Author Talk: Elspeth Hay
The Chilmark Free Public Library and Vineyard Haven Public Library are pleased to welcome
Cape Cod author and journalist Elspeth Hay for a discussion about her new book, “Feed Us with
Trees: Nuts and the Future of Food.” This event will be held at 12:00 PM on Thursday, July
16th, at the Chilmark Free Public Library, located at 522 State Road in Chilmark. Free and open
to the public. No registration required, but space is limited.
GOLD winner of the 2026 Nautilus Book Award: Restorative Earth Practices, “Feed Us with
Trees” is a new and ancient story about perennial nut trees, our ecological role as humans, and
the future of food. The day Elspeth Hay learned that we can eat acorns, stories she’d believed her
whole life began to unravel. Until then she’d always believed we must grow our staple foods in
farmed fields—the same fields wreaking havoc on our land, air, and water. But all over the Northern Hemisphere, Hay learned, humans once grew our staple foods in forest gardens
centered on perennial nut trees: oaks, chestnuts, and hazelnuts. In Feed Us with Trees, Hay
brings us along as she gets to know dozens of nut growers, scientists, Indigenous knowledge-
keepers, researchers, and food professionals—and discovers that in tending these staple trees, we
once played a vital environmental role as one of Earth’s keystone species.
“Feed Us with Trees” is Hay’s hopeful manifesto about a brighter, more abundant future—and a
critical look at the long-held stories we’ll need to rewrite to build it. It will appeal to
environmentalists, regenerative farmers, permaculture enthusiasts, agroforesters, locavores, and
anyone hungry for a more holistic, nutrient-dense diet rooted in wild foods and ancient
knowledge.
About the presenter:
Elspeth Hay is a writer, public radio host, and creator of the Local Food Report, a weekly feature
that has aired on CAI, the Cape & Islands NPR Station, since 2008. Deeply immersed in her own
local food system, she writes and reports for print, radio, and online media with a focus on food
and the environment. Elspeth’s work has been featured in the Boston Globe, NPR’s Kitchen
Window, Heated with Mark Bittman, The Provincetown Independent, and numerous other
publications. Through her conversations with growers, harvesters, processors, cooks, policy
makers, Indigenous knowledge-keepers, scientists, researchers, and visionaries, she aims to
rebuild our cultural store of culinary knowledge—and to reconnect us with the people, places,
and ideas that feed us. Elspeth lives with her family on Cape Cod, MA