This feature comes from food writer Andrea Strong, author of The Strong Buzz on Substack. If you want to write for this newsletter, please get in touch. -Sean
Nearly 20 years ago, the legendary food writer and devoted carnivore Josh Ozersky began hosting a massive outdoor burger and barbecue party called Meatopia on a small patch of city beach off the coast of Long Island City.
Around that time, Ozersky’s longtime pal Jimmy Carbone, the owner of Jimmy’s No 43, a popular East Village craft beer bar known for its locally sourced menu, was approached by some Greenmarket friends who asked him if he might want to create a direct farm-to-chef-sourced event.
“I was asked by Slow Food NYC to host the farm-to-chef food festival on Governors Island,” Carbone recalled. “That night, I was having dinner with Josh and told him I needed more introductions to chefs. He suggested combining it with Meatopia.”
That first year, 2010, the pair teamed up to co-produce Meatopia on Governors Island.
During the planning, Josh coined the name Pig Island for the festival as a joke. The event was a resounding success and led to a call for a sustainable meat event by Carbone’s friends at Greenmarket and Slow Food.
“I created Pig Island immediately after Meatopia,” recalled Carbone. “Josh had coined the name previously in jest, and I ran with it (with his blessing), buying direct from Greenmarket pig farmer Violet Hill Farm and giving them to chefs to cook nose-to-tail.” The rest, as they say, is history.
