Water Tank & Garden to Table Round up.

As we head into the hot, dry months of summer we are extremely happy to have our own sustainable supply of water for our school edible gardens. 

New water tank - in place for the winter rainfall

                                                 

A huge thank you to Auckland Council for the grant to make this happen and to the school PTA for purchasing the water tank initially. 

Gardening in progress!

The garden beds still need nurturing and watering over the school holidays to maintain good soil quality for next year. We still have things growing too! 

We will be back into our Garden to Table programme in Term 1 2023. 

When surveyed, 95% of students who took part in this programme rated it very highly for how much they enjoyed it. 

The majority also commented that they felt it had many real life learning benefits. 

I know they all enjoyed the kai! 

Vegetable risotto, kale chips and fruit muffins

If you are keen to help out with watering or weeding in the holidays please email me: b.long@howickprimary.school.nz 

Garden to Table Working Bee

On the morning of Saturday 12th of November there was a Howick Primary School working bee!

For a start, my mum drove me there I had to wear old clothes so it wouldn't matter if they got dirty.

Once we got there I said “hello” and asked for a job, my first one was scooping the compost into a bucket. I did that for a while, then I asked for another job and it was taking staples out of cardboard so it could be recycled and we put it on compost, surprisingly we had enough cardboard to cover all the compost.

My next job was shovelling bark into a wheelbarrow to then put on the cardboard. It took a while but we did it! While we were doing that we stopped for a food break and then we kept going after that. My mum came to pick me up but I asked if I could stay longer? And she said YES!

My mum also said I could go home with one of my friends, for the rest of the time I kept on shovelling bark.

By Sophie Kealey Room 2. 

Before...

   

...After! 

Work in progress! 

Snack break! 

Re-purposing lots of cardboard to suppress weeds 

Garden to Table: Room 2 and Room 4 & 6 'taster' sessions

 As term 4 continues we have found ourselves in the lucky position to offer our Year 4 classes each 2 'taster' sessions of Garden to Table prior to them becoming involved in the programme in 2023 when they are in Year 5.  

We had much excitement building up to the sessions about what they would be doing and making in the kitchen. We have lots of produce so it gave us lots of choices! 

In the kitchen we have made: 

Week 3- Imagination salad, which looked amazing! Herby bread chips - a big hit which turned out really well in the air fryer and kawakawa biscuits.

Week 4 - Risotto - also a huge hit (see photos for the recipe), kale chips - which are incredibly easy and were also very popular and rhubarb and apple slice bars (click HERE for recipe). We pre baked the slice for the following group and group 2 made it for the garden working bee which is on the Saturday.  

We have also been giving the students some weekly challenges; 

1) Name 5 produce in the garden that starts with S.

2) How many 'Garden to Table' verbs can you think of that start with S? See below for how Room 2 and 6 got on! 

In the garden we have been busy composting, weeding and prepping for our working bee. 

 

Garden to Table - Room 2 and Room 7 taster session.

 Term 4 has begun and spring has arrived in the garden! 

The Room 2 students were super keen to get back to the gardening and cooking. 

This term we are able to offer the Year 4 classes two 'taster' sessions. 

Room 7 were extremely excited to have their turn!

In the garden we have been busy planting, weeding, mulching and watering. We have a lot of greens growing in the garden. I challenged the students to find FOUR produce items growing in the garden starting with the letter S. Can you guess what they are? 

In the kitchen so far we have cooked: tabbouleh, broccoli flat bread and beetroot brownies. This week we made greens and cheese fritters, leek and potato soup and lemon and white chocolate muffins.  Click on the item for the recipe.