Oh, Quinoa!

I wrote a post for the KidsVT Family Newspaper blog about my latest quinoa salad creation.

You can read it here if you're interested in a funny story about my quinoa obession.

OR just check out the recipe right here! The bottom line? Kids and grown ups love this one. Give it a try!

prepping ingredients


Warm quinoa salad

2 cups quinoa (I usually cook 2 cups of quinoa with 3-3.5 cups water and a pinch of salt. Bring it all to a boil, then cover, reduce heat to low, and simmer for 15 minutes.)
1 medium butternut squash – peeled, seeded, cut into ½ inch dice
1 small red onion, diced
3 or 4 scallions, thinly sliced
3 Tbsp olive oil, divided
1 cup crumbled feta cheese, divided
2 tsp dill
1 tsp salt (or to taste)
1 tsp black pepper
Juice of ½ a lemon

Preheat your oven to 400. Toss the squash cubes with 2 tbsp of the olive oil until all the pieces are coated. Arrange in a single layer on a rimmed baking sheet and roast in the hot oven for about 15 minutes.
While the squash is roasting, cook the quinoa, then transfer it to a large bowl.
Chop the onion and the scallions, and add to the quinoa while it’s still warm.
Check your squash! It’s ready when it’s easy to pierce with a fork and turning brown and slightly crispy on one side.
 Add it to the bowl, making sure you get any nice crunchy bits and all the oil from the pan.
Then throw in the salt, pepper, dill, and lemon juice and mix everything well.
Last, add ¾ cup of the feta and toss to combine.
Taste and adjust the salt, pepper, or lemon juice if you like.
Ready to serve!
To serve, sprinkle the last ¼ cup of the feta over the top, and drizzle over the last Tbsp of olive oil.

Enjoy!



Ever heard of the Center for Agricultural Economy?

Neither had I. But now, they are my new heroes.

Last week we were were lucky to try out some pre cut veggies from a new program called Just Cut. Their mission is to provide options for seasonal produce from small Vermont farms to institutions that are looking to increase their local buying options, but that face the usual challenges of limited storage capacity, kitchen equipment, or skilled kitchen staff time.   This very cool project is supported by.... yep,  The Center for Agricultural Economy, based in  Hardwick VT.

From their brochure:

Founded in 2004, the Center for an Agricultural Economy has acted as a non-profit resource for local food systems in the northeast kingdom.

From food systems planning, technical assistance, business advising, to hunger relief, public events and community projects, the CAE is striving to create a regenerative, local based, healthy food system.

Pretty great, right?

They also run the Vermont Food Venture Center, a "multi-use process facility" designed to help budding food  entrepreneurs and farmers get their businesses running. They offer business plan consulting, training in the use of their industrial kitchen spaces - they have three, each with different specialty industrial equipment - and storage for farms  and food businesses.

Just Cut offers veggies that have been minimally processed (peeled and cut, or cut and frozen, nothing else) right at the Food Venture Center. The produce is high quality, local and traceable, and available for ordering right now through several area produce distributors.
Currently they are offering beets, potatoes, carrots, and broccoli in various cuts, fresh or frozen. We sampled three cuts of fresh carrots ( shredded, diced, and sticks) and fresh sliced beets.

They were great! Everything was fresh and delicious, and the beets especially were a huge hit.
beautiful beets
even the pan was pretty





















Chicken soup made with the Just Cut diced carrots

Lunch for the babies





I am beyond excited about this program! Getting more local produce into schools and other institutions while strengthening small farms and community food systems...? Everybody wins.
Read more about the CAE and everything they do here...

www.hardwickagriculture.org


Meanwhile, we've been cooking and eating up a storm in the kitchen at BCS. Here are some little folks enjoying some shepherd's pie along with shredded carrot slaw made with napa cabbage and sweet dressing...


Yes, these are....
actual preschooler lunch plates!






And a few random kitchen pics from this week.....



Shepherd's pie headed for the oven, 



Beautiful radishes from our farm share get a soak in the sink

Have a great week!
xo
Erinn


Fall is here, and we're happy

There's no denying it, summer is pretty much over here in Vermont.  The days still warm up by the afternoon, and yes, there will be those few sweltering days that always pop up sometime in October, but the angle of the sunlight has shifted. The nights are cool. The air smells different.
Fall has arrived.


But we're glad, really. It's harvest time! Our weekly boxes from the Intervale have been FULL of wonderful organic kale, carrots, chard, herbs, fennel, melons, cucumbers, and peppers.
We've been giving lots of  beautiful produce away to our families, and turning the rest in to delicious lunches!

Here's a journey in photos, from farm to school lunch...
The gorgeous grounds at the Intervale Center


My trusty minivan, full of organic goodness!

Kale, kale, and more kale! Time to wash, dry, and remove stems.

Kale and carrots in the food processor, ready for chopping

Finely chopped kale and carrots, cooking in a little olive oil

Turkey meatballs, made with kale and carrot mixture

Fresh tomato sauce for pasta, also made with kale and carrots

Kale salad


Here's a recipe for my easy tomato sauce with extra veggies..


1 bunch kale, washed, dried, tough stems removed.
4 medium carrots, peeled and cut into one or two inch pieces
1 medium onion, peeled and quartered
3 cloves garlic
1/2 cup water
2 Tbsp olive oil
1 28 oz can of crushed tomatoes
2 tsp. salt
2 tsp. black pepper
1 Tbsp dried oregano
1 Tbsp dried basil (or three or four fresh basil leaves, chopped)
1 tsp red wine vinegar
1 tsp brown sugar


Add first five ingredients to food processor and whizz until everything is chopped finely and almost forming a paste.

Heat two tablespoons of olive oil in a large saucepan on medium heat, then scrape everything out of the processor and into the saucepan. Stir with a wooden spoon until the mixture is heated through. Add the can of crushed tomatoes and stir to combine everything. Let simmer over medium/low heat until it's just starting to bubble. Add the salt, pepper, herbs, vinegar, and sugar and stir well. Reduce heat to low and let simmer for at least 15 minutes, or up to an hour or two. Taste and adjust seasonings if you like.
Tomato soup with kale and carrot base, on an Actual Preschooler's Lunch Plate!

Serve over pasta,  use as a sauce for homemade pizza, OR stir in 1 1/2 cups of warmed milk (2% or higher, no skim!) and 1/4 cup of good grated parmesan cheese for a delicious soup - as seen above!

xo
Erinn







A new school year begins

"Do you have a....what's that word? Recipe! A recipe for these?"
                        -Preschooler at lunch, enjoying the heck out of some organic carrots


organic carrots from our farm share




It's the first week of the new school year at BCS, and we're enjoying the best part of harvest season at lunch. Carrots, green beans, cucumbers, greens, herbs, melons, zucchini and more loaded our farm share boxes last week, and I "pickled" the carrots and beans using the lacto-fermentation method I learned from our friends at City Market. Just veggies in brine with dill, sealed and left to turn salty, crunchy and delicious.


Lacto-fermented veggies. Aren't they gorgeous?


The staff ate them with biscuits..
I am obsessed with biscuits.



Lunch for my amazing co-workers

 and a veggie frittata for lunch during their week of setting up and settling in for the new year. We also had burgers, and two amazing salads I lifted  from the fantastic food52.
Raw corn salad...pretty much summer in a bowl



I love those pickled carrots, so i made a lot. Like, a LOT. I served them to the kids for lunch on Monday.
Actual preschooler's lunch plate
We also had pancakes with my secret maple cinnamon yogurt, and bananas. Simple, easy, and familiar. Just the thing to soothe those first-day-of-school jitters.  Not that there were many of those. The teachers at BCS are absolute masters at what they do, and everyone was humming along like they'd always been in their new classrooms by the time lunch rolled around.
Fall, here we come!

                

Make this for dinner...

Quinoa, black beans, cherry tomatoes, cilantro, lime juice, salt, pepper. Tried it out on the kids for lunch with our farm share cilantro a few weeks back and I can't stop thinking about it.

I'm on a Family Vacation!

...But since I can't let go of lunch lady life completely, I thought I'd post a few photos from the last few weeks, plus a link to my latest post over at Kids VT!
We had an awesome summer family dinner last Thursday, featuring local greens, pesto, and heirloom tomatoes on pizza.

The preschoolers have been growing peppers on the playground.

We found crazy carrots in our farm share.

We ate some beautiful, healthy summer lunches.

Blueberries burst into full season in Vermont.

And I wrote a sentimental blog post about pie.

Read it here...
Http://m.kidsvt.com/KidsVTBlog/archives/2014/07/30/its-time-for-pie


Summer farm share is here!

Yesterday was a really good day.
My ten year old, Eli, came to work with me to help out with lunch and the weekly shopping trip. We knew it would be a busy day, but when we arrived at BCS to start work Sarah reminded us that it was also the first farm share pick up of the summer at the Intervale Center.  Yes!!!! I couldn't have picked a better day to bring along a kid assistant!

We couldn't wait to get to the barn, and when we arrived our excitement was matched by the enthusiasm and warmth of the volunteers who met us. I am slightly biased, because one of those volunteers is a fantastic BCS parent/board member/fundraiser/cheerleader  I'm always happy to spend a few minutes (or an hour) catching up with. But truly, the whole operation is really something special. We were greeted by folks who happily retrieved our 2 giant boxes of produce from the gorgeous new walk-in fridge inside the new barn, and then cheerfully packed it all into our van. Really!
All Eli and I had to do was sample the delicious snacks that were on hand.
Hunger Free VT had a representative there  (Hi Becca!) demonstrating a few recipes using some of the veggies everyone was receiving this week - frittata with zucchini and basil, and cucumbers with homemade ranch dressing. We couldn't wait around for the frittata to finish cooking sadly, but the ranch dressing was incredibly good.




Becca also had some great handouts with local resources for extra food during the summer, recipes for the veggies in our shares, and info about shopping and meal planning on a budget.  Really well done, and useful info too.


Basically, this project is great and I'm so proud of everyone involved with it, especially the folks who are accessing this awesome local food.  It makes me proud of our town. Go Burlington!

But the best part... serving up local greens for lunch today.







We even had visitors! Margot's parents stopped by and joined us for turkey burgers, Digger's Mirth greens, and pineapple.




 Ahhh summer!
xo
Erinn




Take home bags are taking off...

...in a really big way. It's hard to believe we are in our fifth month of the take home food bag project! We raised enough money during the marathon fundraiser to keep things going strong while we come up with new funding ideas. (Side note: I'm working on a grant proposal for Hannaford  - our neighborhood supermarket - in hopes that they will support our effort with a donation, especially since we buy almost all of the food for the bags there.)
The response to the program has been so good that we've permanently upped our weekly offering from 5 to 10 bags, and we're getting great feedback from the families who are taking and enjoying them.




We've moved from sending bags of staple ingredients for a variety of meals to packing bags with all the ingredients to prepare a large meal for a family - along with a few extras. So far we've packed bags with everything folks need to make homemade macaroni and cheese with salad, lasagna, curry chick peas and rice,


BCS kiddo Cabby enjoys Curry chick peas and rice at home
Empty curry bowl, full belly!

breakfast for dinner with pancakes and eggs, and the big favorite... pizza.


Pizza made at home for a family of 4 with a take home pizza bag! (photo provided by BCS family)
We generally include a great loaf of bread (which we've been lucky enough to recieve donated from August First Bakery) and a big bag of fresh greens from Digger's Mirth Farm - with whom we are lucky enough to have a close BCS family connection (thank you S'ra and Arlo!).

Homemade croutons with August First bread! (photo provided by BCS family)
We've gotten tons of great feedback are and thrilled to see that the bags really are helping families cook and eat together, and we are so thankful for everyone who has sent photos and kind words about how they've used the extra food, tried out the recipes, and shared a great meal together at home.

This week we are sending home bags with the recipe and ingredients for my easy tomato sauce...





 along with pasta, bread, greens, eggs, zucchini and carrots, a ball of pizza dough, and olive oil.  Sarah even made a zucchini cheat sheet with ideas for using up the ubiquitous Vermont summer veggie...

On top of all that, Monday marks the beginning of our summer farm share program through the Intervale Food Hub, so we will have even more fresh veggies and fruit to feed to the kids and send home with families.
Hooray for summer in Vermont, for our farmers, and for everyone having enough to eat!

Take Care,
Erinn

Lunch was darn good today


Summer is here, along with the desperate search for meals that don't require use of the oven! Thank goodness it also means beautiful veggies and salads, salads, salads.
I didn't completely accomplish the oven-free meal yesterday - I turned the oven on to roast some chickpeas. And I cooked some quinoa because I was anxious to try out an idea that came to me after talking to a co-worker about rekindling our love affair with the grain. We started cooking quinoa at BCS about a year ago, mainly using it as a substitute for rice in casseroles, or with beans or chili. It worked well as a side dish and the kids ate enough to make me believe I should try to incorporate it into the menu more often.
Here's what I came up with today...quinoa salad with rainbow peppers and black beans, along with carrots, hummus, whole grain bread and cantaloupe. Look at those lunch plates!

Actual Preschoolers' Lunch Plates

Hi there!
It took a week or so to recover from marathon madness, but we made it and.....(drumroll)....... we raised over $2500 for our take-home food bag project!!! Thank you to everyone who supported Team BCS in our efforts to make sure everyone has enough good food to eat, at school and at home. We love you!
We have already stepped up our efforts. In the coming weeks we plan to double the number of bags we prepare each Friday. This week we're sending home the ingredients for curried chick peas with brown rice and salad, along with bread and fruit - enough to make a hearty dinner for 5-6 people. I will keep you updated and post some pics of our bags this Friday! 

Now we are moving full speed ahead into summer, and getting excited about growing season in Vermont! Soon our weekly farm share from the Intervale Food Hub will begin, and the kids will be growing herbs and veggies in their raised beds and neighborhood garden plots. 
In celebration I'm going to start posting the photos I've been collecting of actual preschoolers' lunch plates! 
My plan is to continue this throughout the summer, focusing on all the fresh local veggies we'll be enjoying and sharing with families. 
We serve and share our meals and snacks family style, so remember these are plates of food children have served themselves. Look at all that green!



Turkey shepherd's pie and spinach salad

Add caption

Quinoa, stir fried veggies with chick peas, red grapes and apple slices


I

In other exciting news, starting on Wednesday I will be posting on the Kids Vt blog every other week as the lunch lady!  Look for great recipes to make and share with kids, and maybe some stories about lunch lady life at BCS too. I'm so thankful for the opportunity and look forward to working with the cool and talented staff at Kids VT! 

Take Care!
Erinn