Following on the success of the raised bed vegetable gardens installed at Percy Centennial Public School last spring, Abundance Project organizers decided to approach the Warkworth Business Association and the Municipality of Trent Hills for approval to install moveable raised bed gardens along Main St. The concept is simple – bring community gardens right into the core of the village – grow vegetables where community members shop, walk and socialize.

With approvals in place and the endorsement of the WBA, a small crew of volunteers came together in early May to build the 8 raised bed units. Once built, the units were moved to a staging area to be filled with top soil and then triple mix, and finally moved to their summer locations with the assistance of the Warkworth Farm Supply forklift.

Warkworth has a number of talented organic market gardeners, and Abundance turned to one of these, Barbara Klatt for a planting plan. The individual raised beds are themed (eg. salad garden, herb garden, root garden, ‘pizza’ garden) and Barbara’s plans maximize the variety of vegetables planted in each 4’x4’ box.

Planting was done in a blaze of activity with the help Peter Brackenbury’s students from Percy Centennial PS. All five boxes in town where planted in about an hour, while the three new ones at the school where planted at a later date.

While a few of the tender plants had to be replaced following the late May heavy frost, all boxes are now looking great with seeds sprouting and tomatoes, basil and peppers established and growing.

These are the Warkworth Community Gardens. As you walk to the bank or the library stop at the planters and pull a weed or two, tie up a sagging tomato, deadhead the flowers, but most of all enjoy the produce. Pick what you need for a salad or tomato sauce. Any produce not consumed by the community will be harvested for the Seven Hills Community Food Bank.

Eat green! Eat healthy!

These days televised cooking competitions are all the rage and have huge audiences. On June 11th, a bit of that excitement and passion came to Warkworth. The students of Mrs. Anderson’s grade 8 class put into practice the skills and food lessons they had learned over the course of the school year in the weekly Abundance Project cooking class.

Four teams of approximately 8 students each were given one hour to prepare from scratch one main course dish and then present their work to our panel of local judges; Chef Tina Moorey from On The Side catering, business owner Elizabeth Aitkenhead from Our Lucky Stars café, and fitness coach and Abundance cooking volunteer Alaria Richie. Judges then evaluated each dish based on a number of criteria formulated by the students themselves.

It was clear from the time that the competition was presented to the students that they were excited and very motivated by the challenge. The class was given about 10 days to research their recipe, assign tasks within the team and to develop the rating criteria. Students were encouraged to select healthy recipes that incorporated ingredients from all food groups. We were very encouraged to note that the final ingredient list for the pantry had about twice as many vegetables as any other food good.

Given the size of the teams, and the space restrictions in the church kitchen, only two team members were allowed in the kitchen or the ‘pantry area’ at one time. There was plenty of scurrying to and fro by team members – even a mad dash up Main St. to pick a bit of mint from the Community herb garden. All the while judges circulated amongst the teams, observing how they worked and offering the occasional bit of professional advice.

Once the hour prep time was up, two members of each team presented their dish to the judges, explaining why they had chosen that recipe and commenting on any challenges their team had faced while preparing it. The room fell silent and 30 students watched with great anticipation as the judges tasted each dish, completed their evaluations, consulted amongst themselves and made comments to each team.

Although the judges selected a runner up and first place team, in the end every team was a winner and all the students clearly gave their best and prepared some fantastic meals. We look forward to working again with Mrs. Anderson’s students next year and to another Master Chef challenge.

For another take on this event please visit this link: http://www.insidebelleville.com/news-story/5681698-master-chef-challenge-a-hit-with-percy-centennial-students/.

For six weeks this spring the Gathering Place and kitchen of St. Paul’s United Church echoed with the happy sounds of approximately 20 children from Percy Centennial Public school. The program, a partnership between the Abundance Project, the Early Years Program of the Northumberland YMCA and the Haliburton Kawartha Pine Ridge Health Unit offered these young people a variety of activities.

As with all Abundance Project initiatives, a critical aspect of this program was to provide the participants with healthy eating choices and the opportunity to learn basic kitchen skills. Every week, the participants had 20 to 30 minutes of kitchen time to prepare things like fruit kabobs, muffins, and granola bars.

While not learning new kitchen skills, the participants took part in craft activities and various physical activities including yoga and social games.

Each week a special story was selected and read with the group which tied into the kitchen activity. For the final week, the kids were read Stone Soup, and then went on to assist in the preparation of a vegetable soup to be served to their parents and family the final evening.

Judging by the enthusiastic response of participants and parents, it is most likely that an After School program will run again next school year.