The Green Minute

Aside from being the best little school there ever was, the local elementary school that girls attend is committed to engaging in and creating opportunities for “Going Green”. From an outdoor learning center and solar panels to reusable silverware at lunch, each month the school highlights a “Green” fact or activity. On April 29th, our family was invited to share our Maine-Food Project with the school. We worked together to create a script (they wrote 90% of it) and the girls read the whole thing. It was too cute not to share!

FINLEY: On Earth Day- April 22, 2011, our Family started our year-long project of eating food only grown from Maine. For one year, we will eat and cook ONLY with things from Maine- Hamburgers and Hotdogs to Spaghetti and meatballs Everything we eat will use only Maine ingredients!

 PARKER: Our Family thinks this project of eating locally and “going green” is important for many reasons and for the Green Minute today, we wanted to share with you a little bit about this project!

 FINLEY: Eating locally helps us to know where our meat and food comes from. We can pick farmers that treat their animals and the Earth with respect. The Earth is a very special place and we worry that if we don’t think about what and how much we use from it, there won’t be enough for our children’s children.

Eating locally saves energy, fuel and money and helps reduce and prevent pollution.

Eating locally helps kids and parents try to eat new and healthy foods like broccoli, carrots and zucchini.

 PARKER:As a family, we are learning to make bread, pasta, ice cream and yogurt and we will be learning how to can & freeze food for the winter.

We will work together to create and keep a garden full of veggies and herbs that will feed us through the summer and beyond.

We will learn to forage- from fishing to hunting for mushrooms. We will go to Farmers Markets and local farms and meet the people who work there to produce and grow the food we eat. We will take field trips to farms and local companies will share our experiences and what we learn with everyone on our blog!

 FINLEY: Here are some interesting facts we have learned.

Did you know that most bananas travel almost 2,000 miles just to get from the tree it grew on to our table? To do this, they must be picked before they are ripe and flown and driven across the country using lots of gasoline, which hurts the earth

 PARKER: Have you ever wondered where your dinner comes from? The meat and vegetables on your plate come from someone’s garden or farm but do you know where? Have you ever met your farmer? In Maine there are over 8,000 farms with 582 of them certified as organic.

 FINLEY: Did you know there are over 60 farmers markets in Maine 7 right here in York County! Kennebunk’s Market opens on Saturday May 7, 2011!

What can you do to help the earth by going green and eating locally?

Know where you food comes from. Ask someone how far your food has traveled!

 PARKER: Eat locally. Buy food from local farms and support them through CSA’s or Community Supported Agriculture- groups that work together to make food easy to buy. Visit the Kennebunk Farmer’s Market on May 7^th and every Saturday through the Summer.

My favorite part of our project so far is our family working together to make dinner and learn how to do different things.

 FINLEY: My favorite thing so far is learning how to make bread and ice cream

By eating locally you can help the Earth. Go Green and Eat food from Maine! It tastes great and makes a big difference!

…Now, if we could just start that school-grown garden!

And So It Begins…The First Supper

“There are no passengers on Spaceship Earth. We are all crew. “
Marshall McLuhan

 

It’s here. Earth Day, 2011. An otherwise ordinary, sunny-but-breezy, not-quite-spring-day. The 41st Earth Day and the start of our one year Maine-only Diet. I’ll admit I woke up on the wrong side of the bed today. I’ll blame it on oversleeping my alarm, but if im honest, I didn’t sleep much last night. I’m really not trying to be over dramatic or a whiny complainer, but I’ve seriously been stressing out wondering if this is the right thing to be doing. The worry that gets me the most? What (on this great, green Earth) will I pack the girls for lunch? I’ve already put the kibosh on school lunches so I really must rely on food from home. No more Nutri-Grain bars. No more cheese-sticks. No grapes or goldfish or bananas with peanut butter.  I spent the majority of the early morning hours, tossing and turning, brainstorming foods fit for a 3rd graders lunch box, sadly wondering if anyone would want to trade their Blue Raspberry Fruit-By-The-Foot for Parkers heirloom carrot sticks or Tempeh Trailmix.

After grumping at Nate (for no good reason) this morning, I drank my faux-coffee and nibbled some homemade bread with maine butter and homemade strawberry jelly. Not so bad. A tad bit of guilt as I poured the girls orange juice (I swear I won’t buy anymore)  and they too, were happy with toast and jam. Lunch came and went and I was blissfully saved by a busy day which failed to allow me time to eat. However, but noontime, I was still unsure of what to make to celebrate our kick-off dinner. By 2, I had convinced myself I could locate the ingredients and whip-up a homemade seafood chowder, which for the record, turned out brilliantly (if i do say so myself. Just don’t ask Finley, who decided that she HATED clams and wanted NOTHING to do with the fish or shrimp or potatoes). Salad greens from Sunset Farm Organics with beets, tomatoes and cheese from Maine and my favorite, a bottle of Lavender Mead from Maine Mead Works. With the help of my bread maker, I threw together (literally) dough, which I then made into dinner rolls (also fabulous!) with wheat flour from Harris Farm, Honey from Tony’s honey and butter from Kates of Maine.

Gigi and Grandpa Joey (otherwise known as The Wise Old Owl, aka TWOO) joined us to celebrate and dinner was filled with laughter, explanations of just WHY we were doing this (crazy) project and a reminder that family and food are two of my favorite things. It’s a great process of learning how to put into words the many feelings and esoteric philosophies we have about the reasons for this project. Most simply- help the earth, help our health, help the economy and help our neighbors. Make conscious choices about the food we purchase, eat and grow and think locally about our money and who it supports.

We can’t thank everyone for their words of support and encouragement. We hope this is as fun for you as it is for our family. Hopefully, we’ll come out no-worse-the-ware on the other side, but until then, stick by us. We’ll need all the local go-green love we can get.