Nicki's Central West End Guide

Got Wheels?

The Food Pantry at Second Presbyterian Church

There is a lot to learn about the impressive Romanesque Revival Second Presbyterian Church, including its collection of Tiffany windows in the sanctuary. The Church, located at 4501 Westminster at Taylor, is currently undergoing some interior renovation, see photo above.

Some readers may be familiar with the classroom space in the lower level of the Education Building, constructed in 1930, as the polling place for two 28th Ward precincts in the CWE. It also houses a food pantry, Good Ground, which has been in existence for over thirty years. On Saturday mornings 18 to 25 families come for groceries and, here's what's unique to this pantry---samples of a healthy recipe. If the clients (who are scheduled to visit the pantry once a month) are interested, they are given the recipe and a bag full of ingredients they'll need to recreate the dish at home.

Jana Sisler and John Leo are co-directors of Good Ground Pantry. The items on the well-stocked shelves above were purchased by the volunteers using monies donated by parishioners and others. Bread-stuffs come from Panera Bread on Forest Park Blvd. which donates end-of-day items to a different organization each day.

Other donations come in the form of fresh produce. One of Second Church's parishioners purchased a share in a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) and donated it to Good Ground Pantry. CWE Board Member Arthur Culbert also drops off fresh produce from the community garden he and the 4th grade class from New City School cultivate on Waterman. And children at the Washington Montessori School in north St. Louis have planted a garden that benefits the pantry. Neighbors are also invited to drop off excess produce grown in their backyards, see information at end of this post.

Once a month, a nutritionist from Operation Food Search brings a healthy recipe that volunteers help Karen Buckey test and then make for sampling each Saturday. The March selection was "Friendship Soup," above, which included legumes that don't need to be soaked, a spice packet, and a bag of oyster crackers.

A spicy bean salsa was April's selection, above and below. It came with a box of cornbread mix. The volunteers shop at big box stores, or wherever they can get the best prices on the ingredients. In addition to developing the recipe, the nutritionist from Operation Food Search visits Good Ground Pantry once a month to offer advice to the clients on healthy eating. The hope is that with exposure to the good nutritious food Good Ground provides, and follow-up consultation with a nutritionist, the clients' health will improve.

There are lots of ways you can help Good Ground Pantry at Second Presbyterian Church continue its work. To volunteer by handing out samples of the healthy recipe on Saturday mornings, contact KABuckey@gmail.com. If you have excess produce growing in your backyard, bring it to Second Presbyterian Church on Saturday mornings at 9:30, or drop it off in the church office during business hours. Use the entry on the parking lot, there is a buzzer.

And once a month a group of volunteers gets together for "Table Talk," which is a chance to network over dinner. The group meets at a local restaurant--last month it was Duff's--to support a locally-owned restaurant and discuss topics such as local food sources and sustainability. Contact Karen Buckey if you'd like to join Table Talk: KABuckey@gmail.com.

Finally, donations to Good Ground Pantry can be sent to Second Presbyterian Church, 4501 Westminster, 63108. Make the check out to Good Ground Pantry.

Herb Day at the CWE Community Garden

May 5th was Herb Day at the CWE Community Garden in the 5000 block of Waterman. This vegetable and fruit garden is being cultivated by CWE Board Member Arthur Culbert with assistance from the 4th grade class at New City School.

Two Saturdays ago Geoff Beal, an herbalist, offered an afternoon workshop at the garden that included a scavenger hunt for children, information on herbs and their benefits, and an  Hibiscus-blend iced tea from Kateri Meyer of the Traveling Tea Company. You'll find Kateri at the Tower Grove Farmers Market on Saturdays.

 

There was a teaching moment about beneficial bugs when a ladybug was discovered on an apple tree planted on the periphery of the garden, see below. Geoff Beal informed me that later on a wiggly earthworm showed up unexpectedly to the delight of the 3 to 9 year olds who were there.

Three-year-old Hazel tries out the architectural stonework that was salvaged from a neighbor's yard by Tom Brackman for use as an outdoor classroom. The community garden experience is being used by the 4th grade teachers at New City as a class on citizenship. The students harvest the vegetables they've planted from seed for two food pantries located in the neighborhood.

Last Monday the 4th graders were going to pick strawberries and spinach (below) for Trinity's Food Pantry. The other food pantry the students serve is at Second Presbyterian Church. I'll be posting a story on Second Church's program later.

Geoff Beal is a Professional Herbalist and Naturopath who does herbal health counseling with individuals over 20 years of age. To contact Geoff, who also loves to work with children (and adults) at schools, summer camps, community gardens, etc.: geofftheherbalist@yahoo.com.

Bike Shop Coming to Euclid!

In the onward and upward department, it was exciting to discover that a bike shop is about to open in the neighborhood. This morning, I noticed a sign in the window at 324 N. Euclid, in the space below Lemon Spalon and next to Wolfgang's Pet Stop, indicating that "Mike's Bikes" is "coming soon."

A bike shop has been on many people's wish list of businesses or services missing from the mix in the neighborhood for years. Now at last that wish is about to be fulfilled.

The website listed on the sign in the window appears to be a work-in-progress. As soon as I get more information, I'll pass it along.

Mikes Bikes, opening soon at 324 N. Euclid.

New City School 4th Graders garden for others

One blustery February afternoon New City School 4th graders and their teachers were introduced to an urban garden they were adopting as part of a curriculum on citizenship. The fruits of the children's farming efforts were to benefit two food pantries in the Central West End, one at Trinity Church and the other at Second Presbyterian Church. Involving the children in the gardening effort was the idea of indefatigable CWEA Board Member, Arthur Culbert (see photo below). The plot of land on Waterman had been farmed for the same purpose the year before by a group from Health Literacy Missouri on Euclid (see post here).

On their first day working the garden, the children were handed seeds for lettuces and spring peas. Despite the chilly conditions, mittens were foresaken so the seeds could be sown in neat rows. Each child was given a pumpkin seed to plant in a paper cup full of soil. The pumpkin seeds were carried back to the classroom to germinate on the windowsill. I overheard one student say that she couldn't wait to make a pumpkin pie! Another said, "I am so excited, this is like a dream come true."

Photo courtesy of Arthur Culbert

The photo above was taken much more recently. Arthur's gardening scheme also involves neighborhood businesses. Wolfgang's Pet Stop on Euclid donates pet hair from grooming sessions that is put into mesh bags and laid around the garden to repel rabbits. Accompanying the hair, Wolfgang's sends a picture of the donor, which garners lots of admiration from the children. New Market Hardware on Laclede at Sarah recently donated paint sticks for signs the students made for the food pantry. And a neighborhood volunteer, Emma Holtzman, waters the garden every morning.

Photo courtesy of Arthur Culbert

The 4th graders have proved to be enthusiastic farmers. One of the student's parents called Arthur on a  recent Saturday morning to ask if she could bring the sleepover group to work in the garden that day. Just yesterday the children worked for over an hour harvesting 16 pounds of collard greens, lettuce, spinach, and turnip greens for Trinity's Food Pantry. They carefully shook the dirt off the greens and put the produce into 20 bags, which was delivered to the church for yesterday's clients.

 

Photo courtesy of Arthur Culbert

Photo courtesy of Arthur Culbert

The photo above shows the produce on the table at Trinity's Food Pantry. Someday soon the 4th graders will take a field trip to meet the clients they serve.

 

 

Arthur Culbert also planted fruit trees around the perimeter of the garden, above. This whole effort from start to finish is the work of this one wonderful volunteer. He came up with the idea, arranged for the involvement of New City School, and purchased the vegetable seeds and fruit trees on his own. And the benefits of this effort will definitely leave an impression on these young lives and benefit those who are less fortunate.  Many thanks to Arthur for his amazing contribution.

Dr. Jeff & Beki Marsh and the Bhutan Cleft Care Project

This post has been in the works since before Thanksgiving when I interviewed Jeff Marsh, who has been a friend for at least 30 years, in his CWE home. It was on my way home from that interview that I broke my foot, and while the two events are related only by timing, and while it has taken the intervening four months to get this story together, it has taken even longer to get back into my dancing shoes. I hope you enjoy reading about this CWE couple's medical missions and viewing the gorgeous photographs of Bhutan that Jeff provided. Thanks to Beki and Jeff for their editing help--they've been incredibly patient with this medical novice. 

 Longtime CWEnders Dr. Jeff Marsh, Director of Pediatric Plastic Surgery at Mercy Children's Hospital--formerly St. John's--(front row, third from left) and his wife Beki, (second row, far left), a retired operating room nurse, have been journeying halfway around the world to Bhutan to perform cleft palate surgery since 2003. The couple travel with a team of equally-generous medical professionals who use vacation time to perform surgery, speech therapy, and dental services over a ten-day period. The "Smile Train" organization provides most of the funding for these medical missions---Jeff served on their Advisory Board for years--and private donors assist in the transportation and lodging of the medical team.

The international team, above, varies depending on who's available. The last mission included two surgeons, N.Y.-based Dr. John Girotto and Dr. Thomas Lambrecht from Switzerland, two anesthesiologists, Canadian Dr. Stuart Neil and Dr. Paul Schueller from Germany, and two speech therapists from India, Suraj Subramanian and Vijay Kumar (not pictured).  Also in the photograph are two recovery room nurses, New Yorker Heather Garbarino, and Israeli Edna Gabby, Shannon Skidmore, an OR nurse from Canada, and a volunteer patient coordinator, Sharon Shuteran, from Colorado. Bhutanese surgeon Dr. Karma Tobgyel (holding child)---more on Dr. Karma later---and his wife, Mika (far left) are also pictured above.

In 1991 Dr. Marsh began traveling to Bangkok Children's Hospital to teach cleft lip and palate surgery as a volunteer. How the Marshes wound up in Bhutan actually has its genesis in the CWE, specifically in Jeff's passion for yoga.  He began practicing yoga--at Beki's suggestion---20 years ago under the tutelage of Deni Roman, in a workout studio located in the space currently occupied by Pi.

During a layover in the Bhutan airport bar on his way to a take a week-long class with world-renowed yoga master Rodney Yee, Jeff met a USA plastic surgeon who was performing cleft palate surgeries in Bhutan. As Jeff, who studies Buddhism semi-seriously said, "the meeting was 'fated'--a good thing according to Eastern thinking." The surgeon had a mandate from the Bhutanese government to begin a cleft care team and enlisted Jeff to join him. The Bhutanese government chose a local surgeon, Dr. Karma, to head the team. As Jeff said: "With a name like that, how could I refuse?" (Bhutanese refer to each other using their first name although they usually have two names, e.g. Karma Tobgyel.)

According to Jeff most cleft medical missions involve "parachute teams," like ones depicted on "M*A*S*H*. They fly in, perform surgery, and leave--no one having been taught to perform the surgery once the medical team has departed. Dr. Marsh has a different approach he summed up with the following quote:

"If a man is hungry, don't give him a fish, teach him to fish."

Dr. Marsh loves to teach and was happy to instruct Dr. Karma on the latest cleft palate surgery techniques. Dr. Marsh and several of his colleagues brought Dr. Karma to the USA and to Switzerland for advanced training. A very important part of cleft care is speech therapy. Dr. Marsh sponsored Kuenzang Dorji, one of only two speech therapists in Bhutan, as the American Cleft Palate-Craniofacial Association's Visiting Scholar in 2010. Kuenzang spent a week each in St. Louis, Cincinnati, and Atlanta studying with cleft speech therapy masters and then attended the Association's annual scientific meeting. 

When I asked Beki how long it takes to get to Bhutan, she replied:

"We have never been able to figure it out. There are two plane trips, including an overnight flight to Bangkok, an arduous bus trip to the clinic in Bhutan...you cross time zones, lose days, gain days...we just don't know."

Ninety percent of the Bhutanese population is rural and the country is sparsely populated. A daily tax on tourists of $150 to $200 a day pays for the education and healthcare systems.  There are 25 district hospitals, and in addition, each village has basic health care units. According to Jeff:  "Medical practice there has a very good grassroots organization, but tertiary care is available in only a few hospitals and is limited in what services can be offered."

There are no actual addresses in rural Bhutan, so information travels by word of mouth, radio, TV and newspaper.  For the first few years that Jeff, Beki, and the medical team traveled to Bhutan hundreds of people would walk for 2 to 3 days hoping to receive cleft palate surgery for their children or themselves at Trongsa Hospital, above. The team can perform 60-70 operations in 10 operating days, so potential patients would wait on the hillside beside the hospital hoping to be called for treatment---many were not and would come back the next year.

For the past three years public service announcements have been used to alert the villagers that the operations are to be performed, provide them with a phone number for registration (now feasible due to the prevalence of cellphones) and consequently surgeries are now scheduled in advance. In addition, cellular communication makes it possible to do follow-up communication.

There are two operations going on simultaneously in the small operating room. Power-outages and water shortages are a common occurrence. The prime operating table is the one next to the only window, in case the power goes out. In addition, the operating team is now equipped with LED headlamps, just in case. In the photo above you see Dr. Marsh, left, Beki Marsh in her role as operating room nurse, and anesthesiologist Stuart Neil, middle.

The team carries all the donated medical equipment they will need over the ten-day period in suitcases. Any equipment or medicines that aren't used are left behind for Dr. Karma.

The optimum age for cleft palate surgery is before speech develops, or about 12 months of age. Inability to communicate orally negatively affects education and employment, and is the prime reason parents want surgery for their children, or adults want the operation for themselves. Cleft lip surgery can be done at any time but is preferably done in infancy to minimize psychosocial consequences due to facial difference.

Dr. Marsh also said: "Because the Bhutan Cleft Care Project Team has been operating in Bhutan for eight years, and Dr. Karma has been able to repair clefts himself when the Team is not present, the average age of the cleft palate patient has dropped. However, older unrepaired patients still present for treatment." 

This family is all smiles after surgery, above.

The photo above shows the Trongsa Valley with the region's Zhong (a combination monastery of civil and religious administration in a 17th century "fortress") in the distance, above and below. 

Bhutanese children gather around the team's bus hoping for a balloon, which one of the doctors brings with him. Jeff said a typical day at the hospital starts at 8 a.m. and operations continue until about 6 p.m. The team then heads to the guest house for a happy hour and dinner. Beki chuckled when I related Jeff's account. She said it's more like 8 or 9 p.m. by the time they wrap things up, and there wasn't much of a happy hour---or much of a dinner. Everyone is just too exhausted.

On a 2010 trip to Bhutan the Marshes ran into a patient post-surgery with his/her father at the local market. When I asked Jeff whether the baby in the photo was a boy or girl, he said that the Bhutanese have two names that are assigned by a monk on an auspicious day after a child's birth and the names have no correlation to family or gender. So many patients have the same name. This can make record keeping very confusing for Westerners.

Whenever the Marshes travel they explore the markets where they find the best examples of local culture, native foods, and spices. As an aside, Beki, a fabulous cook, was the leader of the Slow Foodmovement in St. Louis for many years. She will drive for hours every November just to purchase a heritage turkey from a Missouri breeder for the family's Thanksgiving table.

On their way to the hospital each morning the medical team sees children climbing up the mountains heading to school wearing the traditional male costume--"goh"--which adults must also wear during the work day. The girls and women wear traditional dresses called "kirtin."

 

Some Bhutanese boys between the ages of 6 to 8 are sent to school to study Buddhism on the path to becoming monks. At the age of 16 they are asked to decide whether to continue their education in the monastery or to return home to a secular life. The photo above shows a prayer wheel in the center of Trongsa. 
Prayer wheels and flags, above. 

You might be surprised to learn that the monks in the photo above are watching an archery contest, the big national sport in Bhutan.

What is even more admirable about the Marshes' contribution to aiding a population in a remote corner of the world is that it is done very quietly. To make a donation to the Bhutanese Cleft Care Project, send a check to Dr. Jeffrey Marsh, Mercy Hospital, 621 S. New Ballas Rd. #260A, St. Louis, MO 63141. Donations are tax-deductible.

Someday soon I hope to share the couple's gorgeous photos from a recent trip to Israel, where Dr. Marsh performed surgery on several patients with Beckwith-Widemann Syndrome and other complex craniofacial deformities.

P.S. When our children were young, Jeff's artistic surgical skills were visible on the most fabulous show-stopping pumpkins he carved for Halloween. 

 

Neighbors find it's easy being "green"

 

Photo courtesy of Laura Lock

A few weeks ago I stopped by Laura Lock and Scott Garnholz's (above) CWE home to get a closer look at their backyard. I've known the couple for years--Laura was on the board of the Central West End Association and at one time worked as a staff member for the neighborhood organization. My curiosity was piqued by Laura's recent gift of homemade "Cabernet Sauvignon Vintage Vinegar" to Jim, and subsequent email correspondence showing a photo of the couple's hoop house.

While I stood on the Laura and Scott's back porch admiring the yard, Laura explained how they became so "into" organic gardening. It began several years ago when the couple began to question the impact they were having on the eco system. After reading about the environment and resource management, Laura and Scott began to implement ways they could live a "greener" life in the middle of the city.

Their tiny north-facing backyard contains a rainbarrel (lower right), a hoop house, and a long narrow vegetable garden. Laura would like to add two more rainbarrels and replace the lawn altogether (if Scott would agree), leaving more farmable area. I learned from Laura that a scant 1/4" rainfall adds about 50 gallons of water to the rainbarrel, more than enough to take care of their gardening needs. 

Around the same time that the couple was transforming their yard---and their lives--- Laura made a career change. She decided to pursue a more sustainable career path that was aligned with her value system. To that end, Laura discovered that St. Louis University offered a Masters in Sustainability. SLU's program---one of eleven universities across the country to offer the degree---is underwritten by a $5M grant from the Alberici Company, a leader in the implementation of sustainable design and construction practices in our area. Laura is well into her first year of the two-year program. 

The couple had been growing vegetable and flower seeds in their basement using grow lights. In the spirit of being environmentally conscious, they moved their seed growing efforts to a hoop house, above, purchased at a big box store for $30.

When I visited, there were flats of sprouting radishes, beets, and peas within.

 

Laura orders many of their vegetable seeds from The Thomas Jefferson Center for Historic Plants, above, as she loves the idea of growing vegetables that may have the same genetic makeup as vegetables Thomas Jefferson grew at Monticello.

The photo above shows clever plant markers--sage, basil, dill, etc.---made by a friend from old silver spoons.

Three years ago, Laura and Scott built a raised planter bed that is 8" tall x 4' wide x 15' long. As Laura said, they chase the sunlight, which is at a premium in their backyard. In December, they planted a winter crop of broccoli, swiss chard, and cauliflower. With the mild winter we experienced, they had already harvested the broccoli, swiss chard, and lots of lettuce (sown every six weeks) by the time of my visit. If the winter had been more seasonal, they would have covered the bed to protect the crops.

A composter is visible at the top of the photo above. Composting plays a major role in their gardening scheme. They throw in grass clippings, weeds, and kitchen scraps--no meat, of course. They learned it's best not to clean the bed out after the harvest but to enhance what organic matter is left behind with compost.

Photo courtesy of Laura Lock

The photo above shows bounty from a harvest one week last summer, including several varieties of tomatoes. On Saturdays during the growing season, the couple bikes to Tower Grove Park's Farmer's Market to supplement what they can't grow themselves. Laura and Scott are not vegetarians but try to buy only sustainable fish, and to eat meat almost as a side dish.

I asked Laura how she incorporates herbs and vegetables into family meals. She enjoys making small batch salad dressings using the herbs from the garden. And the night before I visited, Laura had made a Meyer Lemon zest mayo (without eggs) with chives from their garden. She combined shallots, snap peas, and baby asparagus from the market and served it with sauteed scallops, and prosciutto purchased on The Hill. (I should not write these posts when I am hungry!)

Someday I hope to catch up with Scott and learn how he makes red wine vinegar. Scott, who worked as a kitchenware salesman for companies like Krupps, manages the housewares department at Restaurant Depot. When Laura isn't hitting the books, she volunteers for the CWE's Places for People and the food pantry at Second Presbyterian Church. The volunteers at the food pantry do more than serve meals. They also develop healthy recipes and provide the ingredients to cook the menu at home. I'll have more on their efforts in a future post. 

We can all take a few cues from this resourceful CWE couple who have learned how to live off the land right here in the neighborhood.

Liz Heller: Neighborhood Biker Chick

My  scheduled interview with Liz (Trinkie) Heller, above, got off to an inauspicious start last Sunday morning, when the fact that it was daylight savings time just blew right past this household. The photo-op scheme was to catch her leaving her CWE home and heading off to Forest Park for the start of the Great Forest Park Bicycle Race, where she was participating in a one-mile criterium (a bicycle race of a specified number of laps on a closed course over public roads closed to normal traffic). Instead, I was the one racing from her CWE condo with instructions from Liz's husband, Bill Joffe, to try to catch up with her near the Muny on one of her practice laps around the park.

I've known Liz, a lawyer and competitive cyclist, since she was a teenager living on Lenox Place. The Heller family moved from New York in 1960 and left the street--but not the neighborhood--in 1976. For reasons she can't remember, Lenox Place neighbor Harry Langenberg --one of the neighborhood's storied characters--taught Liz to ride a bike. Harry was an amateur athlete to the core, including founding the Missouri Rugby Football Union (which sport he played into his 60's). He was also a founder of the Claytonshire Coaching Club, and was the proud owner of a vintage Plymouth he salvaged from the Mississippi River and drove forever. Harry died at age 96 in 2005.

Liz said that The Great Forest Park Bicycle Race attracted more out-of-town participants this year because there were two races in town that weekend, the other being a criterium on Saturday in South City's Carondelet Park.

Liz participated in the USAC Women's Open, a 50 minute 4+ lap race around the park. She pointed to her competitors, above, and said they were mostly in their 20's and 30's, while she is 54. She took a 15-year break from competitive racing and jumped back in full throttle when she discovered "cyclo-cross" several years ago. If you missed Jamie Mowers excellent account of Liz's career in the last issue of the West End Word read it  here.

Liz proudly wears the neighborhood's Dressel's Racing Team jersey. I chuckled when she said she  babysat for Dressel's Public House owner Ben Dressel when he was a toddler living on Walton Row.

The photograph above shows the Junior Boys as they headed for the finish line at Government Drive near the handball courts. Unfortunately, I had to leave before the start of Liz's race but she emailed later: 

"Alas no joy in Mudville. I went for the win on last lap but got caught in the home stretch and finished well out of the money. Maybe 8th but not bad for an old lady. Trinkie"

Not bad indeed.

Experiencing Green Bean

Some of us are still trying to figure out what we want to be when we grow up. Then there's Nick Guzman (behind the counter above and below) who has three businesses under his belt, and he's only 23! Two of these businesses, MAStorage (since sold) and Mass Drinks, were started when Nick was a student at Amherst College, class of 2011. Nick, along with business partner Sarah Hazelkorn, opened Green Bean, a healthy salad and wrap restaurant at 232 N. Euclid (just south of Maryland) last December. Judging by the varied patrons I've observed on several visits to Green Bean ---neighbors, local business people, out-of-town visitors staying at the Chase (including a Comedian who was in town for a performance), students from W.U. and S.L.U.---it appears that Nick's business acumen remains intact.

When I first heard that  people from Washington, D.C. were opening a restaurant featuring locally-grown seasonally-available ingredients on Euclid, it seemed odd. Then I learned that Sarah, a friend of Nick's from D.C., is a junior (yes, a junior!) at Washington University. If the eat-in, carry-out restaurant is successful, Nick and Sarah plan to expand the concept to other cities. In the few short months it's been opened, Green Bean has already been named to General Mills's "Eat Better America" program.

Everything is pretty simple and straight-forward at Green Bean, including the decor. Being environmentally conscious--and working within their budget--Nick and Sarah recycled wood left behind by the previous business and made bench-seating and counters.

The young entrepreneurs partnered with Chef Peter Pastan (8-year James Beard "Best Chef Mid-Atlantic" semifinalist), to develop the concept including menu, seasonal recipe development, and purchasing expertise. Chef Pastan, whose children grew up with Nick, has two successful restaurants in D.C., Obelisk on Dupont Circle, and the popular 2 Amys pizza restaurant. At this point in my interview with Nick I had to pause and ask if entrepreneurship is in his gene pool??? Or, did his parents discuss business opportunities every night at the dinner table?  In his laid-back, low-key manner, Nick replied, "No...not really."  

Ordering at Green Bean takes some thought. You can stick with the combinations suggested on the clever menu ("seoul train," "turducken," the vegan "mermaid," etc., $8 to $10), or create your own salad or wrap starting at $6. Extras cost, well, extra. For kids of all ages there are pb&j roll-ups, $2.50, and veggies & dip, $1.  Seasonal soups, $3.50 a cup, keg wine, $6, and local beer, $4, are also on the menu.

On my second visit to Green Bean I tried the "cobb-out" combination as a wrap, $8.50, above and below--it turned out to be my favorite.

Chilled Cake Balls, $1 each, from local baker Kaylen Wissinger's Farm Fresh Cupcakes are available for dessert.

Spring-y Green Bean t-shirts are $15 to $20; and as you would expect, recycling is encouraged down to the very last straw, see above.

Green Bean, 232 N. Euclid, 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. every day, (314) 361-4444.

This P.S. is a little off-point but as long as I'm talking about food, it's worth mentioning:

In early February I met neighbor Emma Hand, the creator of Snap Story, and her friend Stephanie Pollack (the redhead in a photo with Nick, above), at Green Bean for lunch. Emma, a big promoter of mine, had been trying to set up a meeting to discuss blogging with Steph who writes the successful "Cupcake Project" blog. Steph was also a finalist in the RFT's 2012 St. Louis Web Awards. Between bites of a great "citrus caesar" salad, and "cobb-out" wraps for my companions, we discussed Steph's jaw-dropping 1,000,000 hits a month on her blog, and her latest creation: Buffalo Chicken Wing Cupcakes. She came up with the cupcake recipe for Super Bowl Sunday and made them again for a "chef's night out" dinner. I had a hard time imagining the combination as a savory cupcake, but apparently they were a big hit with the chefs---a pretty tough audience. And while I can never imagine receiving that many hits on Nicki's Central West End Guide, it was interesting to learn how another young entrepreneur has created a successful business out of a simple idea.

Meet Pi's Executive Chef Steve Caravelli

I stopped in to see Pi's Executive Chef Steve Caravelli (above) on Friday morning to get the lowdown on the posters in the restaurant's windows plugging "Meatless Mondays" (see below). I assumed the push at Pi was solely to encourage healthier eating ("Meatless Mondays" has its own wikipedia entry: look here), but there is more to it.

Steve said that the business model restaurant owner Chris Sommers and his partner, Frank Uible, have adopted is heavily weighted toward making  Pi an ecologically sustainable restaurant.  The Meatless Mondays' initiative (at the CWE location only at this point), is a step in that direction.

The newly-created Meatless Monday menu rolls out today, and will list among other choices, the "Western" and "Berkeley" pizza.

Once we finished discussing the initial reason for my visit, my ulterior motive for contacting Steve surfaced. I love getting behind the scene of almost anything--especially restaurants, and talking to chefs about their background and how they came to the restaurant business is high on the list.

Steve graduated from Mizzou with a degree in Journalism, and if there was any thought of the food business at all, it was writing about it, not working as a chef. But his father--who has a large cookbook collection and loves to prepare family meals---suggested that Steve might like working in the restaurant business. Father knew best and Steve apprenticed for some of the top chefs in St. Louis--- Aiden Murphy at Old Warson Country Club, Larry Forgione at the late, great American Place (one of our favorite special occasion spots), Gerard Craft at Niche, Eric Brenner at Chez Leon and Moxy (another old favorite).

Steve has been at Pi for about six months. One of his first assignments as Corporate Chef was to help open Pi's Washington, D. C. location, District of Pi at 910 F St., N.W.  He still travels to D.C. every month to tweak the menu. I asked Steve to compare the top selling crust in the CWE location to the District of Pi. Thin crust is more popular in D.C., where on a good day they sell 400 to 500 pizzas. In the CWE deep dish rules the day, and on a really good day here 300 to 400 pizzas are served. Anyway you slice it, that's a lot of pizza!

On the domestic front, when Steve has time off, he and his wife Cara and their two-year-old daughter enjoy spending time with both of their families, usually centered around a meal. Steve says that Cara, a graphic designer, whose online business is called "Clever Hands Press," does most of the cooking and makes a mean minestrone.

Pi, 400 N. Euclid, open 7 days a week, (314) 367-4000.