So Nutrition Education and Agency Relations decided to pare down the intensive course into a 2 hour basic workshop geared towards food pantries, soup kitchens, Kids Cafe sites and others served by the food bank.

So how do you take 16 hours and smush it into 2 hours?  It starts with the KEYS to food safety (developed by the Nutrition Education Department) – Keep it Clean, Cook Food Fully and Store Food Safely. Then we take those KEYS, and turn them into skills.

The skill building part of the workshop is where participants learn how to calibrate a thermometer, make bleach water, practice proper hand washing techniques and match foods with the correct cooking temperatures.  Then participants map out where food travels through their own organization to identify where KEYS to food safety can be applied in their own daily operations; and which staff or volunteers would need to be trained in a specific skill area.

At the end of the workshop, participants came up to me to say how much they enjoyed learning in a fun and interactive way, which is the rewarding part!

As with all new trainings we have created, there continues to be tweaking.  But the goal remains the same – provide knowledge and skills to empower our partners to serve, store, and cook food safely!

Throughout the morning we discussed snack and supper options, new reporting forms, upcoming training opportunities and new resources that are available to our site leaders and children. Many great suggestions were shared and we look forward to implementing some new ideas. It is always so energizing to get all of our site leaders in one place to talk, share food, and focus on the children we’re serving. We already look forward to our next round of forums this fall!

We want to send a special thanks to Covenant Baptist Church for allowing us to use their space again this spring.

Planning for the class was challenging because most of the nutrition education activities were sight-dependent and needed to be modified. Instead of reading nutrition labels on cans of food, we decided to have a taste-test of canned fruit and vegetables to investigate sugar and sodium levels. Instead of showing pictures of food portion sizes, our nutritionists created models using a 9-volt battery (cheese) and a deck of cards (meat). We utilized activities that employed the four other senses in order to teach the nutrition aspect of food.

The most challenging and awe-inspiring part of this class was the culinary aspect. When asking the participants why they were taking our OFL class, the majority of the responses were, “To gain some independence by learning to cook better on my own.” There were a variety of skill levels, from experienced household chefs to those who had never correctly chopped an onion. One woman who was brought in by her daughter told us, “I never liked to cook especially now that I’m losing my vision, but being with others in this class who are blind and cook for themselves makes me believe that I can do it too.”

Chef Mitch Greene, a two-time volunteer for Operation Frontline, had experience with this type of class as he had taught with the program before. One day during class, Chef Mitch decided to teach the class how to cut an onion, a seemingly impossible task. Yet the descriptive instructions created a vivid mental image for the participants which made the skill easy to pick up. It became clear that it didn’t suffice to just point something out; the vibrance of the details was equally important.

To get a better perspective on the class, the class leaders and I even tried cooking at home with our eyes closed. The experience was a bit disorienting and even terrifying but it instantly became clear why confidence in the kitchen had the power to provide greater independence. Learning to cook for oneself is a fundamental skill that should be taught to everyone, regardless of age, gender or even disability.

It doesn’t matter what skills you already have, anyone can cook. In our Columbia Lighthouse class, it was often the blind who actually had the strongest vision on life.

This post is also on the Share Our Strength No Kid Hungry blog.