Recordnet.com: Students growing their own lessonsTuesday February 3, 2009 - 10:27 AM Go to: eSanJoaquin.com BUSINESSES | JOBS | CARS | HOMES 45° Weather | Traffic Local News Crime/911 Government Education Commuting Growth Environment Urban Affairs Columnists Nation/World Obituaries Archive Sports Home Sports Columnists Outdoors Thunder Lightning Ports Cougars Motorsports College Sports Prep Sports Raiders 49ers Pro Sports Entertainment Home Local Entertainment Going Out Events Calendar Music Dining Getaways TV Listings Games Lifestyle Home Wine Food Home & Garden Health Religion Family Pets Youthink Vintage Celebrations Business Home Columnists Real Estate Agriculture Retail Personal Finance / Stocks On the Job Opinion Home Editorial Letters to the Editor Op/Ed Columnists Submit a Letter to the Editor Special Reports Home News Features Sports Multimedia Interaction Home Forums Blogs Photos Photo Archive Suggest a Poll Poll Archive Submit a Photo Buy a Photo Marketplace Home Autos Careers Homes Classifieds Your Town Home Stockton Lodi Tracy Manteca Lathrop Calaveras County Lockeford/Clements Ripon Escalon Linden Relocation Guide Subscription Services Contact Us Advertise with Us Jobs @ the Record Submit News Submit an Event Submit Photo Submit Letter Record Rewards Card Students growing their own lessons School garden used to make salad, teach about nutrition Print this Article Email this Article Text Size: A | A | A By Dana M. Nichols Record Staff Writer February 03, 2009 6:00 AM MURPHYS - Albert Michelson Elementary School first grader Michael Dow, 6, munched on a small cup of cabbage and broccoli salad made from vegetables out of the school garden Monday. "I wish I could have another bowl," Michael said. Then he pondered a question that many Michelson grown-ups also have been wondering for the past few years: Why do the people who run school kitchens, who obviously care deeply for children and their health, so rarely serve up meals containing fresh local ingredients? "Maybe they don't know how to," Michael said. Vegetables on TV The new episode of "Jenny's Kitchen," which features a fresh school garden salad prepared at Albert Michelson Elementary School, should be edited and ready for viewing by March on Comcast Channel 7 in Calaveras County. "Jenny's Kitchen" usually is shown three times a week. Check the program schedule at: co.calaveras.ca.us/departments/ patv/patv_1a.htmlMichael is on to something, said Gail Feenstra, a food systems analyst at the University of California, Davis, Agricultural Sustainability Institute and the statewide UC Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program. But part of the reason grown-ups who work for schools don't know how to provide kids with fresh vegetables is because a variety of laws, economic factors and institutional constraints prevent them, Feenstra said. "They have to purchase pre-processed products because labor is expensive," Feenstra said. "The kinds of things they have to work with are already heat-and-serve. The salad Michael and other students enjoyed Monday had to be made first thing in the morning, before the normal kitchen processes that involve heating frozen food got into swing. And that salad was not a routine event, but a one-of-a kind show in which television chef and teacher Jenny Baxter was videotaped along with the students who harvested vegetables and made the salad. In the next month or so, the new cabbage broccoli salad installment of "Jenny's Kitchen," Baxter's regular show, will begin showing in Calaveras County on Comcast Channel 7. The garden planted last year at Michelson Elementary and the salad made Monday are part of a year's-long effort by parents and teachers there to legitimize fresh local ingredients. That campaign began when fed-up parents went to a meeting of the Vallecito Union School District Board of Trustees with a board on which they had glued the various packaged cookies, crackers and other processed foods that make up much of what is offered in the Michelson cafeteria. Last year, local organic farmers Eric and Christine Taylor as well as the nonprofit agency Foothill Collaborative for Sustainability donated money and materials to provide everything the garden needed from seeds to deer-proof fencing. Now, every student in the school has spent time planting or weeding in the garden, and that alone had generated a new consciousness about food, staff and students said. "The children at recess time always are checking it out to see how high things have grown," Michelson Principal Phyllis Parisi said. Schools throughout California in recent years also have begun planting gardens and offering cooking lessons to get students and families excited about fresh local food. One key, Baxter said, is not to overcook. "If you can cook your vegetables to be crunchy, children will like them better," Baxter said. And while health is one big motive for the statewide effort to encourage fresh local vegetables, economics are a factor too. The small farms that grow local produce need to find ways to sell to institutions such as schools if they are to continue to thrive, and there are few distribution systems that make that possible, Feenstra said. Feenstra and other sustainable agriculture researchers have teamed up for the past year with the Community Alliance with Family Farmers to create a manual for college-based food services that face similar challenges in providing fresh local food. "It just came out," Feenstra said. "And it came from the research project we were all collaboratively involved in - how to make it more possible for small- to midscale family farmers to have their food purchased by cafeterias, schools and other institutions." Contact reporter Dana M. Nichols at (209) 607-1361 or dnichols@recordnet.com. To learn more Learn more about how the Community Alliance with Family Farmers is helping schools in California serve fresh locally grown foods: www.caff.org/programs/farm2school.shtml#resources.HOME Reader reactions have moved These discussions and our forums are not moderated. We rely on users to police themselves, and flag inappropriate comments and behavior. You need not be registered to report abuse. In accordance with our Terms of Service, we reserve the right to remove any post at any time for any reason, and will restrict access of registered users who repeatedly violate our terms. 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