Owner Denise Whiting believes in what Geraci's trying to do. She thinks that if Alice Waters could turn Berkeley, Calif., on to seasonal, local ingredients by opening the famous Chez Panisse in the 1970s, that 30 years later Baltimore should be ready for its own local eating revolution.
"It's teaching kids a new subject and that subject is food," she says. "Food does not come in a tortilla chip bag. Food does not come in a box. ... Real food comes from the farm."
She'd love to see city kids head down to the farm and find out how they can "grow" a pizza.
"What if Tony plants a pizza garden? What if he takes a plot and plants tomatoes and basil and peppers and garlic and oregano? You start with something they can absolutely, 100 percent relate to," she said. "It's about education."
At the farm-to-be, crews will begin breaking ground this week, hauling away weeds and dead tree limbs to prepare the orchards and prime the fields.
One day last week, Geraci was showing off a former kitchen on the property that had been stripped bare of anything useful, with a musty odor hanging in the dusty air. But all the food service director saw was potential, and all he smelled was a home-cooked breakfast sizzling on a future griddle.
"Three months from now," he said, "this will be filled with sparkling stainless steel."
TONY GERACI
Age: 51
Family: Married with grown children: two daughters and a son.
Job : Baltimore City schools food services director
Experience : Food services chief for a school district in New Hampshire; founded First Course, a culinary program for low-income and at-risk young people; chef; professional race car driver.
Philosophy : "I'm here for a nanosecond. For the time I have left in my life, I want to be a part of the solution."
