4.2.7 Healthy Environment
Summary
1. Sustainable eating: Clay Pot Cooking
2. Sustainable eating: Bloody Butcher Cornmeal
As mentioned in Habitat Restoration and Structures for Environmental Learning, the Children's Garden is the hub of agricultural programming in the park. The Children's Garden Club and Adult Garden Club plant, grow, harvest, cook and eat their own food, learning important lessons about sustainability and eating local.
In addition, weekend programs are conducted to teach participants about using the bounty of our garden. Topics/recipes have included:
Eat Your Weedies (edible weeds)
Wild Berry Shortcake
Wild Edible Pizza
Pickle Party
Homemade Salsa
Fermentation
The following are descriptions of two programs that focused on traditional cooking methods and locally-sourced ingredients.
1. Sustainable Eating: Clay Pot Cooking
July 2021
Children attending Earth Skills Camp learned to cook in clay pots over an open fire. They harvested much of the foods themselves:
-- wild onions and herbs from the garden to stuff the fish
-- sweet potatoes, turnips, and zucchini from the garden for the vegetable stew
-- daylily leaves to tie the fish for roasting.
-- wineberries and blackberries for the wild berry compote
July 2021
Children attending Earth Skills Camp learned to cook in clay pots over an open fire. They harvested much of the foods themselves:
-- wild onions and herbs from the garden to stuff the fish
-- sweet potatoes, turnips, and zucchini from the garden for the vegetable stew
-- daylily leaves to tie the fish for roasting.
-- wineberries and blackberries for the wild berry compote
2. Sustainable Eating: Bloody Butcher Cornmeal
September 2020 and 2021
Members of the Adult Garden Club grew Bloody Butcher Corn and learned how to process it in different ways. In 2020, Ranger Breena taught them the process of nixtimalization, a traditional process in Mexico and Central America whereby corn is treated with lime, cooked and dried and ground to produce the flour to make tortillas. In 2021, they ground the corn into cornmeal, starting with our turn-of-the-century corn shucker and grinder, to make their own cornbread or polenta.
September 2020 and 2021
Members of the Adult Garden Club grew Bloody Butcher Corn and learned how to process it in different ways. In 2020, Ranger Breena taught them the process of nixtimalization, a traditional process in Mexico and Central America whereby corn is treated with lime, cooked and dried and ground to produce the flour to make tortillas. In 2021, they ground the corn into cornmeal, starting with our turn-of-the-century corn shucker and grinder, to make their own cornbread or polenta.