/h3>\n

The purpose here isn’t just to make a buck, though: Godshaw and Daniell want to use the profits from their venture to fund sustainable agriculture initiatives, specifically their food forest. The idea is to produce value that’s returned to ecological restoration: according to their website, “We are\u00a0like ants in\u00a0food\u00a0drink and\u00a0production:\u00a0planning a takeover based on plant landscapes\u00a0& collective\u00a0intelligence to\u00a0create the conditions for\u00a0earth repair.” And while they do want to grow, the plan is to keep their enterprise local and humanly scaled, so as not to undermine their restoration efforts.<\/p>\n

Pretty idealistic, no doubt, but there’s clearly some business savvy at work here, too: they note how their costs often boil down to “the supplier\u2019s time and the cost of transport.” That’s got to create fairly healthy margins, regardless of how idealistic you are.<\/p>\n

Have you had the opportunity to try one of Old Tree’s products? If so, tell us what you thought. And if you know of similar efforts – anywhere – share those with us, too.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Brighton, UK-based Old Tree Brewery follows an ecosystem approach of turning waste into food with its bottled drinks made from excess produce.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":56,"featured_media":18520,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36,13],"tags":[6491,7997,4150,6724,1300,5661,7995,7994,7996,202],"yoast_head":"\nOld Tree Brewery's Ecosystem Approach To Bottled Drinks<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Brighton, UK-based Old Tree Brewery follows an ecosystem approach of turning waste into food with its bottled drinks made from excess produce.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Old Tree Brewery's Ecosystem Approach To Bottled Drinks\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Brighton, UK-based Old Tree Brewery follows an ecosystem approach of turning waste into food with its bottled drinks made from excess produce.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Sustainablog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-03-25T18:53:45+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/03\/restoring-ecosystems-one-bottle-at-a-time.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"640\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"436\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/person\/9b578e764fdaeb0c31f2d565d3f02b30\"},\"headline\":\"Foraging, Fermentation, And A Food Forest: Old Tree Brewery’s Ecosystem Of Good\",\"datePublished\":\"2015-03-25T18:53:45+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2015-03-25T18:53:45+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/\"},\"wordCount\":505,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#organization\"},\"keywords\":[\"brighton\",\"drinks\",\"fermentation\",\"food forest\",\"food waste\",\"london\",\"Nick Godshaw\",\"old tree brewery\",\"Tom Daniell\",\"UK\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Business\",\"Sustainability\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/\",\"name\":\"Old Tree Brewery's Ecosystem Approach To Bottled Drinks\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2015-03-25T18:53:45+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2015-03-25T18:53:45+00:00\",\"description\":\"Brighton, UK-based Old Tree Brewery follows an ecosystem approach of turning waste into food with its bottled drinks made from excess produce.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Foraging, Fermentation, And A Food Forest: Old Tree Brewery’s Ecosystem Of Good\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/\",\"name\":\"Sustainablog\",\"description\":\"Since 2003, Sustainablog has been one of the pioneers of sustainability news online.\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Sustainablog\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/cropped-sblog-logo_3b.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/cropped-sblog-logo_3b.jpg\",\"width\":200,\"height\":142,\"caption\":\"Sustainablog\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"}},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/person\/9b578e764fdaeb0c31f2d565d3f02b30\",\"name\":\"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/36b723ef9244464afe2e59d68b238a07?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/36b723ef9244464afe2e59d68b238a07?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg\"},\"description\":\"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg is the founder and editor of sustainablog. You can keep up with all of his writing at Facebook, and at Google+\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/author\/jeffmcintirestrasburg\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Old Tree Brewery's Ecosystem Approach To Bottled Drinks","description":"Brighton, UK-based Old Tree Brewery follows an ecosystem approach of turning waste into food with its bottled drinks made from excess produce.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Old Tree Brewery's Ecosystem Approach To Bottled Drinks","og_description":"Brighton, UK-based Old Tree Brewery follows an ecosystem approach of turning waste into food with its bottled drinks made from excess produce.","og_url":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/","og_site_name":"Sustainablog","article_published_time":"2015-03-25T18:53:45+00:00","og_image":[{"width":640,"height":436,"url":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/03\/restoring-ecosystems-one-bottle-at-a-time.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/"},"author":{"name":"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg","@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/person\/9b578e764fdaeb0c31f2d565d3f02b30"},"headline":"Foraging, Fermentation, And A Food Forest: Old Tree Brewery’s Ecosystem Of Good","datePublished":"2015-03-25T18:53:45+00:00","dateModified":"2015-03-25T18:53:45+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/"},"wordCount":505,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#organization"},"keywords":["brighton","drinks","fermentation","food forest","food waste","london","Nick Godshaw","old tree brewery","Tom Daniell","UK"],"articleSection":["Business","Sustainability"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/","url":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/","name":"Old Tree Brewery's Ecosystem Approach To Bottled Drinks","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#website"},"datePublished":"2015-03-25T18:53:45+00:00","dateModified":"2015-03-25T18:53:45+00:00","description":"Brighton, UK-based Old Tree Brewery follows an ecosystem approach of turning waste into food with its bottled drinks made from excess produce.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/foraging-fermentation-and-a-food-forest-old-tree-brewerys-ecosystem-of-good\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Foraging, Fermentation, And A Food Forest: Old Tree Brewery’s Ecosystem Of Good"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#website","url":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/","name":"Sustainablog","description":"Since 2003, Sustainablog has been one of the pioneers of sustainability news online.","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#organization","name":"Sustainablog","url":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/cropped-sblog-logo_3b.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/cropped-sblog-logo_3b.jpg","width":200,"height":142,"caption":"Sustainablog"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"}},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/person\/9b578e764fdaeb0c31f2d565d3f02b30","name":"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/36b723ef9244464afe2e59d68b238a07?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/36b723ef9244464afe2e59d68b238a07?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg"},"description":"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg is the founder and editor of sustainablog. You can keep up with all of his writing at Facebook, and at Google+","sameAs":["https:\/\/sustainablog.org"],"url":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/author\/jeffmcintirestrasburg\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18518"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/56"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18518"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18518\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18520"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18518"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18518"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18518"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}