Turkey Valley

Connecting kids to their food

Turkey Valley is one of the six Farm to School pilots for this year.   This page highlights some of their projects and activities.

School cooks back to school

Turkey Valley cooks went back to school early this year to sharpen their cooking skills by attending a 5th Season Workshop hosted by the Northeast Iowa Food & Fitness Initiative Farm to School program.   Guest chef and author, Monique Hooker from De Soto, Wisconsin showed food service workers how to prepare and store fresh local produce to be used throughout the school year by creating a vegetable dish called ratatouille.  (Read more)

It's Garden Time

Where were Turkey Valley students for the second to last day of school?  Planting veggies. 

With guidance from horticulturist David Cavagnaro, students in Robyn Vsetecka's fourth grade class designed and planted a 20-by-70 foot plot in a few hours.  However, much preparation contributed to the success of the day.

School and community members started planning the garden in February.  Vsetecka and her 25 students started tomatoes, peppers, and eggplants in their classroom.   Add garden tools purchased with a Farm to School grant from the NE Iowa Food & Fitness Initiative and a friendly neighbor to till a section of the school lawn, and the garden started to take shape.  (Read more)

School Lunch

Turkey Valley has used some of their FFI funds to purchase a salad bar for their school lunch. 

School Garden

Students, adults and volunteers from Turkey Valley have been planning the school garden.  Parents, staff and youth are doing some serious planning!  One fourth grader interested in herbs is leading the pack! 

They are meeting on April 6 to with two teachers and students for a tour of potential garden locations.  On April 22 (Earth Day), classes will be planting tomatoes and peppers.  From May 27 to the end of the year, they hope to engage as many kids as possible on the very last days of school to keep them from going nuts by having them all help plant the garden!

Cooking School for School Cooks - Stir Fry

(9/26/11) Turkey Valley school food service staff are sharpening their cooking skills by attending 5th Season Workshops hosted by the Northeast Iowa Food & Fitness Initiative Farm to School program.  Guest Chef Jason Skarin from Luther Collage led a stir-fry workshop at Decorah Middle School.  Food service staff prepared and froze stir-fry vegetables from the school garden and local farmers. Read more.

Cross-age teachers trained

High school students participated in a training to prepare them for their role as cross-age teachers in the Farm to School program which will begin in January.  The high school age team teachers will facilitate Farm to School lessons with second grade students once a month using folios developed specifically for northeast Iowa.  The folios feature a different local food each month and provide information for parents and students. (Read more)

School Food Service Workers Complete ServSafe Training

School food service employees from five school districts participated in a day-long food safety in-service taught by Iowa State University Extension specialists Cindy Baumgartner and Jill Weber.  The training was part of the Farm to School project in northeast Iowa.  ServSafe® is a program of the National Restaurant Association Educational Foundation.  Participants learned about prevention, regulatory requirements, and how to improve food quality. (Read more)