Campers at The Unquowa School's Farm Camp 2008

Earlier this month I had the pleasure of spending an hour with Sharon Lauer, Head of School at The Unquowa School in Fairfield, learning how she executed her vision to make the school a model of sustainable education. “Baby steps” is how Sharon described the process. Over time and after careful planning, teaching and development, the friolator was tossed, corn syrup was sworn off, frozen processed foods were banished, cage free meat and eggs were introduced, bulk organic milk and snacks replaced single serve, and organic food was sourced locally from Sport Hill Farm and a winter CSA (Community Supported Agriculture), supplemented by the school’s own raised beds.

Today, Chef Peter and Asst. Chef Dan prepare and present local, organically grown food in the school’s dining hall as students jockey for the chance to serve and clean up meals. After four years, they’re still raising the bar as true practitioners of kaizen, a philosophy of continuous improvement. Homemade pasta, pizza and bread are the latest menu additions, thanks to the donated Hobart mixer. Chef Peter stresses that delivering a short informative talk about new foods before service is a must “or they’ll go uneaten because no interest has been generated.”

Mary Curran, formally a kindergarten teacher at Unquowa, became an environmental science instructor this year, teaching gardening/composting/bird crafting to both educate the children and prepare them to model their lessons daily as they tend the six raised beds and confidently compost scraps after service. Sharon point out that “it’s important for children to experience joy in school. Our fifth graders were so excited by digging up potatoes, you’d think they were digging up gold. Our gardening program breathes life into why we’re doing all these other things. Children have to learn where food comes from and the relationship between living things. We make it transparent to them.”

The Unquowa School has truly become the epitome of sustainable education. Sharon very consciously made changes to how they run their dining hall to ensure that the model would be replicable. According to Sharon “it costs us no more to run the cafeteria with locally grown food because we have cut down on waste by buying milk and snacks in bulk instead of single serve. We spend money on lunch. Children are not our customers. However, we are spending our money more thoughtfully. By moving away from frozen processed foods we are down to one bag of garbage after lunch instead of six.”

When Sharon arrived at The Unquowa School, she was on a mission. UNESCO had recently declared a Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (DESD), and The National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS) followed with a recommendation for member schools to join the movement. After attending a two week workshop at NAIS’ Sustainability Institute, Sharon and her staff felt empowered to develop and implement a sustainability plan. Sharon hired John Turenne, President and Founder of Sustainable Food Systems LLC, to consult them on modifications to their food service program and credits him as a big contributor to their success.

A young camper harvesting root vegetables at The Unquowa School's Summer Farm Camp

Want to give your child a taste of sustainable education? Recognizing a void in the local summer camp offerings, Sharon looked to Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture and the Yale Sustainable Food Project for guidance on how to structure and run a summer farm camp. The Unquowa School’s Summer Farm Camp is open to children in grades Pre-K through 6^th and “offers the fun of traditional camp while teaching the principles of sustainable food systems and land stewardship” according to Sharon. You can download a brochure from their web site. All but the smallest campers take daily trips up to Sport Hill Farm for a true hands-on organic farming experience and receive daily cooking lessons from Chef Peter. On Fridays, Chef Peter works with the campers to prepare a healthy, well-balanced meal from the foods they’ve harvested throughout the week. Maybe I can convince them to do a camp for adults too!

The Lime Restaurant, Norwalk

Maybe you’ve heard of The Lime Restaurant? It’s been named the best vegetarian restaurant in Fairfield County from 1999-2008 by readers of The Advocate an Connecticut Magazine. Our waitress chuckled as she told me “Funny thing is we sell a lot of meat.”

Their tag line is “naturally delicious” and that rang true during my visit. I was surprised to see organic beer, wine and soda on the menu - first time in Connecticut. Steaz’ sparkling green tea root beer, made with certified Fair Trade green tea was delicious and not overly sweet. The organic beer menu included Stone Mill Organic Pale Ale, Scarecrow Golden Ale, St. Peter’s English Ale and Ommegang Belgian Style Abbey Ale.

The lunch menu is both wide and deep, offering three types of veggie burgers, ten different salads, their signature vegetarian black bean chili, and more than 25 different sandwiches and wraps. The portions are ample and the food is tasty and satisfying. Prices range from $5 for the chili to $8-$10 for the burgers, sandwiches and wraps. Despite the fact that no food is listed as organic, many of the items are including the rice, pita bread and cheese. The loaf bread is made in-house along with the soups, sauces and salad dressings. You won’t find canned or processed foods here.

Amazing as it may sound, the Lime was absolutely packed within minutes of my sitting down for lunch. I was so surprised to see party after party told to come back in ten or fifteen minutes, and from the looks on their faces, they were regulars used to waiting for a lunch seat. There is no recession at The Lime! My advice is to get there early, make a reservation or take out. It’s worth the trip.

The Lime is open for both lunch and dinner Monday through Saturday and for dinner only on Sunday.Visit them at www.limerestaurant.com. Bon appetit!

Edible School Gardens Workshop

Save the Date: Monday, MARCH 16, 2009

Location: Unitarian Church, 10 Lyons Plains Road, Westport, CT

The workshop is free and open to the public.

Please RSVP to Carmela atci@mainstreetresources.com.

This workshop is sponsored by Green Village Initiative and the Environmental Action Group of the Unitarian Church of Westport in partnership with Slow Food in Schools of Connecticut.

Edible Schoolyards are popping up everywhere! Join us to learn about growing a K-12 sustainable education program.

FEATURED PRESENTER:

Dorothy Mullen, Master Gardener, Founder, Princeton School Gardens Cooperative

In a few short years, Princeton, NJ has created an outdoor classroom at every school in the district. Dorothy will share with us how Princeton schools worked with the community to make this happen. Her presentation will also cover curriculum integration and the many benefits of hands on learning in the garden environment.

LOCAL EXPERT PANEL DISCUSSION:

Annie Farrell, Master Farmer, Millstone Farm (Wilton)
Annelise McCay, Garden Founder, Sherman Elementary School, Fairfield
Jim Hunter, Wilton High School Science Teacher
Jane Slupeki, Connecticut State Farm to School Program
Sue Muro, Director, Monroe Farmer’s Market

These farm and garden mavens will show us how to site, plan, build, plant and harvest a simple school garden. We’ll leave plenty of time for them to answer your questions.

9:30AM: Coffee, tea, snack and networking

10:00AM - Noon: Program and discussion

Sue Cadwell of Health in a Hurry

It was going to be a crazy evening - pick up the kids at school, race them to karate, have a meeting while they were in class, pick them up and get home before my little guy fell asleep before dinner. Dinner! I had been wanting to stop in Sue Cadwell’s award-winning Health in a Hurry on the Post Road for some organic vegetarian cuisine to go and this was the perfect moment. Alright, I heard a bit of whining as I explained that not only were we stopping for gas but also to pick up dinner and I’d probably have to “visit” with the owner a bit.

I’m glad I forged ahead because the trip was well worth it. We ate the hot miso soup as an appetizer and then chose a few dishes to heat up for dinner. The food got rave reviews from the whole family. Don’t think just tempeh and tofu, this lots of organic vegetables, legumes, and whole grains thoughtfully and lovingly prepared for families that care about feeding their families well.

In short, there are five darn good reasons to buy Health in a Hurry’s organic vegetarian prepared food.

#1 It’s delicious and you’d probably never make these dishes yourself.

#2 You can receive $100 worth of food for $85 if you use their prepaid giftcard.

#3 It’s convenient and there’s abundant choice from soups to desserts for everyone in the family to love.

#4 Hot lunch is available Monday through Saturday and in the nice weather you can eat outside in her cafe area.

#5 They cater!

Owner Sue Cadwell is now hosting winter cooking classes. If you ever wanted to know how to prepare whole grains, beans, tempeh and gluten-free meals, this is the place. Visit her web site for more information.