Entries Tagged as 'vegetables'

Are You a Square Gardener, or a Row Gardener?

June 29th, 2010 · No Comments · garden

I have to admit, I’m a sucker for any kind of vegetable grown in a row. A row of lettuce heads fills me with envy, and makes me think it must have been planted by a genius.
But rows are for farmers. Rows are for walking down. Rows are for driving tractors through. Rows are not [...]

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Kids Make Spring Couscous Salad

May 21st, 2010 · No Comments · kids

One of the challenges of working with large groups of children in the kitchen is keeping their attention. Once you lose it, it can be difficult getting it back. If we can keep the kids working with their hands, they stay focused. This couscous salad is one of those dishes that requires lots of handiwork [...]

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Lessons from Berkeley: The Truth About Vegetables

May 17th, 2010 · 13 Comments · Berkeley, kids, school food

Might as well say it straight up: Kids don’t like vegetables.
At least most kids don’t like most vegetables most of the time. That’s the ultimate lesson I draw after spending weeks in school kitchens from Washington, D.C., to Berkeley, CA. And that certainly challenges the idea of produce as a magic elixir for the childhood [...]

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Berkeley Schools Cook from Scratch: Hold the Beans, Please

May 14th, 2010 · 1 Comment · Berkeley, kids, school food

After spending hours sorting chicken pieces my first day on the job in the Berkeley school system’s central kitchen, I got a break. “How would you like to serve the kids at lunch?” asked Joan Gallagher, the sous chef in charge of kitchen production. “It’s the most exciting part of the day. You’ll get to [...]

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Kids Makes Ethiopian Spicy Vegetables (Yataklete Kilkil)

April 23rd, 2010 · No Comments · Ethnic, Recipes, kids

Teaching kids about food and cooking I’ve come to learn that an appreciation for vegetables is largely a function of age. The younger ones–Kindergartners–walked away from this dish of freshly cooked vegetables tossed with aromatic butter. All they wanted was the bread. The older children–nine- and 10-year-olds–weren’t so crazy for the spongy Ethiopian injera bread, [...]

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Sorry, We Can’t Cook: D.C. Schools Say ‘No’ to More Vegetables

March 18th, 2010 · 7 Comments · Tales, Wellness, kids

In a move that could signal a serious fault line in the argument for more vegetables as a tonic for childhood obesity, drafters of “Healthy Schools” legislation pending before the D.C. Council have skuttled a push for additional produce in school meals after school officials said they cannot guarantee their kitchens can prepare vegetables that kids will [...]

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Kids Pass Knife Certification, Make Soup

January 30th, 2010 · 3 Comments · Tales, kids

Well, it’s finally happened. The kids in the food appreciation classes I teach at a private elementary school here in the District of Columbia have graduated (the older ones, at least) from plastic knives to real knives.
The only reason this hadn’t happened sooner was my failure to deliver on promises I’d been making for, oh, the [...]

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Kids Make Chicken-Vegetable Stew with Palm Oil

January 26th, 2010 · No Comments · kids

Continuing on our virtual world culinary tour, our food appreciation classes last week bade adieu to West Africa. But we could not leave without sampling a staple food item there: palm oil.
Palm oil, derived from the fruit of the oil palm, is immediately recognizable by its deep, red color. The color comes from a heavy [...]

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Tales from a D.C. School Kitchen: Part Three

January 21st, 2010 · 3 Comments · Tales, kids

I recently spent a week in the kitchen at H.D. Cooke Elementary School here in the District of Columbia observing how food is prepared. This is the third in a series of posts about what I saw. You can find previous posts here and here.
Each morning Mattie Hall performs a ritual in the cafeteria at H.D. [...]

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Kids Make Chicken-Vegetable Stew With Peanuts

January 15th, 2010 · No Comments · Ethnic, Recipes, kids

Who knew turnips and peanut butter could taste so good together?
One of the things we like about the African food we are making in our food appreciation classes is the use of fresh, whole ingredients and lots of vegetables. This stew is a perfect example, and something we could easily grow very fond of in [...]

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