Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Greens, Eggs & Jam 2009

A HUGE Thank You to everyone who attended, cooked, invited friends, helped out, and made Sunday's Greens, Eggs & Jam Garden Brunch fundraising event a delicious success!!

Over 65 people were in attendance, plus many children, and we raised over $10,400 in gifts and pledges. This is about a 30% increase in attendance from last year.

This inspiring support from our community is what enables us to keep our day-to-day work going strong for the over 700 students who count on us! Plus, we unveiled our new plans for the coming year, in which Urban Sprouts will step up as leaders in the healthy food movement by sharing our methods, our research results, and our sustainable leadership style with more schools and educators all over California and the West!

On Sunday we gathered at Ida B. Wells High School and fun was had by all. For the full photo spread, CLICK HERE. Our guests started by touring the Wells school garden, and then joined us inside to taste the harvest.

Our friends from Nopa Restaurant (below, setting up) prepared the delicious frittata pictured at top left, made with produce from our school gardens (including purple potatoes, fava beans, collard greens, kale, rosemary and sage). Nopa's biscuits and gravy were also a huge hit. (I can't wait to try out their new restaurant, Nopalito!)
Student chefs from Martin Luther King Middle School and International Studies Academy also prepared dishes, including vegetable spring rolls and pesto pasta with fava beans. Yum! Mario (at right, below) also inspired our guests with a speech about his and his classmates' experiences in the MLK school garden.

The festive ambiance was greatly enhanced by our neighborhood bluegrass musicians, led by friend of Urban Sprouts Jordan Klein on banjo.
Decorations came from our own school gardens, including flowers like these!We couldn't have pulled this off without all the wonderful help from Ida B. Wells' staff and students, Urban Sprouts' staff, Advisory Board, and volunteers, and a Saturday volunteer group from USF. Thank you!

If you didn't make it to this year's brunch, we hope to see you next time!

And don't forget, our MONTHLY GARDEN TOURS will be starting up again in May, and it's never too late to make your spring contribution to our efforts. To donate today, CLICK HERE!

Monday, April 06, 2009

You're Invited to our Spring Brunch!

Experience Urban Sprouts! Tour the Ida B. Wells school garden and try garden activities like seed saving, seed sowing and herb harvesting . . . and enjoy home-grown live music for some extra-sweet jam!

Taste brunch made with crops grown in our school gardens,
prepared by local chefs from Nopa Restaurant and by our students!

Support our work by bringing friends and family (kids welcome), and bring your checkbook! You will be invited to give - no gift is too large or too small. Every donation helps urban youth learn to grow their own food at school.


If you can't attend our event, but you'd like to make a donation today, please click here.

Thursday, April 02, 2009

Farmer-In-Residence Program Launch


This past Saturday was the official launch of the Urban Sprouts Farmer-In-Residence program! Two families from our partner school, International Studies Academy, spent the morning breaking ground on their campus plots. From now through summer these inaugural families will plant, tend, and harvest their own food on the school campus. Throughout the season we hope to not only grow food but share recipes, stories, and experiences from our diverse food heritage.

Saturday was an absolutely beautiful day in the City and a perfect day to prepare the beds, spread compost, and make our crop plans.

We are so excited to be able to offer a program to further engage the students and families that we work with.

We will be breaking ground on our second Farmer-In-Residence site, June Jordan School for Equity, in the coming weeks. Stay tuned for more details.