Kindergarten Edible Social Studies: Week 5

Our theme this week was all about the power of coming together as a community to create something larger than ourselves. In the classroom, we read Marcia Brown’s retelling of the European folktale Stone Soup. In the kitchen, we made our own version of the soup (using potatoes to represent the stones)!

There was a LOT of chopping of vegetables and mincing of herbs, as well as some waiting involved while the ingredients cooked. Without the hard work of everyone at our tables, we would never have been able to finish the recipe within the confines of the class time. Not only is cooking together a healthy act, but also sitting down together to eat. The kindergarteners will hear many, often confusing, messages as they grow up about what constitutes a healthy diet. In this lesson our intent is to celebrate the magic of sharing a meal—any meal—with people you love, just like we have the privilege of doing every day at our school.

1st Grade Edible Social Studies: Week 9

For the final week of our unit, we read Meenal Patel’s book Priya Dreams of Marigolds and Masala about an American child who keeps her family’s cultural traditions alive across geography and generations. In the kitchen, we made rice kheer, a sweet pudding popular in the Indian subcontinent.

The first graders crushed spices in a mortar and pestle, then cooked them with basmati rice in ghee before adding soymilk and allowing the mixture to simmer and thicken. While we waited, we made mandalas using all sorts of colorful and interesting grains of rice glued to round pieces of wood.

The kheer was finished off with golden raisins, sugar, rose water, saffron, and rose petals. We’ve used some of these ingredients before in a dish originally from Iran, but they were transformed into something entirely new in a rice pudding. Check out the works of art below. We can’t wait to see everyone next year in second grade!

Kindergarten Edible Social Studies: Week 4

This week was all about celebrating creativity and art in both our food and in our communities. In the classroom we read the book Maybe Something Beautiful: How Art Transformed a Neighborhood. In the kitchen, we made salad people, working with different colors, textures, and tastes. Some chefs chose to go the abstract route; others made salad cats. Some of the most popular materials were the kalamata olives and the chick pea pasta. Everyone’s work of art was singular and delicious. You can try this at home with whatever you have on hand, drizzled with a little olive oil or your favorite dressing!

Kindergarten Edible Social Studies: Week 3

Earth Day is coming soon, and this week the kindergarteners discussed what we can do to help keep the planet healthy. In the classroom we read Todd Parr’s book I Love the Earth and Melanie Walsh’s book 10 Things I Can Do to Help My World. In addition to turning off the lights when we’re not using them and doing our best to conserve water, what we eat also has a huge impact on the environment. We will explore diet and climate change more with our fifth grade Edible Social Studies unit, but this year our focus is simple. It takes less energy and water to produce plant protein like beans than animal protein like beef, and there’s no more stunning sign of spring than the fava bean. Fava beans are not only fun to work with in the kitchen when there are many friends around to pitch in, but also planting them nourishes the soil.

With the backdrop of the tall fava plants the second graders started growing from seeds only in February, the kindergarteners got to work shelling the beans from their velvety pods. A big two-pound stack yielded a small bowlful of raw fava beans, which we then blanched in salted boiling water for about a minute. After shocking the cooked beans in cold water, we peeled them again, removing the outer layer of the seed coat to reveal the bright green beans underneath.

The peeled and cooked beans went into a food processor with tahini, lemon juice, garlic, dill, and olive oil. We enjoyed our homemade fava bean hummus with crackers and slices of rainbow carrot and cucumber. Room 111’s class was interrupted by rain (hooray!), but everyone cheerfully moved indoors for a special treat at their desks. We love the earth and we love fava bean hummus!

1st Grade Edible Social Studies: Week 8

In the classroom this week the first graders read Thank you, Omu! by Oge Mora. We could practically taste Omu’s thick red stew that she cooked all day long after looking at Mora’s beautiful collage illustrations, so of course we had to make our own stew in the kitchen classroom.

Jollof rice is made in several West African countries and is often served with meat. We made a vegan version with coconut oil, onions, and a vibrant mixture of tomatoes and bell peppers cooked down with garlic, ginger, thyme, and a mildly spicy African curry blend. The first graders made a quick Nigerian coleslaw with cabbage, carrots, and mayonnaise—the cool crunchiness of the slaw perfectly complemented the heat of the jollof rice. Several students had fourths. They have learned to work together so well this year, and we look forward to one final class, dessert, next week!

Kindergarten Edible Social Studies: Week 2

This week we explored the wisdom of Indigenous foodways and learned that popcorn has been enjoyed by Native peoples for thousands of years. In the classroom we read Tomie dePaola’s The Popcorn Book, in which we learned that one-thousand-year-old popcorn kernels were discovered in Peru and could still be popped!

In the kitchen classroom the kindergarteners made a Peruvian spice blend, popped fresh popcorn, and cut up fresh fruit for chicha morada, a refreshing Peruvian beverage made with purple corn and spices. We had so much fun grinding the spice blend in the mortar and pestle, chopping pineapple and green apple, squeezing limes, and customizing our own bowls of popcorn with our homemade spice mix, melted butter, nutritional yeast, and the Japanese rice seasoning furikake.

1st Grade Edible Social Studies: Week 7

Our lesson this week was a great example of how ideas travel around the world. Arroz chaufa from Peru takes its inspiration from Chinese fried rice. The vegetarian version we made together featured ají panca, a mild Peruvian red pepper that gives the dish a bold, fruity flavor.

In the classroom the first graders read a Peruvian folktale, Un Lazo a la Luna (Moon Rope). In the kitchen, they got to work cracking and whisking eggs, chopping red bell peppers, snipping green onions, and measuring out soy sauce and sesame oil.

This is a simple yet satisfying dish that is a great way to turn cold leftover rice into something special. We can all continue in the make-it-your-own tradition by adding our favorite vegetables, protein, or seasoning.

Kindergarten Edible Social Studies: Week 1

We had great fun in our first Edible Social Studies classes together. In the classroom, the kindergarteners read Lois Ehlert’s colorful book Planting A Rainbow, which features some plants that Rooms 107 and 111 are already growing by the window! We discussed how colorful fruits and vegetables provide healthy phytonutrients to our growing bodies. Similarly, the diversity of our school community only makes us stronger.

In the kitchen, we made a rainbow fruit salad, cutting up first-of-the-season California strawberries, peeling and segmenting Golden Nugget mandarins, slicing mangoes, peeling kiwis, and combining them with blueberries and blackberries. In the process, we learned to use some new tools, got messy, worked together, and got to enjoy a sweet snack outside.

1st Grade Edible Social Studies: Week 6

We continued our exploration of all the food cultures that make up America with Rashin Kheiriyeh’s picture book Saffron Ice Cream about an Iranian American child’s first visit to the beach in New York City. In the kitchen, the first graders worked with saffron, cinnamon, fresh turmeric, candied citrus peel, raisins, and dried rose petals and made havij polo, a Persian carrot rice dish. Everyone marveled at the vibrantly colored ingredients, especially the turmeric, which dyed our fingers and the worktables a brilliant yellow.

The sweetest thing about this week’s lesson was the fact that our recipe incorporated two ingredients made by other grade levels during their own Edible Social Studies units this year. The fourth and fifth graders were studying the intersection of the food system and climate change last semester, and during a lesson on food waste, they candied the peel of lemons, oranges, and limes - turning stuff that would normally be thrown away into something not only edible but considered a delicacy.

Just before serving the havij polo, the first grade chefs drizzled a simple syrup over the rice that was the byproduct of candied kumquats the second graders made last week for their final class on the farmworkers movement and the history of agricultural labor in California. We love intergenerational moments in the kitchen classroom almost as much as we love all the interesting flavors in this Persian rice!

1st Grade Edible Social Studies: Week 5

In the classroom this week, the first graders read Maurice Sendak’s classic Chicken Soup with Rice and shared their birthdays as we went through each month of the year.

In the kitchen we made a vegetarian avgolemono soup, a dish with roots in Spain, Turkey, Italy, and Greece. The chefs got busy prepping celery, carrots, garlic, lemon juice, and egg. The soup came together fairly quickly with cooked rice, Aneto vegetable broth, and a garnish of fresh dill, oregano, and parsley. We are so impressed with the first graders’ teamwork and their positive attitudes. The soup was deliciously creamy and savory and another wonderful example of how rice is enjoyed around the world and at home in the United States.

2nd Grade Edible Social Studies: Week 9

For our culminating class, the second graders learned a Spanish folk song called “De Colores,” which is the unofficial anthem of the United Farm Workers. We sang along in the classroom to a rendition by the group Las Cafeteras and friends.

In the kitchen, we again celebrated the agricultural bounty of California, this time with mini olive oil cakes made with California olive oil, eggs, and wheat. Students sliced first-of-the-season organic strawberries, made fresh whipped cream, picked edible flower petals, and candied kumquats for a beautiful, colorful dessert that was even more fun to eat together than it was to make.

Thank you to all the farmworkers who work tirelessly every day to feed us. Thank you to Ms. Reynolds and Ms. Butler and to all our incredible volunteers for their help with this unit: Arabella, Aurélie, Janette, Jodi, and Rebecca. See everyone in third grade!

1st Grade Edible Social Studies: Week 4

This week, the first graders worked with edible rice paper and rice vermicelli. In the classroom, we read a book called Duck for Turkey Day about how a Vietnamese American child and her classmates enjoy different foods at home for the same holiday. In the kitchen, we made Vietnamese spring rolls.

Students got to work prepping fresh herbs (mint, cilantro, Thai basil), cucumber, carrot, cabbage, lettuce, and braised tofu into long, thin shapes, then rehydrated the rice paper in a bowl of water. Once the rice paper was wet and placed on the worktable, we piled on the fillings of our choice, including the rice noodles coated in sesame oil and edible flower petals.

There was enough for every chef to make at least two rolls, so all had ample practice rolling the wrapper up over the filling, folding in the sides, then continuing to roll up until all of the paper is folded around the filling. We made a simple vegan dipping sauce featuring lots of fresh lime juice and optional minced serrano chiles. One of the kids at Strawberry table exclaimed, “I love this so much!”

2nd Grade Edible Social Studies: Week 8

We’ve spent many weeks learning about the problems within our farm labor system. This week, we celebrated a model, community supported agriculture (CSA), that connects consumers directly to the people who feed us. In the classroom, we watched Dixon farmer Lorraine Walker, a friend of our program, introduce Eatwell Farm, which is located about 70 miles north of Harvey Milk. CSA members of the farm get a weekly newsletter detailing what’s happening around the farm, a weekly box of produce with an option to purchase eggs, and seasonal opportunities to visit the farm to harvest strawberries or lavender, make tomato sauce, pick olives, or just hang out. Members can donate to a burrito fund to show appreciation for the farm crew, and can donate their farm boxes if they’re away to benefit community members who are living with cancer and others who need access to high-quality organic produce.

In the kitchen, the second graders made a stir-fry from everything in the Eatwell CSA box this week: green garlic, spring onion, arugula, cauliflower, bok choy, fennel, radishes, kale, and mandarins. We marinated firm Hodo tofu (made in Oakland!) in soy sauce, sesame oil, and the mandarin juice, added garlic and ginger to the aromatics in the wok, and stir-fried all the vegetables together until they were cooked and well coated with sauce, then enjoyed our work over a bed of warm brown rice. This is a great clean-out-the-fridge recipe, and we hope students will carry the basics of how to make a simple meal such as this one into adulthood and that access to CSA boxes from local farms continues to increase for everyone in our community.

1st Grade Edible Social Studies: Week 3

This week we explored one of the great pairings in many food cultures around the world, rice and beans! In the kitchen, the first graders prepared aromatics for Jamaican rice and peas, mincing garlic and ginger, slicing green onions, and pulling leaves off of fresh thyme. Everything went into the pot with cooked kidney beans, white rice, and coconut milk. While we waited for the rice to cook, we had a chance to try Jamaican sorrel tea and read a wonderful book by Sandra L. Richards called Rice and Rocks, which took us on a journey to Puerto Rico, New Orleans (where Ms. Webb is originally from and where Louis Armstrong used to sign his name “Red Beans and Ricely Yours”), and to Japan (where Ms. Chie is originally from) to learn about sekihan, a red beans and rice dish from Japan.

It was special to be able to connect the curriculum to our incredible first grade teaching team, whose families have roots in New Orleans and Jamaica, respectively, and to get our chefs thinking about how what they eat might be the same as and different from other kids in their community.

2nd Grade Edible Social Studies: Week 7

In the classroom, we celebrated Black History Month by listening to two poems written and read by contemporary Black artists. The first, Jordan Chaney’s “Conflict,” is dedicated to America’s migrant workers. The second, “A Love Letter to Future Generations,” is by Naima Penniman of Soul Fire Farm in New York.

In the kitchen, the second graders made hot tamales, a speciality of the Mississippi Delta that some historians believe grew out of the meeting of migrant Mexican farm laborers and African Americans picking cotton side by side in the early twentieth century. Hot tamales are traditionally filled with pork, but our vegan version incorporated sweet corn and poblano peppers. Unlike Mexican tamales, the dough is made with cornmeal instead of masa harina. Everyone had a lot of fun working with the corn husks and the dough, but it was a messy endeavor with a reward at the end that was worth the wait! Black history is American history. Black food is American food.

1st Grade Edible Social Studies: Week 2

In the classroom this week, the first graders read The Star Maiden, a retelling of an Ojibway legend. We deduced from the illustrations that the Ojibway (also known as the Chippewa) are close to the natural world and that based on the clothing the people in the pictures wore that they were living a long time ago. One of the illustrations showed the Ojibway with a harvest of wild rice, or manoomin, the food that grows on water.

In the kitchen, students made a manoomin salad with wild arugula, roasted butternut squash, dried cranberries, and toasted pumpkin seeds. They learned to make an emulsified salad dressing by slowly drizzling oil into acid drop by drop. In our closing circle, we looked at the book The Story of Manoomin, which features pictures of present-day Anishinaabe children and teaches Ojibway words and phrases related to the rice harvest. Over the course of their time at Harvey Milk, the first graders will continue to explore Indigenous peoples and Indigenous foodways in acknowledgement of the fact that native peoples like the Ojibway are still here and thriving.

2nd Grade Edible Social Studies: Week 6

This week we celebrated two icons of the farm labor movement, Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta. In the classroom, we read Side by Side/Lado a Lado: The Story of Dolores Huerta and Cesar Chavez by Monica Brown and illustrated by Joe Cepeda. The second graders were fascinated by the many ways these two leaders fought for change, including organizing labor strikes, long marches, boycotts, and even hunger strikes to protest low wages, poor working conditions, and harmful pesticide use.

In the kitchen, we made an iconic breakfast dish that originated on Mexican farms, huevos rancheros. Students warmed corn tortillas, made a fresh salsa, sliced avocado, and learned to fry eggs. This is a deceptively complicated dish requiring a lot of technical skill with knives and heat - the chefs handled it all with aplomb! You can see how they scored the meal (out of 10) in the last photo.

1st Grade Edible Social Studies: Week 1

We kicked off our Everybody Cooks Rice unit with Yangsook Choi’s book The Name Jar in the classroom. The first graders could relate to the main character Unhei’s nervousness as she moves far away from her grandmother to a new country and starts a new school. Many students told stories about their own names and the meanings behind them.

In the kitchen we made kimbap, which features cooked short-grain rice rolled inside seaweed with lots of delicious cooked vegetables and eggs. Kimbap looks similar to Japanese sushi, but the “bap,” or rice, is seasoned with sesame oil instead of vinegar and sushi rolls frequently contain raw, rather than cooked, ingredients. Each chef got to choose their own fillings and practice rolling kimbap with a bamboo mat. Some of the fillings were familiar to many, like sesame seeds, carrots, spinach, and cucumber, and some were new to most of us, like pickled radish and braised burdock. Kimbap is colorful and fun to eat, and the first graders make for delightful snack companions at the table. We can’t wait for more culinary adventures ahead!

2nd Grade Edible Social Studies: Week 5

The second graders learned about the life and times of Larry Itliong this week. In the classroom we read excerpts from the book Journey for Justice by Dawn B. Mabalon and Gayle Romasanta and illustrated by Andre Sibayan. We watched a Smithsonian Folklife short film about the role Filipinos played in the formation of the United Farm Workers as told from the perspective of the Chicano social activist and musician Augustín Lira. Many students in California learn about Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta, but Larry Itliong’s contributions to the fight for farm labor justice often go unmentioned.

In the kitchen we made lumpia, a spring roll popular in Filipino food culture, from scratch. First, students filled and rolled lumpia wrappers for frying. Then we made our own batch of filling, consisting of lots of fresh vegetables, to share with either the next class or our wonderful community of volunteers.

The process of making lumpia together connects to the dumplings we made last week and to the Vietnamese spring rolls we made with rice paper in first grade Edible Social Studies, reminding us of the ways in which food from around the world is both similar and different. We enjoyed the lumpia with a tomato-based chili garlic sauce and a Thai chili pineapple hot sauce. One student had fourths and Ms. Butler said she enjoyed them so much she would write a poem about them.

2nd Grade Edible Social Studies: Week 4

We celebrated the Lunar New Year this week by making dumplings, a traditional Chinese symbol of good fortune. In the classroom, we watched a short video about an initiative in Sonoma to commemorate the contributions Chinese farmworkers made to the burgeoning wine industry in the 19th century. Chinese people were some of California’s first farmworkers, a history many of us aren’t taught in school.

In the kitchen, students folded dumplings by hand. While the dumplings steamed, we prepared another batch of filling ingredients: garlic, ginger, tofu, carrots, shiitake mushrooms, Napa cabbage, Chinese chives, and cilantro. (One of our mighty parent volunteers diced the shallots, savings students from tears!) We set the table with chopsticks for everyone to practice eating with, and served the hot dumplings with a simple dipping sauce of soy sauce and rice vinegar. Many students expressed doubts about a recipe containing mushrooms, and we’re happy to report there were quite a few converts. Happy New Year to all!