After nibbling on an artfully plated “tasting” of gourmet, organic delicacies in the Windsor Elementary School lunchroom, third grader Amelia Berkhof was excited to discover a new vegetable – the ever humble beet.
“I didn’t know what these little square things were, but they tasted really good, and I loved the seasoning,” said Amelia, 8, who gathered with hundreds of her classmates in the lunchroom at the Arlington Heights School District 25 elementary school on Friday, feasting on healthy recipes prepared by chef Thomas Leavitt, which featured fruits, herbs and vegetables harvested from the school’s organic garden.
The 6th annual “tasting” was held at Windsor in celebration of the autumn harvest yielded from the school garden, with the bounty of fresh fruits and vegetables transformed into some of Leavitt’s specialties, including smashed potatoes, kale “washed” with olive oil and salt and pepper, an assortment of pastel-colored beets, and, for dessert, slices of juicy, fresh-picked watermelon.
“After I converted my business to an organization that uses organic and locally sourced foods, I thought it was important as a chef to volunteer for a service project at a school, and I landed here at Windsor,” said Leavitt, the owner of White Oak Gourmet in Long Grove.
Among the many PTA volunteers who assist with Windsor’s Green Team are Samantha and Joe Sheehan, whose kindergarten son, Jacob, is already immersed in gardening at school and at home.
“I definitely grew up gardening, watching my parents and my granddad,” said Sheehan, 28, who grew up in Central Illinois. “Back home, everyone gardened, but around here, there are not a ton of people who do, so my wife and I thought it was important to help out with this project, getting the kids outside and having the chance to enjoy seeing whole food coming out of the ground, and not out of a package.”
PTA volunteer Heidi Boesen, 42, and a mother of three, said students plant the school garden in the spring – which is cultivated on a patch of land on the west side of the school building – then take turns dropping by during the summer to water and weed.
By the time the new school year begins in the fall, Boesen said the rows of kale, potatoes, watermelons and other produce are ripe for the picking, just in time for the all-school tasting.
“The students are seeing first-hand a seed become a plant, and then growing into something they can actually eat…it’s the whole cycle of life, and the kids find it magical,” Boesen said.
kcullotta@tribpub.com
Twitter @kcullotta
