It's a Wrap!

It's a wrap on Farm Camp 2017! As we wind down our final week of camp we are so grateful for everyone who makes this experience possible. Thank you to all the parents, guest educators, counselors, staff, fruits, vegetables and campers!!!

We hope that everyone will continue to try local fruits and vegetables and connect with the farms in their area. See you next summer!

Small Chefs 2 Begins!

We are beginning our last week of Farm Camp with a great group of campers, lots of fresh vegetables, and fantastic guest educators. We would like to extend a huge thank you to Alison from Big Bear Café in D.C. who did an incredible workshop with our camp. She taught us about making sourdough, june and kombucha and everyone got to bring some dough and june starter home!

For our last week we will be introducing Heather Johnson, Arcadia's full time Education Director. 

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Heather oversees Arcadia’s education programs which include Farm Camp, Farm Field Trips, Farm in the Classroom and Mobile Market School Programs. She develops and helps maintain Arcadia’s educational garden, known as the Groundhog Garden. Heather has a master’s degree in Education from Wheelock College in Boston, MA and over the past two decades, she has dedicated her career to providing hands-on, interactive experiences that promote deep exploration and collaboration in authentic environments. While with the Children’s Museum of Richmond, VA, Heather worked closely with communities in need and recognized how little access these communities had to fresh, affordable produce. She wants to work with Arcadia to combat this issue. As families spend less time outside and have less access to nature, she relishes the opportunity to get kids outside to discover the simple yet extraordinary wonders of the garden and the delicious rewards that await.

We hope you have enjoyed getting to know our team! 

Overheard at Small Chefs 1

Small Chefs 1 is coming to a close. We have had a wonderful week of delicious food, farm work and educational activities. As always, here are some of our favorite 'overheard at camp' moments:

While preparing a bed to plant squash a camper came up with a weeding spell: "Weeds weeds weeds come up weeds just come up if you don't come up we'll pull you up"

"Are your chickens for sale?" "No" "Awwwww but I love them"

When I asked to take a photo of a camper with their plate of eggs: "You can have some they are amazing!"

During the blind taste test --
Beets: "it tastes sweet and fruity. I would put it in a salad"
Okra: "okra is so good!"
Parsley: "It tastes really frizzy. Kind of like mint. It might be parsley"

"Oooooh that tickles!" - while holding some wriggly worms during a soil learning activities

"I just want to put it in my mouth now" - while smelling Jonathan Bardzik's Farm-Fresh Fried Rice

"Bees are our friends. They give us honey and are just eating their breakfast... It might look like the bee is coming to sting you but they are just flying around looking for a flower to pollinate"

We had a blast at our tortilla fiesta today!

Thank you to Jennifer and Sophie for coming to teach us about natural herbal fixes to chef injuries! All of our campers went home with an incredible (and easy to make) plantain salve made by Jennifer. 

See you next week for our last week of Farm Camp 2017!

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Chef Jonathan Bardzik Visits!

Extra special Wednesday blog post for our extra special friend Jonathan Bardzik! 

We are so grateful that he shared his love for vegetables, expertise in farm to table food, and enthusiasm for creativity with our camp. Here are some of our takeaways from Jonathan's visit. 

Chef Jonathan Bardzik's cooking rules:
1. It should be fun!
2. It should taste GOOD! If it doesn't taste good, try something else.
3. It doesn't have to be hard
4. Let what looks fresh from the farm help you plan your menu - don't limit yourself by having a recipe in mind first
5. I believe that you can enjoy "special food" (like oysters) any time, any place, no matter who you are/how old you are. All food, all knowledge, and all experience should be available to everyone. 

Our kids were eager to help make and help eat the fantastic dishes Jonathan prepared today. Our menu of farm-fresh fried rice, tomato dill vinaigrette, and quick cucumber ginger cilantro pickles had our campers trying new vegetables, spices, and cooking techniques. Quite well received! 

Many campers left asking about where to find more recipes from chef Jonathan. Here are a few ways to access his entertaining and healthy recipes:

He has 250+ recipes available for free on his website - www.jonathanbardzik.com

His Youtube channel (Jonathan Bardzik) has recipe tutorials and a playlist for All America Selections filmed on Arcadia's farm! - https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLPdoN9Zz0wZTWESCKRhnpCoWIsUY_ro98  

One more huge thank you to Jonathan Bardzik!!!!!!!! Your recipes left us eager to learn more about healthy, farm fresh eating and ready to lick our plates clean...

Small Chefs 1 Assemble!

Small Chefs 1 is off to a delicious start. From quick pickling to scrambling veggies and eggs, these small chefs are blowing us out of the water with their kitchen skills, patience, and creativity. We can't wait for our workshop tomorrow with fantastic chef, storyteller and educator Jonathan Bardzik.

This week we will introduce Ivy and Emily:

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Ivy Assiter is excited to be serving as Camp Manager to this year’s Arcadia Farm Camp. She recently moved to Virginia from Orlando, FL where she spent her time inhabiting many different roles in the local food scene. She is most proud of her position as SNAP Coordinator at two separate farmer’s markets where she was able to work closely with her community, and foster relationships between shoppers and farmers. Ivy knows how summer camps in an outdoor setting can impact a child’s development; she has attended and worked, as well as managed, outdoor experience camps for a total of ten years. Her love for local food, food accessibility, and the outdoors brought her to Arcadia, and she can’t wait to see what this summer has in store! She’s really looking forward to having the okra from this upcoming growing season!

Emily is interning with Arcadia this summer through the Tisch Summer Fellows Program at Tufts University. She has always loved working with kids and is a big fan of outdoor exploration, experiential education and good food. Emily has worked on multiple organic farms in France and was a substitute teacher at La Puerta de Los Niños in New Mexico. She is always looking for ways to share and cultivate her love for the outdoors and healthy eating and is so excited to work with a program like Arcadia! If turned into a vegetable she would probably be a roasted pumpkin, sweet potato, or brussel sprout.