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! 

St. Ignatius visits UofG and the GCUOF

October 5th marked Garden2Table's first visit to the Guelph Centre for Urban Organic Farming. 60 grade 7 students from St.Ignatius visited the GCUOF to learn about where vegetables come from, how to plant seeds, and to taste berries, tomatoes, and flowers.

After visiting the garden, the students joined us at PJs in the Atrium at the University of Guelph to learn how to make snacks with the vegetables they find in the garden. We have them follow simple recipes that they can later make into a recipe book to bring home.

With this group we made pita chips, kale dip, tabouleh, salsa, guacamole and beet chips! Most students hadn't heard of most of these, and were eager to try them out. While the "h" in tabouleh may have thrown off a few, it turned out to be a favourite for most!

Students try edible flowers at the GCUOF

Tomorrow is our second visit, so check back to see how it goes! 

It's That Time of Year Again!

                                                                              
 'Tis the season to harvest and reap the benefits of hard work! This fall Garden2Table hosted two school visits in the garden, where St. Ignatius of Loyola's grade 7 class and Jean Little school's grade 3/4 class enjoyed digging for heirloom carrots, picking many varieties of tomatoes, gathering ground cherries and even tasting some ripening raspberries! Thanks to the beautiful weather, we have been very fortunate in getting as much produce as possible from what was planted earlier this spring.

Garden2Table would also like to announce a very special partnership with Hellmann's Canada and the "Real Food Movement". Hellmann's has chosen the Garden2Table program to help them support healthy eating and teaching children about eating REAL and LOCAL! You can check out their website at http://www.realfoodmovement.ca/latesttalk/get-informed/the-movement/ and "like" them on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/HellmannsCanada?sk=app_125046137587273
Also, if you would like to get information about  volunteering, or learn more about the Garden2Table program, please join our group on Facebook: Garden2Table Guelph! 

St. Ignatius` first visit to the Garden!

St. Ignatius of Loyola School in Guelph came for the first time to help get a start on the garden the first week of June.
Thanks to the beautiful weather, we were able to clear out some of the weeds that accumulated over the winter, get bed ready for planting, and even plant some tiny leeks that had started in the greenhouse.

Before the month ends we will be hosting Jean Little School, to hopefully do some more planting and weeding!
It`s so exciting to see the progress of the fruit and vegetables!
More pictures to come soon!