Potlucks with a Purpose

Slow Food’s “Time for Lunch Campaign”on Monday was a rousing success from coast to coast—with “Eat-Ins” attracting more than 20,000 people across the country. The one I attended in my Brooklyn neighborhood was organized in conjunction with Erica Lonesome at the Brooklyn Food Coalition and healthy food advocate Michelle Grey Campion (founder of the Epi-Cure blog). The event was held in the shadow of the Williamsburg Bridge at the new Bridget wine bar.

The turnout was higher than expected—75 people showed up bearing everything from wheat berry salads and fresh fruit salad to chicken-avocado wraps. (And yes, that’s an oatmeal raisin cookie on the right there.) I don’t know which I enjoyed more: the variety of delicious home-cooked dishes or the investigative documentary “What’s on Your Plate?”, made by two 7th graders who attend public school in NYC. (It’s a Food, Inc. for kids, but all the adults in the room were riveted.)

Annie Novak teaching young Brooklynites how to make basil-walnut pesto

And then there was the pesto-making demonstration, during which Annie Novak of Growing Chefs (and Rooftop Farms) effortlessly got the kids involved in making the nutritious green sauce. As she talked about how basil, a member of the mint family, is packed with Vitamin K and that raw garlic is a super cold remedy, the youngsters were already industriously peeling the garlic cloves and popping them into the Cuisineart with handfuls of fresh basil. I was left thinking that every public school in America should have a cooking class—the messy, tactile nature of creating dishes (even if there’s no actual “cooking” involved) is a creative, absorbing, sensory act that kids love. It also happens to instill healthy eating habits, assuming the teacher understands basic nutrition. (And isn’t on the payroll of Kelloggs.)

And what about the activism? The smart folks at Slow Food USA only allowed those of us who signed a letter to our Congresswoman Nydia Velásquez to enter in the raffle. (People who hand wrote their own letter got two raffle tickets.) As a result, 50 people wrote letters to congress, urging representatives to re-authorize the Child Nutrition Act with more stringent nutrition standards. Not bad!

I brought Pamela Sherrid’s pasta salad, which met Slow Food’s criteria of being cheap (ingredients cost under $12) and healthy (raw garlic, whole wheat fusilli, olive oil, fresh organic tomatoes from my CSA, and basil from my backyard)

For many children, school lunch is their only guaranteed meal of the day. The Child Nutrition Act, the bill that governs the National School Lunch Program (which feeds more than 30 million low-income American kids every day) will soon be before Congress for “reauthorization.” Currently, most districts receive only $2.68 for each free lunch served to a child (schools are reimbursed by the USDA.). Since fresh, unprocessed, REAL food costs money, I asked Congresswoman Velásquez to up that figure by $1 per student. I also asked for more funding for edible gardens and basic cooking classes like the one I’d just witnessed.

If you were unable to attend a Slow Food Eat-In on Labor Day but agree that public schools need healthier food and that we should fund innovative farm-to-school programs, write your Senator or Representative or sign the Slow Food petition. Slow Food’s awesome five-point “Time For Lunch Policy Platform” is also worth a read.  (Scroll down to below the petition and click the red “our platform” button for the PDF.)

I love the idea of establishing financial incentives for schools to buy from local farms, and I’m all for getting rid of vending machines and fast food. But my favorite part comes at the end, where a magnificent idea is put forth: to create a “school lunch corps” comprised of unemployed Americans. “We can’t serve real food in schools without investing in school kitchens and the  people who prepare and serve lunch,” the document says. A school lunch corps would take existing Americorps members and train them to be the teachers, farmers, cooks, and administrators our school cafeterias need.