Fountain Avenue Dishes
Listen in as the cook, Ann, and the dietitian, Emily, behind the long-running source for dependable recipes dish about how it all got started and offer a glimpse into what this new podcast will bring to the table.
Fountain Avenue Dishes
The Edible Classroom: Fountain Avenue Dishes Episode 4 Part 1
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Ann and Emily are so excited to chat with Angie Martin and Jess Oehme from The Edible Classroom! This conversation touches on the many angles of nutrition, education, and the growth of our children.
Welcome to Fountain Avenue Dishes, a podcast where we talk about food, nutrition, and the real life stories that shape how we eat. I'm Ann Fulton here today with registered dietitian Emily Russo, and today's conversation is about how those food stories start early, highlighting an organization that turns school gardens into living classrooms. So we're talking about the Edible Classroom, which is a year-round gardening program in schools. Although that description really doesn't do the program justice, and we're going to get into those details, but first I want to introduce our special guests, Jess, Amy, and Angie Martin. Jess is the director of health at the Edible Classroom, and she's a registered nurse and has a doctorate in public health. Angie is the director of community engagement at the Edible Classroom, and she has an associate degree in occupational therapy. So welcome both of you. It's so great to have you here. Thanks for having me. Your enthusiasm for what you do is contagious, and I'm so excited to share what you do and why it matters.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, thanks for having us on the show. Yeah, thank you.
SPEAKER_00So we like to start with a little bit of fun and some rapid-fire questions. So as a way of uh kicking things off, what is your favorite herb? I think I would say basil. I would say lavender. Ooh, that's a good one. That smells so good too. Um, what is the easiest vegetable to grow in your experience? Radishes.
SPEAKER_04I mean, they they come up so fast. You put them in and it's like the next, I don't know, few days, they're popping up, and so really easy. That's a good one.
SPEAKER_01That matches your shirt. Yes.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, the radish that the radish makes a good O. Uh, what is your favorite gardening task?
SPEAKER_02Oh, um, I would say in our yard, we have a peach tree, and so when those come into season, it's fun to harvest those and and make fun stuff with peaches. And mulching. I sometimes like mulching. It's the visual satisfaction of when it's all done.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I would I would agree with that. Harvesting anything. That's the fun part, right?
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00I love that you have have a peach tree.
SPEAKER_02Those are peaches. I'm gonna come and yes, please do.
SPEAKER_01There's always so many. That's downtown. They have all those peach trees in the backyards. I our cousins had that too. Yes.
SPEAKER_02I don't it must have been maybe they were all planted at the same time, but it was a fun surprise the first season. So yes, yes.
SPEAKER_00Um what is your least favorite gardening task?
SPEAKER_02Weeding. I see weeding. Sometimes I get in a zone and it's kind of therapeutic, but other times it feels like a quite a chore. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Uh what would you this is a generalization, but the students' uh favorite vegetable?
SPEAKER_04Potatoes. They love harvesting them, they love eating them. I would say that's like you know.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, potatoes in all forms are always the right answer, I think. Yes. So they do like the potatoes, yeah.
SPEAKER_00And what about their least favorite?
SPEAKER_02I'm trying to think. I feel like there's, you know, that sometimes they just don't care for certain things as much, but um, it seems like a lot of times they just love trying stuff.
SPEAKER_04I think Swiss shard. Like we we grew this was not recently, we grew that in the past, but that was a tough one to get them to like in any foot.
SPEAKER_00Okay, can I tell you that is one of my favorites in my garden? I grow that every year and I love it. And the and the r the rainbow with the pretty Yes, it's so pretty. It's so pretty. But okay, we just need to find a recipe that they'll be.
SPEAKER_04If you can find a recipe that they love, we have because we love growing it because it is also easy to grow and beautiful. Okay, but we'll follow up on that.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, kitchen has one. It's like we want to share a blog.
SPEAKER_00I love like when we're passionate about something that we have, even when it's just twist hard. Um okay, so finally, do you get icked out by all those little bugs and critters? Um, and maybe maybe they're not all littered, little gifts and big bugs and critters.
SPEAKER_02Probably, yeah.
SPEAKER_00What do the students think of that?
SPEAKER_02Not really. I maybe as a nurse, I it takes a lot for me to get really icked and grossed out. So they don't really bother me now.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, me neither. We we will have students that are like, you know, not as excited about seeing them, but in general, I would say most of the students really love all the colours. Yes, all the critters.
SPEAKER_00The fun factor. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Or the fear factor. Yes. Yes. Okay. So on that note. Yes, yes. Now we really need to know. For the listeners who are not familiar, please tell us what is the edible classroom. Andy, yeah, dive into that.
SPEAKER_04So uh we are a nonprofit that partners with school districts to uh build and sustain learning gardens on school property. And then the students come out during the school day and participate in 40-minute sessions where we create curriculum that aligns with the steel standards, which is the science, technology, engineering, environmental literacy, and sustainability that is across Pennsylvania right now. It's a newer, it's replacing STEM or STEAM. Now it's steels. So we really fit into that environmental literacy and sustainability piece, and so we're helping uh just support what the teachers are doing in the classroom outside in a hands-on way in the garden. I feel like they were probably like, oh, thank you.
SPEAKER_01Fulfill the requirement. Yeah, yeah. Um and so how did you guys get involved with this organization? Go ahead, Jeff.
SPEAKER_02Sure. Um so a little bit about my background. I am a nurse by trade, so I started out in critical care and worked in ambulatory care a little bit here in Lancaster at a fairly qualified health center. And at that time I was finishing my doctorate in public health. Um, so I feel really passionate about health equity. And under that umbrella falls food, um, you know, one of the most basic human rights that we have. And so really exploring food, food deserts, understanding um our food systems, which is you know quite a lot to tackle sometimes. Um but when I finished my doctorate, I took a little time off and kind of tried to figure out where where do I fit in this world of public health right now with my background. And I was aware of the edible classroom and um they had an opening for an educator, but then as I started talking to Grace, our executive director, and you know, looking at my background, she's like, is there a way you could come in and speak to the health component of the edible classroom? And so I came on in July, August in our summer months, and have kind of been trying to amplify the beautiful work that we already do surrounding health so naturally and giving more voice to that. So it's been a few months, but it it's been great.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it's been awesome to have Jess on the team and the perspective that she brings from the house side of things and just her experience as a nurse and all that she learned in her education is just super exciting for our team and propelling us forward.
SPEAKER_00I think it's so cool to have just the backgrounds that you have, and I think you know, just the brief bios that I gave for you doesn't get into the full depth of the work and lived experiences that you have, um, you know, at just at home. Living on a small farm in your case, Angie. Yeah. Um and you feel free to get into that. But I uh it's just really um it it's such a rich kind of background of people that you have working for this organization.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, yeah. It's it's great. I mean, I think because our mission is so strong, um, we uh you know, we have kind of three pillars, which are um academic achievement, of course, we're in schools, healthy lifestyles, and environmental uh sustainability and stewardship. And so that brings a diverse group of people to our organization. And how I first got involved was um Grace and Beth, who Beth was one of our founders, who she's no longer with us, she's going, she um went on to other things. They started the program in Penn Manor Schools, and that's where my my children were attending. And so I heard about them, they weren't in my my children's elementary school, but I wanted to get them in there, so I first heard about them that way and did a little bit of work with them probably about um six years ago. And then I they were just starting out, they didn't have really a lot for me, so I was with another organization for about five years, and then came back and said, Hey, do you have anything for me? And um, yes, they did. So I've been with them for about two years, and it's just been an awesome experience, and yeah, it it it fits with a lot of my passions of gardening, working with students, and um in the the role of uh community engagement, I get to talk to a lot of people about what I'm passionate about. So that's super fun for me as well.
SPEAKER_00So, what does a typical day look like uh in the garden at the schools and what what all do you grow? Just tell tell us a little bit about that.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Oh well, we have the 40-minute lessons, and so we split the kids up into two groups. Um, one group is doing an activity while the other group is in the kitchen, and then we switch. Um so usually the activity and the recipe coincide. Not always, you know, sometimes with gardens, maybe not everything is growing the way you want it to, but um uh they they get to switch, and so all the kids get to experience everything. And what would you say? Some of the things we're growing, I mean a little bit of everything.
SPEAKER_04We have yeah, I mean we grow the staples, like so the activity that we're doing is always in the garden. So we're doing something, maybe we're planting or harvesting, depending on the the season. But um we grow tomatoes, peppers, beans, peas, umkra.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, herbs and right. We try there's radishes and all kinds of stuff out there, yeah.
SPEAKER_04This season, um, I think we're gonna be starting to try to grow coulantra. Coulantro. Um, so we always tried to bring in coulantra. Never heard of coulantro, can you? It's similar to cilantro, but instead of cilantro really likes it cool. And so coulantro likes it warmer. They're more it more it's more tropical. So, you know, when you think of the dishes that cilantra is typically in, they're typically in with like warm season, like tomatoes and peppers. So coulantra is going to get you that same flavor, but the plant is actually able to be grown during the same season as the other warm weather vegetables that you typically have it with.
SPEAKER_00That's so interesting. Um, well, when I was observing one of the lessons back in it was early November, I was so impressed by the scale of the garden, the variety of what was growing, and also it was probably a warmer fall than you could.
SPEAKER_02I think we even still had a we harvested a watermelon that day. We cut out watermelon.
SPEAKER_00I want to say it was like November 6th or two, like your first week of November. And I think you got at least one watermelon. Oh, yes, at least one. It was good, yes. And it this sort of ties into my next question is regarding um the kitchen, that all of the gardens have a kitchen. And so tell us a little bit about that, then we'll talk about because I have some just thoughts based on what I observed that day.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, we do we call it a mobile kitchen because it isn't like if you've never been to one of our school gardens, um, we set up a table and then we have three main appliances that we use for our kitchens, and that is the a blender, an induction burner, and a griddle. And so part of that is really intentional because we want students to be able to do this at home without a lot of adult support if they don't have that, you know. And so we can make these recipes, show them how to do it, and then they can replicate it at home with very few, um, you know, they don't need an oven or, you know, that kind of thing, any big equipment. And so we set that up and we do the the cooking right in the garden.
SPEAKER_00It was I took a picture that day of the spread, and it was so impressive, it was so colorful. Your pictures were so great. Yeah, you know, and I like the way the kids can taste just the raw vegetable, but then you also prepare things that allow them to taste it in a different way because I'm a firm believer that you know, sort of explaining to kids and all people that you know, maybe you don't like a food this way raw, but maybe when you cook it or you pickle it or you do something else with it, you might enjoy it, or you mix it with something, and just that exposure is such a a great thing. Um but that you had uh and there was it was the last day you were harvesting all the sweet potatoes, and I remember the kids also had bags that they could take home to their families, but you had uh pea um pea hummus and um sweet potato hummus. So I thought that was a really fun way, and then different dippers that the kids could use, and it was all presented in a very kid-friendly way, which um it was it was just so cool to see that. And then I also really enjoyed uh we going back to the steel. I that was the first time I had learned about steel that it wasn't always like that it wasn't STEM anymore. Um so that was new to me, but just the level to which your program um is uh uh informed by you the lessons in were geography, were uh sustainability, were math there was a math. Um they learned so much in such an interesting way, hands-on way. And I remember thinking, I would love if when I was in school, I had to go outside for science class and dig in the dirt and be learning as I you am in that environment. It was it just it truly you could feel how it um the lessons just came alive, yeah, and the kids were so engaged.
SPEAKER_02And I think there's something about the garden that feels like how do I say like a level plane, feel like everyone is just welcome to explore and um I mean I know we got to talk about this with the pre pre-questions, and uh in my mind as a health professional, there's such a beauty in them being able to try all the all the vegetables and fruits, and it's I don't know, a place that they can if they don't like it, that's okay. It's not a judgmental place, it's not a place of shame, it's a place just to have fun and explore. So they can try something and be like, oh my gosh, I didn't know I liked that. And um, there's just so many studies that show the earlier exposure kids have to these fruits and vegetables. Um the likelihood of chronic disease down the road really diminishes. So it's such a natural uh extension just to be able to let them try everything and have that hands-on experience that gives them the joy of food, and it's not so much the shoulds of food, it's the it's the um the beauty of just getting to eat all those things and try them.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah, I like that the word exposure, I think, is just really interesting because um I think especially for parents, you know, um we have kids and we're so worried about what they're eating and what they're not eating. And occasionally if I have a you know a client who asks me, you know, how do I get my kid to eat X, Y, and Z, we end up talking about the word exposure. And so when you have you know talked about or looked through research, it's maybe not necessarily um saying, you know, children who have eaten X, Y, and Z, this, this happens to, but it's children who have been exposed. And what I like about that word is that maybe it's just in front of them. Maybe it's on the dinner table, maybe it's one bite and they're done, or maybe they're watching um parents eat these certain foods, or siblings eat these certain foods, or they smell things, other things in people's houses, right? That's exposure as well. Yeah. So I don't know if you want to shed any light on kind of that the nuance of the word exposure and how that kind of relates to to eating healthy down the road.
SPEAKER_02I love the emphasis on that word because I think when I think about food and and food systems and particular, particularly areas of food deserts, it's it's the exposure, it's the access in my mind. Some people maybe have never seen tomatoes grow or dug potatoes out of the ground. And so I think to give kids the freedom and you know, curiosity to get their hands in the dirt. Maybe they don't eat the sweet potato, maybe they don't try anything that day, but they're seeing it, they're making the connection of where the food comes from. And maybe, you know, sometimes we say even just like licking it or they take a little nibble, um, that might stick with them. And then maybe when they see that same item, a tomato, down the road, they'd be more inclined to try it. And so I think it's all connected if expensive for anybody, you know, it's when you go to a restaurant, you're like, I don't want to order the something different because I know what I like, you know, it's kind of that same thing. And so I think there's um the more we can get kids out there chopping and trying and tasting, they're naturally hopefully gonna just feel more comfortable um exploring with other recipes or eating things just right off the vine.
SPEAKER_04I have a story um from the garden that relates to that. We had a student, um, she was in a learning support class, um, had some sensory issues around food, and really was her mom said she's really only eating Alfredo. Like all the that's what she eats, Alfredo. And so she came out often. They had the ability to come out multiple times um during our season, which was really great for the this particular group of students. And she finally one day said, I'm gonna be brave. I'm gonna try a cherry tomato. And she did. And it took that, it took her exposing herself. Like, I mean, she had been in this program, like we were at the school multiple years, and so it wasn't overnight that this happened, but over that repeat exposure. And then the her teacher told me that her mom said she's not only just trying stuff in the garden now, she's trying stuff in the cafeteria and at home. And when you think about the impact for that family, to always have to have like Alfredo all the time for your daughter, yeah. Um, and then opening that up, that is a real, real difference in that family's life. And so that's always an inspiration to me that you know we aren't always seeing like huge leaps and bounds with what we're doing, but we're making impact and we're also, you know, what I like to say is planting seeds for a harvest that we might not see. But we're just again goes back to that exposure, it goes back to giving students the opportunity to try something that they might not be able to try typically.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you're making those connections or helping them make the connections for themselves. And I love that story about, you know, kind of your introduction and then what happens down the road. Do you have any other stories or even you know, numbers that you have about what your exposure um has been able to accomplish for students as they get older?
SPEAKER_02Oh, I would love to do all kinds of studies related to that. I feel like that that hopefully will be in the works in the future with some of our partnerships and looking at some of those numbers.
SPEAKER_00Um sometimes those anecdotal stories are really the most telling. And I always say like little things are big things, right? Just that the um example of someone eating alfredo all the time and just being very sort of one note in and then suddenly having options. It as a parent or the person prov preparing the food for that person, it's really exciting when you have those breakthrough moments and just that one little step can lead to the next one and the next one, and suddenly it feels like exponential. And that can just be so exhilarating when that happens within your own family and and um and the community, and I think it's you word it well, the hair a heritage, like you were planting a legacy.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, we're planting and I love that because it is I I think it's sometimes hard to measure exactly how our impact is gonna be felt in months, years to come.
SPEAKER_00And so you know, just you were literally planting seeds, but also very metaphorically.
SPEAKER_04And I would say a little plug, if anyone is a professor and wants to work with us to do studies to get that data, we would love to do that. Oh my gosh, I have someone for you.
SPEAKER_01Oh we would lovely. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04So yeah, we we would love to partner with people because I think there is a lot that we could learn if we had, you know, that's just not what we do is track in those ways, but I think there's a lot of opportunity to kind of see some interesting results.
SPEAKER_01It's important, I feel like, especially in the health and nutrition world, because it is so much about the qualitative research. We just don't have enough quantitative data. And so to get that, um Yeah, because it takes time. Yes, it's a lot of it's hard. Um but that would be that would be great for you guys. It would be awesome too, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, definitely. So shifting gears a little bit, uh and going back to sort of some of the steel conversation and uh just how your program is so curriculum-based. I know things um like recycling and climate change come into the conversation as well. How do you work some of those topics into your lessons and what what uh sort of impact have you seen them make on your students?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I can I can't. So well, I also like to say all roads lead back to the garden. So I think it's really easy to implement a lot of those um learning points because we have uh you know, we eat food and then what do we do with the scraps of those foods? We can put it in the compost. That compost breaks down through our decomposers, and then we can use that to uh add nutrition nutrition back into the soil, nutrients back into the soil. Um and so that's like a really easy thing. And then just uh talking about water, conserving water, how what how can we? Do that like that's a big topic. We talked about that last season by reading a book called One Well, where we we zoom out and go, Oh my goodness, we're all the whole earth is a part of this, all humans are part of this one well that we have. But then we break it down into but what can we do as an individual? Um, even an eight-year-old, you know, the the typical things like the turn the water off when you're brushing your teeth. But also, we created sub-irrigated planters where we had students build these growing beds that had a reservoir underneath. And so, and then we put a special soil solution on top, and then they're watering from below the soil, so we don't have the evaporation. So we're conserving water in that way. We have lots of ways that we're incorporating those steel standards, um, especially the environmental literacy and sustainability. We also just firmly believe, um, Grace, our executive director, often says, as we take care of the earth, the earth takes care of us. And so coming from that point of like, you know what, if we are kind to the earth, it's gonna give us what we need to sustain us. And so just looking for ways to not put chemicals on a plant so that and and still have it grow and be healthy. Okay, how can we do that? We can pick bugs and put them in soapy solution rather than spray. Um, you know, so really practical ways, things they can take home, do at their house, you know, and just learning that for potentially future gardening opportunities.
SPEAKER_00The day I was there, you were talking about a a spork example. Oh, right. And I loved how it brought math into the equation too. So one if when the students eat their school lunch with a spork and they multi they figured out how many sporks the class used, and then they figured out how many classrooms are were in the school, and they multiply that out, and then they took it to the you know, all the elementary schools and the whole school district. And they figured out how many spores basically were being used for one school lunch. Right. And then you talked about how long it takes for that spork to break down.
SPEAKER_04Which it doesn't totally ever go away.
SPEAKER_00Right. Yeah. And and I thought it was such a simple but relatable example for those students. And and I I thought and just the way it brought math into it in a fun way. Right. Um, you know, it really connects, and to me, it's that feeling of can any of us really make a difference? You know, I think there because it can feel like an overwhelming issue. And I noticed how well you broke that down for the for the kids. And uh so it was really it was fun to to learn about that myself and just to see what what you do.
SPEAKER_04That's part of our winter programming. So we do have programming year-round now. So we are going into the uh school district of Lancaster schools, all their elementary schools get our winter programming where we are talking about we do a timeline of how long everything takes to break down. We do a lunchroom waste audit where we're we're separating things and counting how much plastic we throw away, how much compost we throw away, and then what things really just need to go into the trash. But becoming aware of that and then showing the kids, oh, you know, napkins break down very quickly and easily, and they actually turn into nutrient-dense soil. Sporks, not so much. And so, yeah, just bringing that awareness to them, and then how can we do that? Maybe instead of using a plastic cup at home that we're gonna throw away, we use a glass one that we can wash and reuse multiple times. And it's those little things as we all come together and do little things that add up to the big change.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Well, I feel like we're making so many connections here. I'd like to bring it back again to the garden and you know, our discussion a little bit, a little bit on exposure and access. Maybe Jess, you could kind of bring it back even further. How did we get here? Why do we need exposure? What's the problem with access? And specifically, can you tell us about redlining? I can. Okay.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, sure. So, yeah, there's a lot, there's a lot to go in with that, but I'll give a brief overview of um redlining and where that kind of practice started. It was back in the 1930s. Um, it was a federal policy that looked at neighborhoods and deemed them desirable or not desirable. And literally on the maps, the non-desirable neighborhoods would be drawn in red. And so these neighborhoods that were drawn in red were predominantly neighborhoods with individuals of color or racial minorities. And those neighborhoods were denied um financial support such as loans and insurance, and denied um some services like food, like grocery stores and health benefits and and such things like that.
SPEAKER_01Just based on their address, is what you're saying? Just based on their address.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. So as a result, um individuals couldn't get loans. That's really was the kicker. It was pe individuals couldn't get loans for homes, businesses couldn't get loans for their businesses. So a lot of resources moved out of those neighborhoods. A lot of businesses closed, um, access to food got a lot harder, access to healthcare got a lot harder. Um, and even if people had homes, it would be difficult to maintain them. So we know there's all kinds of environmental issues that can happen with homes that aren't maintained, such as mold and things like that. So that was the 1930s. Um, so you know, we can we can see that as over the years, we're almost a hundred years out from that, which is crazy to think about, but we still see the ramifications of those laws in place now. Um we see cities, particularly with areas that are have food deserts, have have limited access to healthcare. And so, you know, um, unfortunately, yeah, racial minorities and and people of color were targeted in those laws that occurred.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and I feel like with this program makes sense to me that you're really, you know, targeting or focusing on children because that's where things begin, that's where you can start fresh. Once a garden is in place in the school area, what is the responsibility or is there any connection with the community at large? So adults and you know, people professionals who are there, is there a participation or access that that they also have with the garden?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, so we do have two larger gardens that were funded by United Way, uh, Love Up and Launch. And so they are bigger, so we can do more things with them, like events, that type of thing that brings families in. We also like to do with all of our gardens. I I go in and talk to the PTO just about what we could do. We have signups over the summer where they can sign up to water the garden, and then, you know, I try to give them, hey, if there's a lot of cherry tomatoes, if we have cherry tomatoes coming in July, we're not going to be able to use them in August or September. Feel free to take them as you're watering. So we, you know, they have those opportunities. We love, we would love to do more, right? But the all of that, you know, we need to have find ways to fund that. Um, but we would love to have more community events, more ways of getting people in the garden so that they can it it it goes from the students being excited about it to the families being excited about it.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_04We also have lots of volunteer opportunities too. So we get adults in that way as well. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00We have a lot more to talk about with Justin Angie, so stay tuned for part two of our podcast with the Edible Classroom, and you can even find out how to get this program in your schools.