Since the Localvore Lunches are on a pause, our students have had time to reflect on their experience this fall. Their entries below will also be published in the upcoming issue of the Trumansburg Troubadour, a student-run newsletter of the TCSD Foundation, which has so generously supported our club.
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Matthew S. writes:
The Localvore Club is a group of people who cook for the adults in the middle school in Tburg every Thursday. I came up with the idea by reading a boring book for me called Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan. My teacher’s name is Ms. Bryant and she asked us, “what could we do that would make you interested in this book?” I told her I wanted to cook. I wanted to cook for the teachers for working hard even when kids were being jerks; they still went on teaching no matter what. Ms. Bryant also said other students could join if they wanted to and if their teachers were okay with them missing some classes, as long as they promised to make up the work. My friend is Alex O., my best friend. We cook together with a teacher named Ms. Salib, our 8th grade science teacher.
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| Matthew & Alex cook up some spaghetti squash. |
Alex O. writes:
I started by joining in and cooking on Wednesdays every week because my friend Matthew wanted me to join. I think that anyone can join if you wanted to in the school . We come up to the library every Thursday, well almost every Thursday, when Matthew and I want to. Cooking with Ms. Salib is fun because she keeps things fun and crazy. When we made cowboy cookies I got to use an electric mixer for the first time and it was so much fun!
Matthew writes:
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| Alex and Ms. Salib in the kitchen |
This week coming up is our Thanksgiving lunch. Our last one for 10 weeks. At the end of the year we are going on a field trip in Ithaca, going to a food truck and we are going all over the place. It’s going to be blast. The Thanksgiving lunch was successful. We all had a fun time with the teachers and classmates.
Donavan L. writes:
Donavan L. writes:
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| Donavan & Kasieum peeled a lot of carrots...with a smile! |
I am a member of the Localvore Club, which means a Localvore is a person dedicated to eating food grown and produced locally. I like cooking and I also like when there is a mystery vegetable in the baked goods for the kids to guess. I like it because it’s like a snack and I also like it because it’s fun to guess. I did guessed one right, it was a muffin with chocolate frosting with the pumpkin in it. It was fun peeling carrots and chopping apples with the peeler machine.
We also suggested the meat to have in the dish, like chicken.
Matthew started the club when we were reading Omnivore’s Dilemma last year. The book is about eating healthy foods and buying the ingredients from local farmers. I thought it was a good idea when Matthew suggested to make lunch for the teachers and have the kids help. This will be the last week for the whole project. It was fun when it was going on and I wish it would go on for a couple more weeks.
Alyssa F. writes:
My name is Alyssa and I'm part of the Localvore Cooking Club and I learned a lot of new things. One of the things I learned how to make during the first week was how to make goat cheese, mozzarella cheese and butter at home. I learned that it is really easy to make these things and it´s a lot cheaper to do it yourself. The second week, Ms. Brisson taught us how to make menus look nice so the staff would want to buy the lunches. We learned new computer skills to do these things. We also learned very important things such as food safety and keeping your hands clean to protect the food.
My favorite part about the Localvore Club is when I see all the teachers are coming in to get their food and they have the biggest smiles on their faces. That's when I smile and that's what makes my day. The teachers always say thank you for all this food and we even get to talk and hang out a bit in the library while they eat .When we cook it's always something new to learn when we cook and it's always good to see everyone that cooks with a smile on their face and ready to cook.
When Mrs.Bryant cooks with us she has to stay here after school when she has to be somewhere and she gives up all her time to finish all the baking. She also cleans up all the stuff that nobody picked up but we are getting better at cleaning up too so it´s not all on her. I thank Mrs. Bryant a lot that she does for everybody and when she gives up all her time for this. There is also a lot of my teachers who have now retired that come and help us. There are a lot of people helping with this club and that´s what makes it so fun!
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| Alyssa & Kelli were ready for our Cowboy Lunch (chili & cornbread) |
Mari writes:
My name is Mari Wilson and I am part of the Trumansburg Middle School Localvore club. My favorite part of the club was the mystery vegetable. We put a mystery vegetable in some of the desserts. After tasting the dessert, people had to take slips of paper and guess what the mystery vegetable was. One time I thought that I tasted rutabaga, but it was really celeriac!
I appreciated the apple roses. The apple roses were pastries that looked like roses. You could top them with caramel sauce. I am going to help make them for Thanksgiving.
I liked it when my mom came and tasted the food. I was wearing a grin. I felt joyful. My mom loved the chocolate kale cupcakes. The cupcakes were also part of my birthday celebration.
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| Mari tells Mr. Begeal why he should eat carrots! |
I researched a vegetable each week that was in our menu, then I shared my information with the teachers when they came for lunch. I learned a lot of facts about healthy eating. I even dressed up as the “Bean Queen” and talked to teachers about the nutritional facts of black beans.
I loved it when the club made mozzarella cheese. It is my favorite kind of cheese! We also made butter and goat cheese.
