Culinary Misfits - the shop

Culinary Misfits aims to change public perception when it comes to food. Not only do we rescue vegetables that would otherwise be thrown away, but we present them in a variety of delicious and nutritious recipes made with vegetables supplied by local farmers from Berlin and the surrounding areas.

Misfits are natural wonders like crooked cucumbers, heart shaped potatoes, three legged carrots and monster beets that would normally be overlooked and considered worthless in the marketplace and therefore would never make it to the vegetable isle in your local supermarket. We want to showcase their natural beauty and also bring other natural delights, like wild herbs and old varieties, back into the kitchen.

Not only do we want to avoid throwing away perfectly good food, we want to do so in a playful way with fun inspirational recipes and a pleasing, colorful, and unique presentation.

After spending nine months researching sources, catering many events and creating tasty new recipes, we are eager for our creations to be available to the public every day in our store. This isn't only to rescue the misfit veggies, but also to share a new way of thinking about food and sustainability. We also aim to educate the public and to provide a cozy and welcoming place for new ideas to blossom.

We want to influence children and adults alike to feel a connection to where their food comes from and at the same time educate them on just how much food is wasted every day because of perceived imperfection. Our motto is: "Eat the entire harvest." With that in mind, for instance,  we will also turn carrot greens into delicious pesto and radish leaves into yummy soup. We will also develop recipes including fresh alternatives like beet chips, caramelized radishes, carrot soup with wild herbs, and blue potato salad, just to name a few.

We can only get started with your help. All donations will be transparent and go directly into the business of setting up the kitchen, renting space, and turning our ideas into reality. We will keep you up to date on our progress through our blog, and of course you are welcome to stop by the store at any time.

This store will also encourage the organic farmers in and around Berlin to sell veggies that they would normally throw away and enable them to earn extra income. A win/win for everyone.

You are not only supporting our idea, but also the farmers and a new idea in design and sustainability. We promise to fight for the misfits and turn them into delicious recipes that everyone can enjoy. We believe that with our business model, it will begin to creep into people's consciousness that vegetables don't have to look "perfect" to be edible. Eventually we hope stores and consumers alike will begin to think differently and buy the "imperfect" misfit vegetables. It is our hope that we can eventually have an effect on the amount of food that is wasted every day.

We want to open our own store in March/April 2013. We have a lot of passion, great ideas and a portion of the money we need is already in place.
First, we will find a great location in Kreuzberg or Neukoelln and then we can get started right away. We will design the products and recipes ourselves and make Culinary Misfits a cozy and unique place inspired by our environment with furniture from flea markets, recyclable linens, and misfits displayed in their natural beauty, for instance in glass jars and cases, so people can see as well as taste the culinary misfits.
We want everything to be so tasty, comfortable, and inspiring, that you will never forget it and come back often.