A Move in the Markets

A year into the pandemic, small-scale passion projects flourish

by

Just before sunrise on a spring morning, Rome Julian will start up his stake bed truck, revving the engine to a steady purr. He’ll turn the dial on his radio, releasing New Orleans’ most iconic soundtracks, courtesy of WWOZ, out of the open doors. Julian might worry about the brass band music disturbing the neighbors at this hour, if he had any neighbors. Boots crushing the dewy grass, he’ll begin to load flats of vibrant microgreens glistening in the cobalt blue twilight, followed swiftly by radishes, turnips, cabbage, kale, lettuce, and green onions. Just as the sun threatens to break the horizon, roosters will crow in protest of his imposing figure collecting cartons of eggs from their warm coops. 

Julian’s farm, Laketilly Acres, sits on a quiet corner of Robert E. Lee Boulevard (soon to be Allen Toussaint Boulevard) and Peoples Avenue in the old Gentilly neighborhood of New Orleans—across the railroad tracks from Southern University and a stone’s-throw from Lake Pontchartrain. A head turn clockwise reveals the distant and shadowy monoliths of the central business district. Laketilly encompasses nearly an acre of land where houses once stood before Hurricane Katrina. The plot is now finely tilled and rowed with carefully cultivated gardens. Plywood and chicken wire coops resting on caster wheels spring up like Stonehenge in the morning mist, rotated daily so the chickens always have a fresh patch of grass to pluck from.

“Right now, I’m setting myself up for the increase in demand.” Julian said. “I have twenty garden beds, each fifty feet wide, all loaded with spring vegetables.”

Julian hasn’t always been a farmer. For seventeen years, and up until the pandemic, he was working over sixty hours a week as a camera assistant on big budget movies, television shows, and commercials. 

“I was already working on this farming idea before the lockdown,” Julian said. “Working in film is tough. Your career can be very long or very short.” The virus wasn’t the first thing to threaten Hollywood South. The film industry has gone through periods of ups and downs. It’s a transient job affected by politics, tax incentives, and union strikes. Film workers often have some sort of side hustle to fill the financial gaps when on-set jobs get lean. 

Julian’s green thumb took hold at his Gentilly home, less than a mile from where Laketilly Acres currently sits. “It became a situation where I had to have a talk with my wife,” Julian laughed. “I was like, ‘Listen, I’m gonna rip the front yard up. Let’s grow some food.’ And that just kinda snowballed to the back yard, then into my neighbor’s yard. Next came the chickens so we could have our own eggs.” Julian started with two chickens, which grew to four, then ten. He now has over twenty laying hens, and fifty pasture-raised meat birds.

“The homestead took priority in numerous ways,” he said. “I have to eat, not just pay the bills.” 

It wasn’t long before his phone started to ring. Word about his microgreens, produce, and eggs had spread to not only friends and family, but to chefs across the New Orleans area. 

“There was a lot of uncertainty at the beginning of the pandemic about going to grocery stores and restaurants,” said Julian. “So, I started delivering. It was way more convenient for people than the risk of getting sick. With all this new technology, people could just pay me on their phone, and I could leave a box on their porch. We didn’t even have to see each other.”

“I think ultimately, what we really learned most this past year is that our dollar is our most powerful thing. Look for the person that you can give your money to. Look for the business owned by a woman. Look for the Black-owned business. Look for that small farmer. Look for those people struggling, and lift them up. Look outside your normal way of doing things. Connect with the growers and makers of your community. Together we will rise. This is the future." —Leah Vautrot 

That’s when everything went full steam: Delivery after delivery, straight out of the ground or a coop, into a box, and onto their plates. Julian quickly realized he had to expand.

“My grandmother used to live in this neighborhood,” he told me. “I found the farm driving down the street. It was just a big empty overgrown lot. After asking around, I found out it was owned by a church, and I spoke with the pastor. I asked about putting a community farm on the land that his congregation would have access to. He said, ‘Go for it.’”

As he hopped into his loaded-up truck to head to the market, Julian flashed a smile that highlighted his trademark handlebar mustache and said, “Just like that, the side hustle became a full time job.” 

Across town on a busy stretch of Broad Street, Leah Vautrot starts her Sunday mornings sweeping the sidewalk as a line starts to form in front of Coffee Science, a Mid-City hub for all things caffeinated. As vendors begin to descend from every direction and unload their goods into the courtyard, she darts about, pointing people to their stations, carrying crates of produce, and placing heavy speakers strategically on the back patio. As co-owner of the coffee shop, she does this every week in anticipation for the weekly farmer’s market that she curates.  

None of this was exactly part of Vautrot’s plan. Like Julian, she worked in the film industry before the pandemic, but as a makeup artist. “Going to a farmers market was never a real option for me,” she said. “We just worked too many hours on set.”

A little over a year ago, Vautrot and her husband invested in Coffee Science—their chosen side hustle. Then the pandemic came, dropping sales by ninety percent practically overnight. Vautrot was forced to furlough her staff and to devote all of her time to finding ways to keep the business afloat. 

“I just wanted to help. I wanted to contribute,” she said. “My mantra this whole pandemic has been ‘together we rise’. If we take care of each other, and we lift each other up, then we will all get through this together. I quickly saw there was more I could do.”

At the beginning of lockdown, her customers expressed that they were struggling to get basic groceries like fresh vegetables and eggs. So, Coffee Science paired up with Husser, Louisiana-based Covey Rise Farms to sell over 150 produce boxes every week, putting special focus on delivery of seasonal, locally-grown fresh produce to the at-risk community. As demand grew, Vautrot began reaching out to other growing urban farms, including Julian at Laketilly acres. 

“I think I said it half joking one day [to Julian]… Let’s just have a farmers market at the coffee shop!” She laughed, “It just clicked, I was like, ‘I’m just going to put my big girl pants on and make this happen.’ So, we started the Sunday market, and it was immediately a hit.”

[In our May 2021 "Embrace Your Place" issue, we featured stories that celebrate local small businesses and makers. Read another story from the issue here—"Fightinville Fresh: Three local growers unite in battling food insecurity in Acadiana".]

Now, every weekend Vautrot invites dozens of vendors to set up and sell their goods at Coffee Science, free of charge, to help grow these small businesses. The resulting traffic allowed the coffee shop to hire back most of their pre-pandemic staff. 

“The goal with this market was to foster a variety of purveyors,” Vautrot explained. “I try to make sure there is no competition. And that really fostered a sense of community. Everyone feels like they are a part of a team. Most of these people lost their jobs but found their passions. That’s the silver lining in all this. The world has to be a better place if people start doing more of what they love, right?”

Breanne Kostyk of Flour Moon Bagels, for example, used to work in a hotel. “I think a lot of people were stuck in a job they weren’t happy in,” she said. “Now I’m surrounded by really talented people taking risks and doing what they love. And the best part is that the community is really coming out and supporting it.”

“I went from working eighty hours a week to zero,” said Peyton Barrell, Chef-owner of Gourmand, an online gourmet marketplace that brings charcuterie and gourmet goods (like Barrell’s signature pimento cheese spread) to the market each week. The standstill brought on by the pandemic drove him nuts, he said, which is what brought him to start Gourmand as a way to get back in the kitchen. “You get to be human again, not just a vegetable-chopping robot in the back of a kitchen. With the rise of pop-up markets, it feels like the spotlight has shifted from celebrity chefs with James Beard Awards back to the creative cooks that make real, delicious food.”

Amanda Regina of Buttery Spell sells gourmet nut butters, compound butters, and infused oils. Before the pandemic, she worked at a tuxedo shop. “Then all of the weddings got cancelled, and  Mardi Gras after that, and business just evaporated,” she told me. “This has changed my life. Now I’m pushing myself instead of just settling. I’ve found something that makes me happy, and I’m good at.”

[Read about how small oyster businesses battled out the struggles of 2020 in this story from our March 2021 issue.]

“We started making hot sauce for fun,” says Emily Shoemaker. She and Adam Orzechowski, both coming from the hospitality industry, partnered up during the pandemic to start Farm to Funk Ferments. “Being able to explore what we like doing versus what we have to be doing has been a great experience for everyone involved. All of these things that you sort of pencil in? Things you say you want to do at some point in life? During the pandemic, we just did them. And that’s amazing.”

Luci Winsberg and Tyler Correa started Fish Hawk, a fishmonger and pop-up specializing in fresh local seafood, during the lockdown. At the market, they are best known for their signature smoked trout dip. “Everyone here at the market has been really lifting each other up. Promoting and supporting each other as much as possible,” said Winsberg. “I left the market last week with everything I needed for an epic breakfast bagel picnic. You can do all of your weekly shopping at these markets and actually meet the people that make your food.”

And the trend goes far beyond Coffee Science; the markets are multiplying. Julian has even started his own mid-week market at Laketilly. “People from all over town come out,” he said. “They bring their kids, they bring their dogs. They ride their bikes here. It’s just a good way to connect people to their food again. You come here and see the chickens running around while you are buying protein to feed your family. It’s a teaching moment. It’s about entrepreneurship. It’s about communion with the Earth. The money you spend stays right here in the neighborhoods. It circulates. And you start to see things move in positive directions when you uplift people in your community.”

Julian wants people to think more intentionally about their connection to their food and the food movement in their city. “We should care,” he said. “We should know better. And I think everyone should attempt to grow their own food. I don’t care if it’s just a couple of green onions to sprinkle on your gumbo. Start with something. Figure out what you like to eat, and grow those things.”

Vautrot believes where your attention goes is what grows. “I think ultimately, what we really learned most this past year is that our dollar is our most powerful thing,” she said. “Look for the person that you can give your money to. Look for the business owned by a woman. Look for the Black-owned business. Look for that small farmer. Look for those people struggling, and lift them up. Look outside your normal way of doing things. Connect with the growers and makers of your community. Together we will rise. This is the future.” 

The Sunday Mid-City Market at Coffee Science takes place from 9:30 am–noon at 410 South Broad Street in New Orleans. The Wednesday market is from 3:30 pm–6 pm at 6183 Peoples Ave in Gentilly.