In Hochelaga-Maisonneuve, a community business decided to stop being at the mercy of the fluctuating price of vegetables by growing them in town.
“A box of broccoli can have a price variation three times in a month and a half! », says Benoist de Peyrelongue, general director of the Hochelaga-Maisonneuve collective kitchen.
There are many reasons why this manager is interested in food prices, because his group’s activities go well beyond meal preparation workshops. The Collective Kitchen is notably responsible for the cafeteria at the CSN head office in Montreal.
PHOTO PATRICK SANFAÇON, THE PRESS
CSN employees are entitled to vegetables grown in their neighborhood when they eat in the cafeteria.
However, like everyone else, the group’s management finds it very difficult to follow the fluctuations in the price of food, since it must have approximately the same cost to prepare the meals, both those intended for the community workshops and the cafeteria. the CSN or for its ready-to-eat service.
“For collective kitchen groups as for our other economic activities, it becomes complicated, the fluctuation of prices,” says the general director. It pulls on the elastic. »
PHOTO HUGO-SÉBASTIEN AUBERT, THE PRESS
One of the mandates of the Hochelaga-Maisonneuve Collective Kitchen is to ensure accessibility to fruits and vegetables for all, recalls its general director, Benoist de Peyrelongue.
We then decided to take control of the elastic, in part.
The Hochelaga-Maisonneuve Collective Kitchen is intensifying its production in the city: this year, the group will exceed one hectare of cultivation in the east of the city. Because the idea is also to intensify the impact in the neighborhood.
As nature was very generous during the summer, management realized that in-house production had a real impact on production costs.
Three main production points are located in the neighborhood: a greenhouse is installed at the Société des alcools du Québec (SAQ), other plantations are made around a building on rue Hochelaga and another production area is located at side of the Scientific Games company.
There is now a team of 10 professional market gardeners working for the company.
“The carrot at the start of the season has the same price as at the end of the season,” proudly calculates Benoist de Peyrelongue, who adds that this allows his chef to better predict production costs.
In addition to being used in their own kitchens, the harvests are sold to restaurateurs on Ontario Street and in neighborhood solidarity markets, in season. Approximately 30% of vegetables are donated to community organizations.
On the edge of the A25
Since July 2022, the group has been growing on land belonging to the SAQ. The state company ceded the land, along Highway 25, and provided the water and electricity system to facilitate the cultivation of vegetables and fruit trees. The five-year contract is renewable for another five years. There are now 30,000 square feet planted, discreetly, because the place is not very busy.
The unexpected greenhouse
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PHOTO HUGO-SÉBASTIEN AUBERT, THE PRESS
The greenhouse and gardens on SAQ land adjacent to Highway 25 in Montreal
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PHOTO HUGO-SÉBASTIEN AUBERT, THE PRESS
Sowing planning at the start of the season is also done according to the needs of the organization.
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PHOTO HUGO-SÉBASTIEN AUBERT, THE PRESS
“The SAQ wanted a foothold in the local community,” says Benoist de Peyrelongue.
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PHOTO HUGO-SÉBASTIEN AUBERT, THE PRESS
Marie-Charlotte Desjardins, an employee of the Hochelaga-Maisonneuve collective kitchen, in the market garden
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The Kitchen’s market gardening work doesn’t stop there. The group took over a large warehouse at 5600 rue Hochelaga, a multidisciplinary building where it set up its vegetable washing and processing plant.
Not far away, the Scientific Games company, which prints lotto tickets, has also joined the movement. Vegetables are already grown there and, soon, a four-season greenhouse will be installed and heated with air recovered from the printing works.
Expansion continues: the Bimbo bakery, also in the neighborhood, must also offer land for cultivation.
According to Benoist de Peyrelongue, the movement is well established and private or public companies that decide to lend space for cultivation no longer do so just for the sake of image. “It gives meaning to the work teams,” he says.
The advantage of doing business with a group like his is that it offers a turnkey service to companies which can then carry out activities around cultivation spaces.
More people
The Hochelaga-Maisonneuve Collective Kitchen is renowned in the Montreal community. First, she was at the very beginning of the community kitchen movement – the group was created in 1986. She has since been recognized for her dynamism.
Being at the heart of social diversity, the company is also a privileged witness to the social climate, explains Benoist de Peyrelongue. And now things are changing. Community workshops are popular, more than ever.
“There are people we didn’t see before,” explains Benoist de Peyrelongue. The university student, who goes to school and doesn’t arrive, for example. »
So there are more students in the cooking groups. If there were no labor shortage, there would be workshops in the evenings and weekends to also accommodate a working clientele.
We have had cooking at home, in the family, since the world began. It is a place of social diversity. Whether you are a lawyer, an accountant, alone; whether you are on maternity leave and need to be with other people. The cooking group is a vector of social diversity. It breaks the isolation.
Benoist de Peyrelongue
Next step: set up a community store in the old credit union on Adam Street, where the group is staying. And keep gardening!