{"id":12481,"date":"2015-11-04T17:22:39","date_gmt":"2015-11-04T22:22:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=12481"},"modified":"2016-01-13T14:47:48","modified_gmt":"2016-01-13T19:47:48","slug":"spread-some-goodness-with-canadas-food-fighters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/spread-some-goodness-with-canadas-food-fighters\/","title":{"rendered":"Spread some “Goodness” with Canada’s food fighters"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n

A lot of good comes out of people\u2019s ability to access quality food, whether it is health or building a richer community, according to Aurora entrepreneur Chris Neal.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen people get together around food, whether it is around the dining room table, at a community food centre, or around a garden, good things happen,\u201d says Mr. Neal. \u201cThere is great conversation, you can talk about family matters, legal issues, immigration issues, or family matters, and food brings people together.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr. Neal knows firsthand the \u201cgoodness\u201d that comes from food. After all, he and his brother Peter have made names for themselves as the founders of Neil Brothers foods, a growing line of food items that can be found on shelves across the country. For the brothers, Aurora-born-and-bred, their burgeoning food empire started with a simple crouton, but has expanded into much more than that.<\/p>\n

Recently, the Neal Brothers celebrated the publication of their first book, simply titled \u201cGoodness: Recipes and Stories,\u201d bringing together \u2013 as the name suggests \u2013 recipes and stories from 37 \u201cgood food fighters from across Canada\u201d ranging from celebrity chefs like Jamie Kennedy, to prominent food activists, to frontline workers in food banks ensuring people, regardless of circumstances, simply have something to warm their tummies. <\/p>\n

From the start, the Neal Brothers have been very community-minded, contributing to numerous charities and community initiatives in Aurora, the Greater Toronto Area and beyond. From providing product to golf tournaments in the early days of the company, they subsequently became heavily involved in Toronto\u2019s The Stop Community Food Pantry \u2013 and it was here the idea for the book was born.<\/p>\n

\u201cHere was a charity that kind of works in our wheelhouse, we are all about providing healthy alternatives in the different segments we compete in and here is an organization that is all about providing good food to lower-income neighbourhoods,\u201d explains Chris, still an Aurora resident. \u201cIt really resonated with us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Those at The Stop later branched out, turning it into the flagship location for Community Food Centres Canada, which has grown to work with over 80 other similarly-focused community organizations across the country. Peter has since joined their National Advisory Board and it was during a brainstorming session around the boardroom table that he threw out the idea of a cookbook. <\/p>\n

\u201cHe thought, \u2018maybe we could do a cookbook but have the people involved in the cookbook be those food activists across the country trying to bring goodness to food, whether they are farmers, activists, chefs or entrepreneurs,\u2019\u201d says Chris. \u201cThere are 37 activists from St. John\u2019s to Vancouver Island, across all ethnicities, both genders, and the book has a story about each of these people and what their contribution is to the cause.\u201d<\/p>\n

Over the process of drafting the book, Chris says he was excited to learn more in-depth about what each participant contributed to their own communities. After their book launch last month, he says he was particularly struck by the work of Ashrafi Ahmed, who is the garden coordinator at the Community Food Centre in Toronto\u2019s Regent Park neighbourhood.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen the book came out she was so thrilled and said, \u2018I don\u2019t think a whole lot of my job and I never thought I would end up in a cookbook,\u2019\u201d Chris recalls. \u201cShe was so thrilled to be included, yet it is her work that resonates with everybody. It is because of what she does that people are able to learn about composting and growing. In some of these centres, the growing part of it is what really helps people rally around a conversation, learning about where food should come from, and breaking down the barriers to realising it is not a difficult thing to grow your own food.\u201d<\/p>\n

Chris and Peter began to grow their own business in the late 1980s. According to Chris, it was the height of the gourmet food craze with mustards, chutneys and red pepper jellies becoming firm fixtures in kitchens across Canada. Looking for a business to start together, they decided to get their hands dirty \u2013 metaphorically speaking, of course \u2013 in the food industry because there were relatively limited barriers. <\/p>\n

From their first croutons, they expanded into tortilla chips with the concept of keeping things focused on organic and natural ingredients and there was no turning back. In addition to their own product lines, they distribute food for other companies with similar philosophies, becoming keepers of \u201csome great Canadian success stories.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI think anyone in business would tell you that no matter what you\u2019re doing you start to feel a sense of responsibility,\u201d says Chris. \u201cWe are custodians for the products we represent in this market. People are relying on you to help fulfil their dreams and help build their business and it is a pretty big responsibility. It is certainly not one we take lightly.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nor do they take their responsibility to the concept of \u201cgoodness\u201d and the people that make it happen lightly. Goodness: Recipes and Stories retails for $29.95 and 50% of profits from the book go back towards Community Food Centres Canada. Local customers can find copies at Longo\u2019s, Aurora\u2019s Maunder\u2019s Fine Foods and Newmarket\u2019s Nature\u2019s Emporium in addition to amazon.ca.<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A lot of good comes out of people\u2019s ability to access quality food, whether it is health or building a richer community, according to Aurora entrepreneur Chris Neal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":12455,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[26,4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12481","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archive","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/2015-11-05-06.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-3fj","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-11 19:28:37","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12481","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12481"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12481\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12455"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12481"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12481"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12481"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}