Final Cooking Classes for 2012-2013

Last week we finished up our cooking unit in the BHSEC kitchen. We had a great time a learned a ton- especially about vegetable prep. We cubed our vegetables for our stir-fry, made matchstick cuts for our fresh spring rolls and learned how to make chiffonade cuts for our herbs.

Fresh vegetable spring rolls and quinoa stir-fry are both very versatile dishes. One you get the basics of each dish down you can substitute most ingredients for things you have around the house. The quinoa can be substituted for rice, millet or buckwheat for example and the spring rolls can be filled with your choice of fresh veggies or even fruit!

 When we were done cooking we sat together and enjoyed our hard work. We made sure to take several minutes (as we always do) for silent "mindful" eating. Students were pleasantly surprised to discover that their eating experience was enhanced by taking the time to smell, chew, taste and even hear their food.

Recipes

Vegetable Spring Rolls with Peanut Dipping Sauce

Ingredients:

1 carrot, peeled and cut into long matchsticks

1 green pepper, cut into long matchsticks

1 red pepper, cut into long matchsticks

1 cucumber, cut into long matchsticks

Romaine lettuce leaves

6 ounces Asian rice vermicelli noodles

Round rice sheets

Sprigs of cilantro and/or Thai basil, mint

For Peanut Dipping Sauce:

1/2 cup natural creamy peanut butter

1/2 cup warm water

1/4 cup fresh lime juice (from 2 limes)

1 tablespoon soy sauce

4 teaspoons sugar

1/4 cup chopped roasted peanuts

Directions:

1. Chop all of the veggies and set aside.

2. Boil and drain noodles per package instructions. Cool under water. Set aside.

3. One at a time, soak rice sheets into warm water to soften. Use a shallow dish or pie plate for this step. Lay a rice sheet on a towel covered work surface. Working quickly, place some noodles, vegetables, lettuce, and a few herb leaves on the near side of the rice round. Roll mixture forward (in egg roll fashion) one revolution then add additional vegetables. Tuck ends inward and finish the roll. Continue making rolls until ingredients are used up.

To make the peanut dipping sauce:

Makes 1 1/4 cups

In a medium bowl, whisk together peanut butter and water until smooth. Whisk in lime juice, soy sauce, and sugar. Sprinkle peanuts over sauce just before serving.

(Quinoa)  Fried Rice

Serves 4

Quinoa is an ancient grain from South America with a high protein content and a nice nutty flavor. For best results, use leftover quinoa that's been chilled in the refrigerator. If you don't have time, cook the quinoa but using only 80% of the water that the recipe calls for on the package. Once the quinoa is cooked, spread it out on a baking tray or large bowl and place in freezer for 10 minutes. This will chill the quinoa for the recipe.

**Of course, you can use leftover rice if you have it.

** If you can not find fish sauce substitute with additional soy sauce.

Ingredients:

1 tablespoon cooking oil

2 eggs

1 stalk green onion, chopped

1 clove garlic, finely minced

1 teaspoon grated fresh ginger

1/2 cup frozen peas

2 cups cooked, chilled quinoa (about 1/2 cup raw)

1 1/2 teaspoon soy sauce

1 teaspoon fish sauce

freshly ground black pepper

*Feel free to add any additional veggies you might have on hand, just like a stew!

Directions:

1. Heat a wok or large saute pan over high heat. When hot, swirl in the oil. Add in the eggs and scramble for 15 seconds. Once the eggs have just set, remove the eggs to a clean plate or bowl.

2. Return wok to stove and turn to medium-high heat.. Add in the green onion, ginger and garlic, stir fry for 30 seconds until fragrant. Add any additional vegetables you have and cook until tender (remember, always cook according to texture- harder vegetables first)

3. Add in the cooked eggs, frozen peas and quinoa. Toss and stir fry for 2 minutes, spreading everything out over the surface of the wok. Pour in the soy sauce, fish sauce and add in the black pepper. Toss again and stir fry for an additional minute. Taste and add in additional soy sauce or fish sauce if needed . 

Post Sandy Clean up

The BHSEC campus was hit hard by the giant storm and subsequent flooding that was "Sandy". We were biting our nails waiting for news about the garden after the storm hit. To our relief, we received word days later that somehow the garden made it through the storm relatively unscathed.
   Although our garden was in decent shape, the rest of the school didn't fair as well. The gym and the cafeteria were both under water, the entire first floor had to be pumped dry and cleaned ultra-throughly. Filthy storm water reached several feet up the school walls and left a scum that had to be scraped off and the outdoor wooden benches needed to be sanded and re-stained.
   The mighty Kristi Powell organized a very successful clean up day last Saturday. Parents, students and loyal members of the BHSEC community showed up to clean, scrape, paint, weed, transplant, build and actively show their support for the school.
  A huge heart felt THANK YOU goes out to all of those who helped!

Parent volunteers assembling our new garden cart 

The most root-bound plant most of us had seen, we wished we had a chainsaw. 

Zana, our garden club president

Kristi Powell, Principal Dr. Lerner and parent volunteers with the finished product 

With the help of some handy parents we were able to construct our rat-proof bed cover prototype!
We can't wait to put it to use! 

Teacher, Tess Diamond wheels away the debris and compost from the day. 

Healthy and Hunger-Free?

 
   Several weeks ago the New York Times published an article entitled "No Appetite for Good-for-You School Lunches, "given my line of work, the title itself made me cringe. The article went on to chronicle the dissatisfaction some high school students are finding with the changes made to school lunches in accordance with the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act . The act requires schools to increase the amount of fruits and vegetables in their offerings and rein in the amount of calories each portion contains to no more than 850 calories (previously, there was no restriction). Adding fuel to the fire, a price increase of 10 cents was implemented as part of a federal mandate to cover the cost of the lunches. Students are incensed at the increased prices, bad flavor and smaller potion sizes of the meals. Who can blame them?

To illustrate their frustration students from Wallace County High School in Sharon Springs Kansas produced this hilarious and poignant video:

The intentions of the policy are right on target however, the execution clearly does not resonate with hungry and opinionated teenagers. Striking the right balance between health, taste and engagement at a public school is tricky at best but fortunately, there are programs including our own "Food Politics and Systems" that are looking to do just that.

Programs like ours dissect all aspects of the food system in a tangible way so that students are empowered to make decisions about what they eat and buy. Our cooking and gardening classes strive to give students basic and practical skills that they can implement in their homes and communities.  To this day, we have never had a student turn down a dish made with fresh ingredients they have grown and prepared themselves.

These classes are a great privilege for the students who can participate but the question remains: how do we reach students who are not in our class or schools that don't offer programs like ours? One standout example is NYC's "Garden to Cafe" program, supported by the DOE,  the program facilitates the use of produce grown in the school garden to be served in the cafeteria. The connection  might seem obvious but there is usually a ton of red tape to sift through before anything can be introduced to a school cafeteria. This program is the best way to get students to experience the pinnacle of local and fresh. Sure, it's easy for students to toss out a browning piece of overcooked broccoli but most can't resist biting into a sweet cherry tomato grown just feet from their lunch table- it might even have them coming back for seconds.

With hopes to expand our program and take the Mobile Kitchen Classroom on a national tour we are looking forward to helping more schools find ways to engage students in all aspects of food literacy.

Growing carrots, broccoli, tomatoes and more! 

Enjoying the fruits of our labor during our "Mexican Feast". Homemade tortillas, fajitas, frijoles con arroz! 

New Year, New Class, New Club!

We're back in action at BHSEC and making the most of the waning sunlight. This semester our Food Politics and Systems classes are taking a new format; we are cycling through the 10th grade advisories with workshops in cooking, gardening and food politics. We are happy to have the opportunity to reach so many students and give them the tools to take responsibility for their food choices at home, at school and in their community.

Here is what is in store for the classes:

Class 1: Basic Gardening-  This class will focus on growing skills for seed to harvest with work in the BHSEC garden and indoor seed starting during the winter months.

Class 2: Basic Cooking Skills-  Taught in the BHSEC cafeteria kitchen the focus of this class will be building culinary skills with discussion focused on food access and nutrition.

Class 3: Food Politics- This class will focus on the politics that determine national and local food policy with a critical discussion and analysis of the Farm Bill.

What to do with these seeds?

Ah! Plant them, water them, love them.

Collecting seeds to save

The second exciting development of the year is the formation of our Garden Club or as Tess likes to call it, "ladies garden hour" (yes, its all girls for now). We have so many exciting plans for the year including field trips, garden design classes and cooking lessons. We can't wait to cook with our just-picked edibles in the spring!

Sign up for garden club!

Wielding a rake in a skirt, watch out.

Taking care of our tree pits- each member is responsible for two.

We are still harvesting Basil and Peppers!

Its the coolest club in town.

Composting Workshop

The IFAP and Our Relation to It - Alex Fenichell

I don’t think IFAP is sustainable, but I am having a hard time explaining why. In other words, if I had to convince all those involved in IFAP to stop what they’re doing, I don’t think I could do it. Except for an appeal to the morality and humanity and empathy of IFAPers, I know of no effective methods. From the movie we watched, I am most struck by a few things. First, the animal waste confinement farms produce and how poorly managed that waste is. Second, I am struck by the density and poor living-conditions of animals in factory farms [huge space + high density=woah]. Third, I am struck by the corporation-dictators who determine how smaller serf-like farmers work and thus live. Fourth, I am struck by the manipulative power of corporate “bucolic dairy farm” propaganda. Finally, I am struck by how attractive the pasture system and other alternative animal food production methods appear in the film. If IFAP is unsustainable, then I think an alternative for meat and dairy would look like a nation-wide local-as-possible pasture system, with a larger percentage of the population working as farmers.

As consumers: Buying and eating are voting; they are political acts. To avoid contributing to the faults of IFAP, if we eat meat and dairy in the first place, we can eat less of it. If we can afford to, we can buy meat and dairy sourced from independent farms. We should avoid contact and involvement with IFAP as much as possible as consumers, but as citizens we should involve with it by trying to improve it or replace it with more sustainable alternatives.

Alex's post on Pollinators (and compost).

On our thursday class we learned about pollination. On our tuesday class we learned a) about the odorous and noxious problems of putting too much chicken poop into compost, and b) what it must have smelt/felt like to be a feudal dung-shovelling serf! As profoundly humbling as learning about pollinators was -- humbling because although humans can be pollinators, MOST pollinators are insects, non-human animals, winds, and rains, so that we can't give ourselves credit for everything that benefits us and we should be humbled and grateful -- I found the compost experience more valuable and edifying. I will NEVER put that much of an odorous substance into compost ever again. On a more serious note, well-done compost is very helpful for us as humans and environmentally helpful a smart use of waste. However, as we learned on Tuesday, well-done compost demands a careful BALANCE of components that simply was not there with that demon-stuff we shoveled. I actually have no idea if the overly-nitrogenous compost will work well as a fertilizer, but as Tess said "Compost is not supposed to smell like that!" I suspect that a good compost smells better than that fowl-feces-fiesta we worked with. I propose that we discuss what makes a good compost in class. Now I will stop the compost-bashing (I am also in no way blaming the awesome people at the park we go to--thank you for working with us guys!).

A note on the pollinators: I am always surprised every Spring by how few pollinators I see compared to how many flowers I see. What a beautiful, subtle, and healthily transformative process for flowers to bloom in Spring all with the 'help' (unwitting or unconscious) of pollinators! I can easily imagine how people could think of a god or divine force causing the Springtime bloom. Also, it is amazing the sort of co-evolution that has happened between pollinators and plants: I recommend looking up videos of this amazing subject! Thats all folks, :)