Bite of Brainfood Blog

Blog post by Sarah Lange, Spring Intern

What comes to mind when you think of a typical 2^nd grade classroom? Probably not portable burners, cutting boards, or tomatillos. But that is just what our Community MVPs used to transform a classroom into a kitchen when they traveled to Smothers Elementary School for a mobile cooking workshop with The Literacy Lab last Thursday.  

Written by Maeve Rafferty, Program Coordinator, Community MVPs

We made believers out of our MVPs (alright, and me) that a moist, crispy round the edges, soft in the middle, sweet, gotta-have-more-than-just-one, healthy cookie, does in fact exist!   Though the true test, as to whether these cookies were as good as we thought, was held last Thursday.   Twenty four kids from DC Scores, ages 9-11, came to our kitchen to try a hand at making and tasting them as well.  
Now I love words but the real story of this workshop has to be told with pictures.  
 

The workshop began in our classroom and lets just say all hands went right up when Sylverline asked, “Who likes Cookies?!”

Volunteer Spotlight….because we can’t do it without them!

         We rely very heavily on our volunteers here at Brainfood.  They come to class once a week and work one-on-one with students, help prevent cooking disasters, clean up spills and lend words of wisdom and kind thoughts to participants.   Our volunteers are such rock stars that we thought you all should have a chance to see Brainfood from their perspective.  

        This month we would like to present to you, Brainfood Weekly Classroom Assistant, Alan Seifert!  Alan volunteers every Thursday at our Chinatown location.  Here are some of his thoughts…

1.  Why did you join Brainfood?
 I enjoy interacting with young people.  I like getting to know them, bantering with them and passing along some mentoring in a low key way.  Also, eating and cooking are a big part of my life.  Brainfood serves both these interests.

A guest post by weekly Kitchen All Stars assistant, Ellie Wigodsky

What’s a better way to end an unseasonably cold day than with a hearty meal of chicken and spinach meatballs, stuffed bell peppers with turkey sausage, or spicy chicken tacos? Last week at Brainfood students were challenged to cook with ground poultry. Each group braved the texture of the ground meat and created unique and delicious dishes that were full of flavors from around the world. My group made colorful red bell peppers stuffed with rice, spinach, ground turkey, Parmesan cheese, onion, spices and topped with breadcrumbs for a delicate crunch.