New Beginnings!

After a great vacation I'm headed back to the kitchen today to cook up some comforting macaroni and cheese and a cool, crispy salad for our new classrooms! I stopped by yesterday to check on the state of the kitchen and make a list of what we'd need to get through the week and, holy cow! The teachers and staff worked incredibly hard this past week of in-service. The center looks absolutely amazing. I can't wait to see the busy kiddos experiencing the new set-ups. Even the kitchen was organized and spotless. I love my job and my incredible co-workers!

I wanted to share a few links I've discovered over the past few weeks.
First, a great blog called Lunches Fit For A Kid, written by a Burlington mom who happens to be a friend of a friend. I am excited to try the pesto recipe, among others. Take a minute to look around, whether you cook for kids or not. She has wonderful lunch ideas (she's a devotee of the Bento thing) and includes recipes for other meals, as well as delicious things she makes for the grown ups.

I also wanted to mention Gruel for Dinner, written by my former neighbor and wonderful lady Kate. Though not technically about food for kids, it is a visually stunning, inspiring and instructive blog with lots of information about healthy, whole, local food in our wonderful Vermont.

Lastly, I just heard that BCS may be able to score a large donation of local tomatoes, which would serve the dual purpose of the wonderful fresh tomato pasta sauce by Jamie Oliver I've been wanting to try out on the kids, AND forcing me to can for the winter!
Happy New School Year everyone!
-erinn

Graduation!

I have been on vacation this week, but I'm busy today baking lots of pizza and making fresh veggie platters. This afternoon is the graduation/moving up ceremony for all of our wonderful kids!
Our 5 year olds will be heading to kindergarten, and everyone else will be moving on up into their new classrooms on August 31st - after a week of preparation by our amazing staff.

The big kids are making fresh lemonade with honey to share at the event, which is taking place downtown at Contois Auditorium in City Hall on beautiful Church St.

A HUGE thank you to City Market for their help - we have funded this final family dinner of the year with part of their generous donation.

I can't wait!

I'd like to thank my incredible substitute Erika for holding the kitchen fort down for me this week!
She made some favorites like barbecue chicken, ravioli, turkey burgers, and sauteed green beans.

I'll be back on the 31st after a little time at the beach with my family, ready to cook it up for the new classes! Please make sure you follow us here, there are great things to come this Fall...

Sweet Potato Salad!

Last week I tried a new cold salad recipe I adapted from the Hannaford food magazine Fresh.
It was super easy - after you peeled, chopped and boiled the sweet potatoes anyway - but I peeled and chopped the afternoon before with my assistant Leah, then left them in a large pot of cold water in the fridge over night. On serving day I boiled them for just barely 10 minutes, until they were tender but firm, then rinsed them in cold water and put them back in the fridge. Then I chopped a large red bell pepper and a small bunch of scallions and added them to the potatoes. Next I mixed up the dressing. Instead of the pre-packaged spice mix in the recipe I used garlic powder, cumin, chili powder, and a little salt. I mixed them all with a half cup of mayo and a quarter cup of orange juice for every 6 cups of potatoes. You can ramp up the spice of course, depending on what your family likes.
I'm not going to lie and say the kids went crazy for this. They all tried it, but it was a new taste so they didn't devour it the way I'd hoped. But it did get more thumbs up than thumbs down, and the adults loved it, including me. It will certainly be part of my summer dinner rotation.
I tried it at home with cous cous and black beans - delicious!!

Young Toddlers...


Eat lunch too!
Enjoying each others company....

learning to eat together....


getting a little help when we need it....



filling our bellies for big afternoons!

Summer is still in full swing at BCS. We have been picking up weekly donations of veggies from our good friends at Digger's Mirth Collective farm.
This weekend we received a big bunch of green beans, some beautiful chard, and a giant cantaloupe, all of which was served yesterday - delicious! I lined the serving bowls with big chard leaves, and then spooned sauteed green beans over them. The preschoolers ate them all up, including the chard, which had been warmed just a little by the buttery beans.
The melon was fresh and amazing. We can't thank our farmer friends enough!!

We've also been packing lunches for outings quite a bit. This Wednesday the Big Toddlers will take a trip to the ECHO Lake and Science Center on Lake Champlain, so my helper Leah and I will pack them a take-along lunch this afternoon. I found a nice little resource on making wraps for kids on the School Connections US Department of Agriculture website. Lots of ideas for portable sandwiches.
All you have to do is mix and match ingredients.....

Fillings:
cheese
turkey or leftover chicken
eggs
beans
nut butter
hummus

Spreads:
salad dressing
garlic
mustard
mayo
hot sauce
ketchup
cream cheese
miso
pesto

Veggies:
bell pepper
lettuce
grated carrot
sliced cucumbers
mushrooms
greens
tomatoes

Wraps:
whole wheat tortillas
big sturdy lettuce leaves
pita
rice paper wrappers
crepes
lavash bread

Fun right? They can be put together in bulk to serve to lots of kids at once (like I do!) and they make a nice change from the usual sandwich if you pack your own kiddo's lunch for school.

They're even a nice, no-oven-required dinner idea, served with a big salad.

Happy Summer!
-Erinn

barbecue chicken, fresh green beans, corn bread, carrots, and apples...


Summer at BCS means...

Picnics at the Intervale, taking care of the raised beds at school, eating fresh mint that grows on the playground, making lemonade and popsicles, and the soon-to-be-kindergarteners hard at work on their production of The Wizard Of Oz..
It also means preparing for the end of this school year and the beginning of the next. We call it Transition, and it includes younger kids visiting what will be their new classrooms at the end of August.
In honor of the Big Toddlers (2 and 3 year olds) and their impending Big Move to the Preschool, I wanted to focus on them a little, and give you a peek into their lunchtime.

Eating family style...


Enjoying apples, carrots and cornbread...A little silliness is to be expected...

because lunch is fun, after all.
Thank you toddlers and wonderful teachers for welcoming my personal photographer (also known as my husband!) into your classroom. You are all terrific!


But there's more!
I have a new assistant in the kitchen!
Leah is a 17 year old volunteer, and she's helping me out three days a week until it's time for her to return to school for her senior year. She has already made herself indispensable! She usually cleans and sets the tables, then helps me with fruit and veggie prep before we serve. After enjoying some of our work herself, we clean up together and prep for the next day. I'm still alone on Mondays and Fridays, and boy do I miss her! We're so glad she's joined us for the summer, and I'll post some photos of us hard at work soon.

In other great news, our July Family Dinner was a huge success. Even though it literally rained on our picnic and we had to move indoors, over 60 people came together to connect and eat delicious food. We had turkey roll-ups with greens, potato salad, watermelon, and all of the amazing dishes brought by our families. We even had a homemade pinata!
So you can imagine how pleased I am to tell you that as of this week, BCS is the proud and grateful recipient of some generous funding from City Market to continue our Family Dinners! We are so excited for our August get-together, and are now busy planning them for the rest of the year. THANK YOU City Market!

Summer is here!

Everyone is spending the mornings out and about - working on the gardens, walking around town, or heading to the Intervale. And that means hot, tired, and hungry kids in the kitchen at lunchtime! I'm looking to expand my sandwich and salad repertoire in the coming weeks. It's hard to sit down to spaghetti and meatballs after a sweaty morning of playing outside, no matter how much we may love them!


The Green Preschool is heading to the Intervale every Wednesday morning. It's a long walk, and they have so much fun it's hard to make it back to BCS in time for lunch. So last week the teachers asked if they could have lunch to-go on Wednesdays for a while. Yesterday I made them a few containers of cold sandwich filling with cucumbers, shredded carrots, diced cubes of cheese and a little ranch dressing, and packed it with pita bread, apples, and crackers.
I'm excited about this challenge, and plan to search around in my cookbooks this week for some fun and healthy picnic options.
I'm also making the switch from store-bought ranch to homemade. I'm trying out this recipe first, I'll let you know how it goes!

No-Mayonnaise Ranch Dressing from all-recipes.com...

I'm happy to be back...

cooking again. I had a terrific vacation but was glad to be shopping on Sunday for red peppers, cheddar cheese, quinoa (a first - coming up this week!) chicken, tortillas, yogurt, berries, broccoli, and a big bag of bread flour. Tomorrow we'll have tacos with ground beef, cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, corn, salsa, AND some fresh cilantro the Green Preschool brought back from their outing to the Intervale today. Delicious ~ thanks Emily!!

Lunch today was a school-wide favorite, good old macaroni and cheese. Peas with butter for the babies and little toddlers, crunchy carrot sticks for the bigger kids. Sliced cantaloupe. Milk.
There was a good bit of macaroni and cheese left over, but by the time I left for the day the teachers had taken care of most of it ~


We are busy planning our June Family Dinner for next Thursday, June 24th. Heather and I decided on the menu, but I'm thinking of throwing in a surprise or two....


And HERE is the recipe I promised last time... Baked Spinach and Rice! My husband stumbled upon this site a week or two ago- Cooking with My Kid. If you need some fresh meal ideas I recommend it. Whether or not you want to involve your kids in the cooking process, this is delicious, healthy, kid-friendly food. The truth is, all of the recipes I checked out looked great, but I was especially intrigued by this one. I tried it and it's delicious. It looks and tastes like it took a lot of time and thought and yet, it's easy as pie to prepare and has only five ingredients. You can even go ahead and chop up some fresh spinach if you have it and use that instead of the frozen! I'm going to adapt the recipe for lunch and put it on the menu next month.

Baked Spinach & Rice Recipe

Prep Time: 25 mins (mostly unattended) Cooking Time: 30 mins

Ingredients:
1 package rice pilaf
1 box frozen chopped spinach
1 cup mozzarella cheese
2 eggs
1/4 cup lowfat milk

Defrost spinach and squeeze dry. Set aside. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Cook rice according to package directions and transfer to a large bowl. Stir in chopped spinach, cheese, milk and eggs. Pour into greased square baking dish and cook for 30 minutes or until set. Let cool for 5 minutes before cutting into squares for serving. Serves 4 to 6.

Take care!
Erinn

We're famous!

Thank you Lynn Monty for coming to visit us at BCS and writing a lovely article about our food program for the Hometown section of the Burlington Free Press!
To read the full article just click here.

I'm also excited because I learned a new recipe today that I think the kids will love, and that will make good use of any greens ( like spinach, chard, kale, etc) we might get from our farm share this season. I'll keep it a secret for now but it will be my next post, after my own kiddos have taste tested!

Take Care!

Squash Soup!

Here is the recipe for Erinn's delicious squash soup, served at our last Family Dinner. This is Vermont so even summer will hold a few days when soup is called for. Make two batches and freeze some, it reheats beautifully and can be thinned with water, broth or milk. Babies love it too.


Lunch Lady Squash Soup
Served at our May Family Dinner

(Food processor or blender required to get really smooth soup)
2 Medium/large butternut squash peeled, seeded, chopped into 2 inch pieces
6 Cups chicken or vegetable broth
1 Medium onion peeled and chopped
Salt, pepper, garlic powder
About half a cup of milk or cream (optional)

Place squash, onions, and broth into large soup pot. Bring to a low boil then reduce the heat and simmer until squash and onions are very soft and mushy. In small batches process the mixture in the processor or blender until it is very smooth , adding small amounts of milk or cream if desired. Season with salt , pepper, and garlic powder to taste.

Great News!


Last week Sarah received word that BCS will be the recipient of a three-year grant from the Vermont Children's Trust Fund to strengthen our food program!! We are thrilled because this will allow us to really focus on making the program super sustainable over the next few years.

Meanwhile, the gardening season has begun! The preschoolers have been hard at work planting the raised beds at the school

and the BCS beds at the Archibald Neighborhood Garden are finally filled and ready!

In addition to that, we will be participating in a gleaning program at the Intervale Center for additional produce a few times a month. All in all, we should be swimming in fresh veggies all summer long!
As one preschooler exclaimed while looking over the seed packets and seedlings in the kitchen last week.. "Erinn, we're going to grow so much you won't need to buy any more food!"

Hi!

Thanks for coming! I wanted to point out the Links list on the left side of the page - we have some good stuff we'd like you to know about.
First, where it reads "Donate Now"? Click there and you will find a great and easy way to donate to the BCS food program. Sarah has even set up some pre-set donation amounts with pictures and descriptions of what those dollars can fund. For example, $15 buys me a new box grater! $25 lets me upgrade to all organic fruits and veggies for a week's worth of lunches and snacks! $50 funds a BCS family dinner! And feel free to forward the site address to anyone you know who might like to help us feed kids great food!

http://bcslunchlady.winwinapps.com/

The CACFP official site and the Vermont Campaign to End Childhood Hunger sites are next - not the flashiest stuff ever, but great information about the work that goes into running the program, and the work that's being done statewide. I highly recommend checking out the "facts and resources" section on the Vermont Campaign site for some sobering statistics served up with solid inspiration to get involved.

Grow Team ONE is the grassroots organization that supports the community garden where BCS maintains 2 plots. My family gardens there as well. Photos of our work there to come soon so keep an eye out.


Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution - we love this guy because he's working on a worldwide scale to get childhood nutrition and the food we serve in schools on more people's minds, and because he's going into school cafeterias to work with the folks who actually prepare that food.

Last is a link to the North American Reggio Emilia Alliance site where you can learn much more about the Reggio philosophy of early childhood education.

Check out the What's for lunch today page on the left to find out about today's meal.
And come back soon!