Mississippi – FoodCorps

Oxford Native, Cooking Enthusiast Loves to Spread Joy of Cooking With LOU Youths

FoodCorps — Mon, 29 Jul 2019 15:00:49 +0000

Elizabeth Speed cooks with kids in Oxford, Mississippi. Photo by Jackson Solari

Jackson Solari, HottyToddy.com

Children of the Oxford community recently had a chance to sharpen their skills and talents in the culinary arts with FUNdamentals Cooking Class for Kids.

FUNdamentals Cooking Class, specifically designed for children ages 8-13, focuses on teaching children how to properly prepare meals in the kitchen. The class, held at the Oxford Park Commission Stone Center building, starts with a beginner class and ends with an intermediate class. The class is taught by Oxford native Elizabeth Speed who prefers “hands-on teaching/learning styles” to impact the budding chefs.

Main points of the class consist of knife safety, culinary terms and how to read a recipe.

“The goal of the class is to have the kids be curious about what they are eating, to cook with and for their families, and to have an experience that helps them to become more independent,” Speed said. […]

Speed said she began teaching cooking classes with an after-school club while she was a FoodCorps service member with Good Food for Oxford Schools. FoodCorps is an organization that helps connect children to healthy food in school so they can live healthier lives and reach their full potential, according to its website.

After Speed’s time with FoodCorps, she still wanted to pursue service work. She didn’t see an opportunity for LOU children to learn cooking outside of their homes.

“I wanted to fill that niche,” she said.

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FoodCorps Alum Named Director of Mississippi National Historic Landmark

FoodCorps — Wed, 29 May 2019 14:00:20 +0000

From the Mississippi Department of Archives and History:

Lauren Rhoades has been named the new director of the Eudora Welty House and Garden. She previously served as public assistance specialist at the Welty House.

Rhoades worked for two years as a FoodCorps service member in Jackson and led nutrition and garden education programs at Magnolia Speech School and Raines Elementary School. In 2015, she was named the FoodCorps Mississippi State Fellow. Her food writing has been featured in the Jackson Free Press and Cookinglight.com.

Previously, Rhoades worked with school groups, developed public programming, and managed the Education and Visitors Center gift shop.

“The Eudora Welty House and Garden is a special place for our state,” said Rhoades. “I am honored to take on a leadership role in preserving Welty’s legacy and encouraging a love of literature, alongside MDAH and our partners at the Eudora Welty Foundation.”

Rhoades earned BA degrees in English literature, Spanish, and political science from the University of Colorado at Boulder. She is currently working on her MFA in creative writing at Mississippi University for Women.

The Eudora Welty House and Garden, which interprets the life of the internationally acclaimed author, became a National Historic Landmark in 2004. The site opened to the public in 2006.

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Watch Jonathan Perform His Slam Poem “Roped Wings”

Jonathan Rosser — Thu, 21 Feb 2019 17:26:41 +0000

Roped Wings

I haven’t told this story that often

about the lynching that I witnessed

and even if an innocent bystander could’ve drawn in a policeman

I think God would’ve erased him

you see this had to happen

this scum won’t learn it’s lesson, and just like we teach them in school books

if they don’t understand

Then we give them an example….

the pulled out flesh eating whips that devoured chunks of him at a time

and what was left of him

was branded

as if he were cattle

they tied to noose tight before hanging him next to the other caged meat

and shipping them off to the corner

their factory

right down the block from some impoverished eight year old

who’s only father is a video

and it just so happens that the lynched men on the corner

look just like the fathers in the videos

nah, it ain’t a problem now

but when he cocoons into his adolescence

and they ask him do he wanna ‘Hang’

that’ll just place him beside lake ponder

soon he’ll be skipping school rocks over to the corner

coming home late like his names Peter Parker

and nah, it ain’t cause you’ve been living with spider-man

it’s because you’ve been living

in spite of man

I don’t need no nigga

all they do is walk on all fours, wag their tail and their tongue when they see you

Thought he was with you but he was with others

under covers

detective role playing at her safe place

he might just hit a Sherlock Holmes past third base

lets face the facts

there are no real questions asked just given for fear of no worth after

my precious we cannot be billionaire Bruce Wayne by day

adhesive to the shadows by night

sticking to some script that we didn’t even write

it could all be so simple just,

destroy me

erase my existence

replace my fibers with omnipotence

so we can enrich the D-boys jingling rocks of loose change

as the street lights flicker

watching a fiend draw hither

lets replace Websters definition of crack rock

with writing utensil

so now when they slangin’ them sacks

the junkies cans say

put a pin in that

let save face like the white folks

make Ebonics a habitual literary abuser

so it can get hooked on phonics

Im just trying to talk in color

excuse me if I don’t walk

I hover across the epilogue in hot pursuit of chapter one

pages flipped instead of birds

wings clipped we are flightless

it’s no wonder we have been ostracized

my generation is not hopeless we just

Hope Less

out a window that wasn’t even open I watched as they threw faiths cage

I saw

Pigeons

Doves

and Swallows fall to their doom

WHY DIDN’T THEY JUST FLY?

I no longer ask why doesn’t they caged bird sing

I try to teach it a song

The post Watch Jonathan Perform His Slam Poem “Roped Wings” appeared first on FoodCorps.

Video: A Year of Service, A Lifetime of Impact

FoodCorps — Wed, 16 Jan 2019 15:29:04 +0000

Serving as a FoodCorps AmeriCorps service member can help you discover new, meaningful career paths. Hear from three alumni about how their experiences with FoodCorps led them to exciting and meaningful career opportunities post-service.

Apply now

Apply to serve by March 13.

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How schools are fighting back against obesity in Mississippi

FoodCorps — Sun, 14 Oct 2018 19:57:42 +0000

By Dillon Mullan, Daily Journal

…

Chloe Buchanan isn’t scared of worms. She knows they’re good for the soil. Earlier this month, she dug into a garden bed with bare hands to plant cabbage with the rest of their third-grade class at Lawndale Elementary.

“Some people complain about the dirt, but I get it under my nails every time,” Buchanan said. “I didn’t like cabbage. I used to think it was disgusting, but I’ll eat it now.”

Kelsey Ioannou has been overseeing these gardening lessons at Lawndale and Tupelo’s pre-K since August. The Californian is the fifth service member from FoodCorps – a non-profit dedicated to connecting the country’s children with healthy food in school – to spend a year in the district. As part of the “Growing Healthy Waves” program, Tupelo has salad bars at Joyner and Parkway and vegetable gardens at its pre-K and five of its elementary schools.

“It’s hard to imagine living in Mississippi and not knowing your food comes from the soil,” Growing Healthy Waves coordinator Donna Loden said. “Speaking of obesity, we have a much better chance of fighting it when kids are growing the food themselves. It’s all about making that real life connection that if you want real food instead of Doritos or Cheetos, it starts with a seed.”

Twenty Northeast Mississippi’s 30 school districts source some cafeteria food from local farmers. During farm-to-school week earlier this month, Will Reed of Native Sons farm in Tupelo spent an afternoon in the Lawndale cafeteria speaking to students about their eating habits.

“The hope is that kids will gain more awareness of where food comes from and at least be exposed to some healthier ways of eating,” Reed said. “We’ve got some real health issues facing the state with the obesity rate, type II diabetes and heart disease being the number one killer. A lot of that is diet related.”

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FoodCorps & Partners Build Urban Farm in Mississippi Park

FoodCorps — Sun, 15 Apr 2018 17:57:23 +0000

By Cristina Carreon, Daily Journal

TUPELO – Local volunteers met Friday at Barnes and Freeman streets to begin rebuilding the Park Hill Community Garden in order to get the surrounding neighborhood and area students involved in the urban farming project.

“It’s our goal for this to be a community jewel,” said Keep Tupelo Beautiful Executive Director Kathryn Rhea.

Donna Loden, a retired schoolteacher, is the coordinator of Growing Healthy Waves, a farm-to-school initiative that partners with Food Corps and the Tupelo Public School District – a partnership that started four years ago.

“We want to talk to the kids and the parents about the different vegetables we’re going to put in it and the benefits of vegetables to the body and fruit trees,” Loden said.

Sara Murphy is a Food Corps service member serving the Tupelo Public School District through July.

“I think there’s a huge health crisis across the county as well as an environmental crisis happening across the world, so getting the kids to get their hands dirty and connect back to the earth and where their food comes from I think can change their lives and set them up for success,” Murphy said.

Food Corps has partnered with the district to teach cooking classes, offer taste tests and create gardens at area elementary schools such as Joyner, Lawhon and Lawndale – and has also implemented salad bars at a few school cafeterias such as Joyner and Parkway elementary schools.

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WATCH: Toyota Motor Manufacturing Volunteers Help Out at FoodCorps School

FoodCorps — Wed, 11 Apr 2018 17:48:11 +0000

By Allie Martin, WCBI

TUPELO, MISS. (WCBI) – Volunteers with Toyota Motor Manufacturing Mississippi spent part of their day getting their hands dirty at a Tupelo Elementary School. It’s a hands on lesson for these second graders at Joyner Elementary as they plant beans and squash, at the “Discovery Garden” with help from workers at the Blue Springs Toyota plant and Mississippi Young Professionals.

“Partnerships make our community such a stronger community,” said Donna Loden, of “Growing Healthy Waves.” This workday is organized by “Growing Healthy Waves,” a farm to cafeteria initiative in conjunction with Food Corps. It teaches young people the importance of eating fresh, nutrient rich foods. Produce from this garden will find its way to the cafeteria as part of healthy lunches.

“We want our children to be able to see it is these very things they are growing and participating in and have a hand in they will also see in our cafeteria,” said Joyner Principal Kimberly Foster. The Discovery Garden takes what students have learned in the classroom, about health, nutrition and agriculture, and shows them how to apply it in real life.

“We also do lessons in the classroom, with them, on cooking nutrition, to have them grow the food and have these lessons in the classroom and tie it into cafeteria as well it is setting them up for success in the future really,” said Sara Murphy, of Food Corps.

Watch now

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WATCH: FoodCorps member Sarah teaches in school district’s first ever greenhouse

FoodCorps — Tue, 27 Mar 2018 14:55:23 +0000

By Katrina Berry, WTVA

TUPELO, Miss. (WTVA) – The Growing Healthy Waves initiative in Tupelo fosters creative efforts to encourage kids to eat those vegetables.

Fourth grade students at Lawndale Elementary are developing quite the green thumb. This is the first green house in the Tupelo Public School District, which is made possible through community grants from Boerner Be Wild and Toyota.

The Sprout House was officially dedicated in September.

Sarah Murphy works with Growing Healthy Waves as a FoodCorps service member.

“It’s just a great learning environment,” Murphy said.

The lesson this week is “Seed Ya Later,” teaching students about seeds and how they travel. For example, did you know that strawberries are the only fruit with seeds on the outside?

Watch the video

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FoodCorps Alumni Featured on Southern Living

FoodCorps — Tue, 02 Jan 2018 22:16:45 +0000

Mississippi alumni Lauren Rhoades and Liz Broussard were profiled in Southern Living’s “30 Incredible Women Moving Southern Food Forward.” Read excerpts below.

By Hannah Hayes, Southern Living

Lauren Rhoades

Jackson, Mississippi

When Lauren Rhoades meets customers at her farmers market booth in Jackson, Mississippi, older folks tell her about their grandmothers tending crocks of sauerkraut and Korean War Veterans come to sample her kimchi. With her line of fermented foods under the name Sweet and Sauer, including kombucha, pickles, and mustard, Rhoades is hoping to redevelop the knowledge and taste for good bacteria-infused foods in a new generation. After moving to Jackson from Denver, Colorado with the FoodCorps program, Rhoades took Sweet and Sauer from a side project to a full-time business. Located inside The Hatch, a nonprofit business incubator in Jackson’s Midtown Arts District, she turns local produce into jarred products sold at independent grocery stores and cafes in central Mississippi.

Liz Broussard

Jackson, Mississippi

When Liz Broussard’s Jackson, Mississippi-based fellowship with AmeriCorps’ FoodCorps program was finished, some expected the New Hampshire-native would head back North. Instead, she chose to grow her roots in Jackson and continue her work teaching students about healthy eating. As the coordinator of Mississippi Food Justice Collaborative (a part of the National Center for Appropriate Technology), Broussard works with groups like Mississippi Farm to School Network and the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians to increase healthy food access for disadvantaged families and children.

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Recrafting Culturally Relevant Foods of Soul for Health

FoodCorps — Tue, 28 Feb 2017 23:49:34 +0000

Ethnic. Soul. Southern. Gullah. Afrocentric. Creole-inspired. There is a vast amount of titles that can represent the cuisine that was originally crafted by Africans more than 400 years ago, then recrafted by African slaves brought to the Americas, and is still being recrafted now, post-slavery. Soul Food is the most culturally relevant food for all Black or African American communities. “It’s not just about food. It’s a slow process. It’s about gathering with family. It’s heavy. It’s a culture to nourish not just the body but the soul.” as described by Emmy Sprayberry, one of my favorite baristas in Jackson, MS at Deep South Pops. As an African American raised in the south, this ethnic cuisine has shaped my palate and the way I see food, but not just me, I believe Soul food has been imprinted in the soul and palate of America. The food culture influenced in America by the black community is a spectrum. Whether it’s in the bayou of Louisiana, the backwoods of Arkansas, the grill pit of North Carolina, or the Mississippi Delta, the “food culture of soul” has and is still greatly shaping the American cuisine.

We use the terms Cajun, Creole, Soul, Lowcountry and overlook the origins. These derive from variety of cultures and nations, from French, Spanish, African, Caribbean, Italian, Native American and others, all shaping a new culture. With certain fruits, vegetables, and herbs originating in a various regions like sweet potatoes in Central America, Yams in West Africa, or Muscadine Grapes in what is now the Southeastern U.S. Slaves took what was found, what they knew, and made something new. These quickly became traditions and now after generation to generation we still benefit from this creative process of food that fills our bellies and our souls.

Of course just about everyone is aware the health complications that come about with a diet filled with fried catfish, chicken livers, collard, turnip, and mustard greens, butter and lima beans, black-eyed peas, cornbread, grits, chitterlings, ham hocks, okra, gumbo, beans and rice, crawfish, shrimp, and hushpuppies. Read that sentence again. There is a great variety of vegetables present. So I pose the question, “What’s the deal?” I would say it’s the bacon fat, the ham hock, the fact many things are fried in lard or some kind of animal fat. But I would not be fully correct. I was having a conversation with Mr. Terry Rhodes, a cross country and track and field coach at Jackson State University, and he stated, “That [soul] food was good for the slaves, it fulfilled their nutritional needs for laboring in the fields from sunrise to sunset in the blistering hot South. We have come long and far from that lifestyle, being now so sedimentary, that diet does not fit us.” So the next question is, how can adjust our diets but still enjoy the over 400 year old cuisine?

Over the span of this school year at Brown Elementary, I have been finding ways to cook Soul food with the students but with a healthier twist. Sweet potatoes are a staple in Mississippi. The students and I harvested sweet potatoes from the school garden and with those we made sweet potato chips. Thinly sliced sweet potato with a little sunflower or coconut oil on parchment paper baked at about 325° F for about 20 minutes until crisp and lightly added cinnamon and sea salt. It was a huge success, the students still ask about making it again. Later, we made fried green tomatoes. Yes, I said fried. I was able to teach the students about the culture of frying in the South. Here’s the twist though: a pan instead of a pot. We pan-fried green tomatoes with green tomatoes, of course, battered in fry cornmeal in a very little bit sunflower oil. Another huge success.

We can create Soul food that’s good for the soul and body with today’s lifestyle. Although it seems impossible or that flavor must be compromised, with learning the skill of recrafting our cooking processes, we can truly find successes in healthy culturally relevant food in our Black and African American communities. I salute all of my ancestors, the ones who took what they knew, what they found, and made something deliciously new, our world has been forever changed.

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