St. Ignatius Grade 7's visit to the Honey Bee Research Centre on Campus!

On October 10th we brought 33 Grade 7's to the Bee Farm where we were lead in an engaging bee tour by Apiary Manager, Paul Kelly. Paul began with teaching us all about the anatomy, types, and behaviour of bees. We then followed him out to the hives where the brave kids were able to sample fresh honey right from the honeycomb!

After purchasing some delicious raw honey from Paul we headed back to the MINS Food Lab where we were joined by Chef Jennifer Rekunyk who led the kids in some fantastic culinary activities. Using some vegetables from the organic garden that the school had harvested the day before, we showed the kids how to incorporate honey into some healthy and easy recipes which included, butternut squash fries, kale chips, garlic aoli, and yummy kale salad.

Our second day at the bee farm was October 17th, with another amazing group of Grade 7 students from St. Ignatius. This time we were joined by Chef Shea Robinson again to help with our honey recipes. We helped the students make granola, banana pops, and honey roasted root vegetables. A huge thank you to both Chef Rekunyk and Chef Robinson for making both days fantastic for the students. We are sad that this concludes our fall programming this year as the fall harvest is coming to a close. But we are excited about the up and coming G2T programs in the winter semester. Stay Tuned!!

 

Fall harvests in the Guelph Centre for Urban Organic Farming

Some beets growing in the garden!

This fall the Garden2Table team had more visits than ever to the Guelph Centre for Urban Organic Farming! Steph and Steven did an incredible job ensuring that all the students had a great time harvesting vegetables from the garden then bringing them up to the cooking labs to cook up a feast.

If you have never been down to the GCUOF you need to go and check it out at some point! We cannot emphasize enough that we could not have this program without the garden and we are so incredibly thankful and proud of the work that Martha Gay and her team do.

During the fall we brought 95 students through the garden, here's a quick recap of our visits:

On Thursday October 3rd, we brought 24 grade 4 students from Jean Little Public School to the Guelph Centre for Urban Organic Farming. We had a tour of the garden and then harvested some fresh vegetables! The kids then joined us in the cooking lab where we helped them prepare kale chips, butternut squash fries and roasted beet and goat cheese salad. The kids all took home something they harvested and were excited to tell their parents how much they loved kale!

Some new favourites- butternut squash fries & kale chips

On Wednesday October 9th we had 26 grade 7 students from St. Ignatius Catholic School in the garden. We harvested turnips, radishes, carrots, celery then washed and chopped them up and ate them right in the garden! We were then joined by Chef Shea Robinson who lead us in a dressing demo and taught us how to make some great dips to have with our veggies.

Quick tour of the garden before harvesting

Chef Shea helping us making dressings and dips for our veggies

Wednesday October 16th was our biggest G2T day! We brought 45 grade 2ʼs to the garden and then back to the kitchen lab. In the lab we were joined by Chef Erika who helped us make individual pizzas topped with fresh veggies from the garden that the students had harvested themselves!

Getting excited to be in the garden!

Learning from Bruce in the greenhouse

Searching for frogs in the pond

Back in the lab, ready to make pizzas

Some of our delicious pizzas!

Hopefully this has given you a little sneak peak of the garden visits we had in the fall. It definitely kept us busy but we were so happy that Steph and Steven were able to organize all these visits which allowed us to reach out to so many children. Thanks to all the guest chefs for helping us in the kitchen, the other student volunteers, and huge thank you to the GCUOF for all their help, allowing us to use their garden and for all the delicious vegetables! 

We're back, busier than ever!

Hey there!

It's crazy to think that the fall visits have come and gone! We apologize for being so late on this introductory post but we've been spending most of our time in the garden, the kitchen or the Honey Bee Research Centre teaching students about food.

We, the Garden2Table team for 2013-2014, are extremely excited for the year and can't wait to spread our knowledge and love for food in hopes of getting children excited about their food!

Without further ado, here's the team for this year:

Children's Programming Coordinators: Stephanie (right) & Steven (left)

My name is Stephanie Redmond. I am a 5th year Hotel and Food Administration Co-op Student. I have always enjoyed working with children and believe it is important to educate kids at a young age about where their food comes from. I hope to teach them the importance and benefits of organic farming, and get them excited to eat vegetables such as kale, beets and turnips. I am most excited about teaching the students how to prepare healthy and simple snacks that they can take home and use everyday. Here is to a great G2T year! 

My name is Steven Pawluch, I am a 2nd year Hotel and Food Administration student. I have always had a passion for the culinary arts, and I am most excited about teaching the kids how to prepare some amazing recipes with fresh organic vegetables from the garden. Being involved in the Slow Food movement back home and now an executive member on the university's student chapter has taught me the benefits of supporting our local farmers and making sustainable consumer choices. I hope that with Garden 2 Table we can install this in the kids at a young age!


Outreach Coordinators: Ailsa (right) & Shannon (left)  

Hi, my name is Ailsa and I am a fourth year student involved in Garden2Table, working on community outreach. I am very interested in eating locally and trying to avoid overly packaged and altered products. That is why I enjoy being in the garden so much, I love seeing where the foods come from and how they grow in their truest form. I am looking forward to a great year of learning and sharing knowledge with kids about the garden.

Hey! My name is Shannon and I am super excited to be working with Ailsa on the outreach for Garden2Table this year. Being a nutrition student I definitely recognize the importance of people understanding what they are eating and where it comes from. I think that we have become so disconnected from the origins of our food and the way to change this is start with tomorrow’s generation: the children. I grew up helping my parents in the kitchen and I cannot wait to create interactive food centered activities that we can take to school and other community groups to teach kids to love and appreciate their food!

College Royal Coordinators: Sharon (left) & Joyce (right)

Hello! I’m Sharon and I’m in second year hospitality and food administration. I’m really excited to be a part of the Garden2Table team this year because I love food! I’m looking forward to learning more about how organic vegetables are grown and sharing my love of food with others! I’ve always been a huge fan of food because it has the ability to make people happy, cheer them up when they’re sad and to bring different kinds of people together. I’m looking forward to meeting you!


Nihao (Hello in mandarin)! I am Joyce. A FOODIE? Of course I am! As most of other foodies do, I love food. And I will never get tired of rocking my kitchen by cooking and baking, but in a neat way. I always feel like working on a piece of art when baking a cake or making an eggplant parmesan dish, etc. in the kitchen. Moreover, I appreciate food, especially those grown locally as it seems like gifts from the God. I am into the bright colours of fresh vegetables, balanced sweetness of organic fruits, even fresh smell of grass. They are just amazing to me!!! I always wish I could hug and kiss the nature if it was a concrete figure. Back to real life, I am very excited to meet more foodies and share the joy from local sustainable food with the team.


The Garden2Table program could not be possible without the help of both Bruce McAdams, our faculty advisor, and Nicole De Athe, our Director of Development!

Make sure to check back to see what we get up to this year!

Garden2Table team