(GREAT BARRINGTON, Mass.) – Visionary restaurateur and foodie Alice Waters and former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich are guest speakers in the final videotaped lecture in Edible Education: The Rise and Future of the Food Movement, a series of videotaped lectures presented by Berkshire Grown from UC Berkeley with renowned author Michael Pollan (The Omnivore’s Dilemma) and Nikki Henderson of the People’s Grocery, on Wednesday, December 7, 2011, at 7 pm at the Lecture Center, Bard College at Simon’s Rock. Of local note, Waters mentions recent Monument Mountain Regional High School graduate Sam Levin, of Great Barrington, and how he started Project Sprout, in the question-and-answer portion of the conversation.

Reich, former Secretary of Labor under President Bill Clinton, and currently a professor of public policy at UC Berkeley, said he had heard that Alice Waters might be the only 1960s radical who actually succeeded. Waters describes how she began her “delicious revolution” and her vision for the future. Reich at times plays devil’s advocate, and gets Waters to tell her story.

Waters, chef, author, and the proprietor of Chez Panisse, is an American pioneer of a culinary philosophy that maintains that cooking should be based on the finest and freshest seasonal ingredients that are produced sustainably and locally. She is a passionate advocate for a food economy that is “good, clean, and fair.”

Over the course of forty years, Chez Panisse has helped create a community of local farmers and ranchers whose dedication to sustainable agriculture assures the restaurant a steady supply of fresh ingredients. In 1996, Waters’ commitment to education led to the creation of The Edible Schoolyard at Berkeley’s Martin Luther King, Jr., Middle School: a one-acre garden, and adjacent kitchen-classroom at a public middle school.

Waters established the Chez Panisse Foundation in 1996 to support the Edible Schoolyard and encourage similar programs that use food traditions to teach, nurture, and empower youth. Waters is Vice President of Slow Food International and the author of nine books, including The Art of Simple Food: Notes and Recipes from a Delicious Revolution.

Robert Reich is Chancellor’s Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley. He has served in three national administrations, most recently as secretary of labor under President Bill Clinton. He has written thirteen books, including The Work of Nations, Locked in the Cabinet, Supercapitalism, and his most recent book, Aftershock. His “Marketplace” commentaries can be found on publicradio.com and iTunes. He is also Common Cause’s board chairman.

Edible Education: The Rise And Future Of The Food Movement, is a series of nine videotaped lectures from UC Berkeley, part of a course coordinated by author Michael Pollan and Nikki Henderson of the People’s Grocery. Speakers include authors Marion Nestle, Politics of Food; Eric Schlosser, Fast Food Nation; and activist and innovative chef Alice Waters.

The public is invited to sit in on one session or attend the series. Each week, guest speakers will draw on everything from economics and agronomy to sociology, anthropology, and the arts to address different aspects of the food movement including farm bill reform, organic agriculture, school lunch reform, food safety, animal welfare, local food economies and more.

All lectures will be screened at the Lecture Center at Bard College at Simon’s Rock, 84 Alford Rd., Great Barrington, Mass., on Wednesdays at 7 pm.

This free series is generously sponsored by Iredale Mineral Cosmetics and co-hosted by Berkshire Grown and Bard College at Simon’s Rock. The Chez Panisse Foundation helped facilitate. For more information, visit Edible Education: The Rise And Future Of The Food Movement.