WASHINGTON — Farmer Gayle pulled up to Anne Beers Elementary School in Southeast, D.C. to unload the bounty from her Brandywine farm: Deep Roots.
The Thursday farmshare is an offshoot of a school program teaching kids how to pick, cook and eat healthy vegetables. The market offers $30 worth of fresh organic produce all for $15.
They even take EBT and offer discounts if you qualify. The price is right for residents of Ward 7, but the convenience and quality are even better.
Gayle said offering fresh fruits and vegetables in a food desert is important to everyone, especially the children.
"Children are learning from a very young age the important of eating fresh and eating local," she said.
"A lot of people are intimidated because they get the food and then they're like 'I want fresh veggies but I don't know what to do with it so I guess I shouldn't,'" Foodprints teacher and farm share manager Serenity Rain, said. "So I teach them you can make something really simple with these veggies. Today we have cucumbers and tomatoes in our farm share I try to figure out how to make a recipe out of it that's simple. So, this tabbouleh recipe will take at most 30 minutes. It’s nice, its tasty and good for summer time and the kids love it."
So, as residents filed in to pick up their bag full of produce, children chopped veggies for the cooking demonstration. The farm share, in its third year, is changing the way people see food, buy food and prepare food at a young age.
"And we know habits that we form as a child stays with us for the most of our lives so that will encourage people within the community to be healthier individuals reduce diabetes, heart disease and obesity -- all of those things come into play," Gayle said.