3 Tips for Improving Your Child's Health

Although it can be difficult to get kids to try new foods and limit their screen time, it is possible. Here are some practical tips for keeping your kids healthy.

1.       Get more fruits and veggies into breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Whether it’s fresh, frozen, dried, or canned, it’s important to get a serving (or even just one bite  if you have a picky eater!) of fruits and vegetables with EVERY meal. Aim for working towards making half their plate  fruits and vegetables.

2.       Kick the can, and the pouch. Sodas, sports drinks, and drink pouches are loaded with sugar. Help your kids choose water instead of sugary drinks by putting a pitcher of water in the fridge… that makes the healthy choice the easy choice.

3.       Start having “recess” at home. You don’t have to make big changes to your family’s day. Just take 10-minute activity breaks here and there during the day. As exercise becomes a habit, add more time.

Bountiful Baskets... Worth it? For Sure!

I’m always hearing how expensive it is to buy local, farm fresh produce. Is that really true? I decided go on a fact finding mission and check it out for myself! Here’s what I did…

On June 4, 2013, I picked up my weekly delivery of local, farm fresh produce from Live Power Farm’s CSA and catalogued what was in my basket. The basket was overflowing this week with springtime greens!… There was a large head of red leaf lettuce, a large head of romaine lettuce, 4 turnips w/ greens, ½ lb. snap peas, 1 large head of broccoli, 1 lb. spinach, 1 sm. bunch watercress, 1 sm. bunch arugula, 1 large baby bok choy, 1 bunch kale, 1 bunch Asian greens, and 1 bunch radishes. 

With this list in hand, I then headed out to two local grocery stores, Raley’s and Ukiah Natural Foods Co-op. Both stores have beautiful, organic produce… though it’s mostly NOT local. Here are a few notes about my procedure: 1) There weren’t always exactly the same items available. For example, the turnips that were for sale at both stores did not include the turnip greens… my CSA basket had tasty turnip greens attached. 2) The stores did not sell the interesting, tasty varieties of Asian greens that were in my Live Power CSA basket… I just found some other specialty green at each store to give an approximation. 3) Raley’s did not have every item available in their organic section, so I did the price comparison with the conventional version of those items (turnips, watercress, and bok choy). And 4) I did my best to check for size and weight that matched up with what was in my CSA basket.

And now… check out the results of my point-in-time price comparison survey.

Fresh Produce	Raley’s	Ukiah Natural Foods Co-op
Red leaf lettuce	$2.49	$1.79
Romaine lettuce	2.49	2.19
Turnips	1.69	1.20
Snap peas	3.00	2.50
Broccoli	1.50	1.00
Spinach	1.50	2.00
Watercress	.50	.80
Arugula	.50	.75
Baby bok choy	2.75	2.25
Kale	1.50	1.00
Asian greens	2.29	2.19
Radishes	1.00	1.69
TOTAL for Live Power CSA  $22.66	TOTAL for Raley’s  $21.21	TOTAL for Co-op  $19.36

I have to say that I am pleased to be eating local, farm fresh, AFFORDABLE produce from Live Power Farm’s CSA. It’s totally worth the extra $2.00 to know exactly where my food is coming from and to be in a relationship with local farmers. Also, I know that as the summer season progresses I’ll be getting WAY more produce in my basket, the tables will turn, and my CSA basket will be much more economical than retail stores.

Are you interested in joining a CSA? Check out the complete listing of Mendocino County CSA’s in the Local Food Guide.

Ford Street Cooking Class is a Success!

Homemade Turkey Sausage Breakfast Sandwiches and Sweet Potato Hash started off the second session of COCER (Community Organized Cooking and Edible Resources) last Tuesday. COCER is a pilot cooking class held at the Buddy Eller Center of the Ford Street Project. The impetus for the project is teaching healthy recipes and cooking techniques to those living in transitional housing at Ford Street.
In the first session, participants enjoyed tasting new foods like kale, chard and fennel, and experimenting with healthy alternatives and learning new tricks in the kitchen.
The first session was a series of four classes, meeting once a week. During one of these classes, the group took a trip to the Ukiah farmer's market, where they learned about the Food Stamp Match program and purchased produced to make hearty Spring Veggie Quiche with Fruit Salad.

The classes are taught by three AmeriCorps members serving in the community (Natalie Loots, Lucy Shapiro and Jessica Ohland). These three have enjoyed the successes of the first session and are excited to continue the class!

Try out this tasty COCER recipe:
Sweet Potato Hash
Makes 6 servings

2 medium sweet potatoes skins on, chopped
1 small jalapeno pepper, finely diced
1 red bell pepper, diced
1 onion, diced
1 tsp cumin
salt and pepper to taste
1 tablespoon olive oil

Preparation: 
-Wash and chop all vegetables
-Saute onions and bell peppers in olive oil over medium heat
-Add potatoes, spices and jalapeno. Stir to prevent sticking until potatoes are tender (about 10 minutes)
-Serve hot. Enjoy as side dish for breakfast, lunch or dinner

Super-Fun Lunchbreak at NCO!

Such a beautiful day for an Open House in the NCO courtyard! Great to meet, greet, and talk with local community members and tell them all about community gardens, nutrition classes, and Farm2Fork success stories. We sold some beautiful Gardens Project t-shirts and blended up some pedal-powered smoothies. Special thanks to Sid Harper of the Savings Bank for being our first ever guy in a business suit to ride the smoothie bike!

In addition to the exciting things going on in NCO Community Action’s group of projects, all of NCO’s programs were out on display at today’s Open House. Did you know NCO works to build healthy, vibrant, compassionate, and strong communities through…

·         a Foster Grandparent program that places retired “grandparents” in local classrooms...

·         a Volunteer Network that connects volunteers with organizations who need them in Lake and Mendocino County...

·         the Leadership Mendocino program that brings leaders together to enhance their leadership skills and to expand their networking connections…

·         the Rural Communities Childcare program that supports working parents with daycare costs…

·         the Head Start program that provides excellent education for local preschoolers…

·         and MORE!

MCOE Earth Oven is Cooking!

The River School youth at Mendocino County Office of Education have completed the Earth Oven and cob counters in the Talmage State Preschool Garden.    Dozens of students gathered at the campus on May 24th to make fresh pizzas in the oven, using the beautifully mosaic counters to prepare them.

The Earth Oven project has been a multi-year collaboration with numerous community partners assisting the youth in learning natural building skills.  The oven construction began with John Richards Construction leading the students in rammed earth building for the base.  Next the Solar Living Institute hosted the oven building class with free admissions for the River School students.   After testing the oven's pizza making abilities, Mike Riddell Construction worked with the students to build a protective roof over the oven.   Finally, this year, Tonia Sing Chi led the students in building the cob counters that wing the oven, John Havemann of MCOE built the counter tops, and Chad Raugewitz and his students at Ukiah High School did the mosaic for the counter tops.  That's what we call collaboration!

To see photos from all of the stages of construction check out the slideshow below.