We are proud to be working for the second year with Principal Catalina Flor of Phillis Wheatley Elementary School in Overtown to activate Chefs Move to Schools, part of First Lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! campaign to raise a healthier generation of kids in America. It’s all about engaging chefs to help teach students and parents about nutrition, and making balanced and healthy choices. Here’s how we partner with our school…
Open House and Planting Day: As with the 2010-2011 school year, we introduced parents to the 2011-2012 school garden program at Back to School Night by serving a fresh, healthy recipe, this time Peach and Local Radish Salad. We also raffled some of Michael’s cookbooks and announced $500 in generous funding from Les Dames d’Escoffier of Miami. Science Coach Tracie Faigenblat then gathered students on Friday, September 23 with community gardener Maggi Pons to plant lettuce, carrot, and tomato seeds, and seedlings including onion, tomatillo, roma tomato, green, yellow, and red peppers, eggplant, kale, bok choy, swiss chard, arugula, collard green, mint, chocolate mint, spearmint, oregano and a papaya tree. We also shared samples of ratatouille prepared at MGFD’s kitchen featuring some of the ingredients that will eventually be harvested. The school’s six newly-planted raised edible garden beds will be maintained by students and incorporated into their science curriculum.
Recipe Demonstrations and Field Trips: Understanding that healthy food options are not always available, the program aims to teach students about where food comes from and set them on a path toward making more balanced choices. Michael will visit the school periodically to cook and show that it is fun and easy to incorporate fresh fruits and vegetables into one’s daily routine. Last year’s Thanksgiving Day event was such a hit that students broke into a spontaneous rap and dance routine about Chef’s local pumpkin stuffing. We also will visit a local farmers market.
Healthier Cafeteria Lunches: Michael will collaborate with students on a fresh, healthy, and tasty item for their school cafeteria lunch menu, most likely Garden Ratatouille made with veggies sourced from Homestead, FL farms thanks to help from Miami-Dade Public Schools Food & Nutrition team including Farm-to-School Grants Manager Erin Healy. Last year Chef co-created Grilled Rosemary Chicken Salad with then fifth grader Gerald Johnson Jr. It’s now available to high school students system-wide in new healthy vending machines, recently announced by Superintendent Alberto Carvalho and Food & Nutrition Department Administrative Director Penny Parham.
On July 5, 2011, the phenomenal news came that Philly Wheatley had gone from an F to an A school, thanks to the enthusiasm of Principal Catalina Flor, and her determined staff. Congratulations to them, and we hope to have some students at Harry’s Pizzeria for a garden veggie pizza party to celebrate in the near future.
