Booker Botanicals Bridges Culture & Agriculture

Madison native Alex Booker uses education and relationships to help communities and individuals reclaim connection with the food they eat.

“I believe there’s a powerful therapeutic aspect to having our hands in the soil,” Alex says. “Society has removed us a lot from how we eat and how we sustain our lives, and that disconnect not only harms the environment but also harms ourselves.”

Alex recently celebrated one year in business as Booker Botanicals, whose mission is to bring real food to real people by providing high-quality kitchen staples to individuals, restaurants and caterers whose cuisine is influenced by the Black Diaspora. Among others, he’ll be working with Pasture and Plenty this season, contributing produce to their virtual cooking class meal kits for MMSD's Black Excellence program.

“Booker Botanicals started off as me just making herbal body products and developed into helping other people set up their own gardens and care for their houseplants, designing productive spaces tailored to what people would actually use, and as time went on, it turned into me actually having a space to farm out in Black Earth and selling herbs and produce to small businesses and to people directly.” Alex is currently cultivating land owned by Andrea Richardson and Rebeca Chacon of Firm Footing Farm near Black Earth, WI.

The seeds of Alex’s entrepreneurial and agricultural journey were planted long ago. His grandparents were farmers in Mississippi, and he was involved in the pilot youth gardening program at the East Madison Community Center. When his mother saw how much he enjoyed it, she helped him start a garden at home, and after that he was “always gardening,” from grade school until he left for college.

Alex went on to work with Urban Triage in Madison and is now the Assistant Farm and Education Manager at Badger Rock Neighborhood Center where he works with families, “talking about the history of Black people and agriculture and changing the stigma of agriculture when it comes to Black people. There is a lot of power in education [and] I feel that it is important to have representation of someone who is a business owner; a lot of times Black and Brown farmers are put into the nonprofit world while most white farmers are not tied to the nonprofit world. I found a way to be in both worlds, to give back but also have my business and charge what my business deserves.”

Looking ahead, Alex’s dream is to cultivate a garden space where folks can come out and connect with nature and with food that nourishes their sense of self. To follow Alex’s agricultural journey or buy directly from him, he invites you to connect via social media (@BookerBotanicals) or drop him a line via email (BookerBotanicals@gmail.com) to join his mailing list.

Looking for a restaurant recommendation from someone who loves food as much as Alex does? He’s got you covered: “Senor Machete’s downtown. It’s this amazing little Mexican restaurant, the food is great, the service is great…” He trails off before hastily backtracking: “Wait, maybe I shouldn’t share this, it’s gonna get so busy there now!”

This article brought to you by the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation's UpStart program.