I spent this past weekend at the sixth annual meeting of the Chefs Collaborative, a nonprofit that is committed to organizing chefs—with their buying power and their star power—into a tool for change.

The group educates its 13,000 members on crucial sustainability issues, such as understanding the economic pressures on farmers trying to raise cattle outside the feedlot system, and it hosts high-profile events such as a national series of “trash fish” dinners to showcase alternatives to overfished species. The annual Sustainable Food Summit, which was in Boulder this year, combines partying and networking with intense teach-ins on thorny issues: this year, among other topics, GMOs, school nutrition, and restoring devastated soils.

(Disclosure: I gave one of the talks, on