“I am a farmer and a mother of three. In my own experience, my three boys would get their breakfast, lunch and afternoon snacks from their schools. At that time, the school meals weren’t as nutritious or healthy. There is a huge opportunity to change this and really impact students with fresh, organic, nutritious meals. …
A Meal for Change: Empowering Schools with Organic Choices Read More »
Turning Green’s summer interns have had the exceptional pleasure of learning about sustainability and environmental justice from a new guest speaker every week, and now we’ve been given a virtual farm tour! This tour was led by our most recent guest speaker, the legendary Farmer Al Courchesne of Frog Hollow Farm in Brentwood, California. With …
Chef Guillaume Pfhal has brought his passion for cooking to Conscious Kitchen since 2015. Having served hundreds of thousands of meals across the Sausalito Marin City School District throughout the years, Chef G is an expert on getting students passionate about FLOSN (fresh, local, organic, seasonal, nutritious) food. His mission is to create a supportive …
Why do we love Earth Day? Because the day calls on us to reflect upon the most wonderful gift we have received—the earth, our home. This year, we celebrated with California’s First Partner Jennifer Siebel Newsom and many like-minded champions of the state’s Farm to School initiatives, local leaders who are dedicated to transforming school …
Earth Day: Expanding Organics Through Farm to School Read More »
What better way to spend spring break than conducting on-the-ground research to build food systems that support the health and wellbeing of people and planet? That’s exactly what Conscious Kitchen did with our Organic Farm to School Mapping Project and a passionate cohort of six local college and university students this spring. This cohort came …
We are always proud of our work with Conscious Kitchen! What a joy to share our organic school food program in person with top leaders across our country for National School Breakfast Week. USDA Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, California First Partner Jennifer Siebel Newsom, Congressman John Garamendi, and State Superintendent Tony Thurmond joined Conscious …
U.S. Secretary of Agriculture & CA First Partner Pay Conscious Kitchen a Visit Read More »
When you want to make change, it can be hard to know where to begin. In the complex world of increasing organic and local procurement for school meals, being able to draw upon inspiration and guidance from leaders, peers, and experts is critical. With this in mind, Conscious Kitchen organized the Central Coast Organic School …
What does our school food program look like in action? The Conscious Kitchen team set up at John Herbert Davis Park in San Pablo with our partner, West Contra Costa Unified School District (WCCUSD), to showcase what is possible with fresh, local, organic school-supported agriculture programs like ours. The WCCUSD Food Truck pulled up to …
Organic School Meals Work: USDA Visits WCCUSD Summer Meal Site Read More »
Rows of organic lettuce and potatoes stretched as far as the eye could see at Pinnacle Farms, our classroom for the day. Our Conscious Kitchen team was busy learning about experimental mulching techniques, water conservation, how hedgerows support native pollinators, and increasing organic soil matter through regenerative farming practices when a van pulled up to …
As Conscious Kitchen continues to honor, highlight and interview farmers, we chatted with Javier Zamora and learned about his incredible journey to owning a successful organic farm. In 2012, Javier started JSM Organics with little more than an acre and a half of land and a mobile home. Now, 10 years later, he drives through the 200 acres of …
