We are thrilled to announce that DoJiggy, an online fundraising solutions provider, listed GrowingGreat as one of their 2012 Grant Recipients!

They recently awarded us with a generous grant to continue our commitment to gardening and nutrition education in elementary schools. GrowingGreat is featured on their website here.

You too can support GrowingGreat by making a donation today. Your gift will make a difference in the lives of children throughout Los Angeles county and beyond! Click here to donate to GrowingGreat!

Thank you again to the DoJiggy team for their support!

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GrowingGreat was nominated for the GOOD Magazine New Year Challenge: Get Healthy. We need your help to win $1,000! Click here to visit our submission page and vote for GrowingGreat today! The grant will help fund our gardening and nutrition education programs – including Spring Harvest Parties and Student-run Farmer’s Markets.

The contest runs through Tuesday, February 7^th. You can only vote once, so please share this information with your family and friends!

Thank you!

The GrowingGreat Family

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Check out our latest press release regarding GrowingGreat & Mary Edwards’ big win in the Aetna Healthy Food Fight competition!

The $10,000 grant we received from Aetna will help us expand GrowingGreat’s school garden and nutrition education programs to more students in the Los Angeles-area and beyond!

Click on the link below to read the press release.

GrowingGreat/Aetna Press Release

Feel free to contact us at 310.929.9216 or communications@growinggreat.org for more information.

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Mary Edwards’ winning recipe is here! Congratulations to Mary for being voted “Fan Favorite” in the Aetna Healthy Food Fight competition! We can’t wait to put our $10,000 grant to use in GrowingGreat gardens and classroom nutrition lessons.

Mary selected GrowingGreat out of thousands of possible nonprofit organizations presented to her by Aetna organizers. When we asked Mary why she selected us, here’s what she said:

I picked GrowingGreat because I loved their hands on, grass roots approach to promoting healthy eating habits, and in particular the work they are doing with children by getting them involved with their own gardens.

It was also an extremely personal decision for Mary:

My three year old grandson has recently come to stay with me, and I was extremely concerned about the eating habits he had developed. He didn’t want anything even remotely healthy. Other than milk, he was pretty much living off of chips and sodas. But one day I discovered that he would eat cherry tomatoes. I came to find out that he had seen them growing in a garden, and red being his favorite color, decided that they would be good to eat. Is there any doubt why when offered a list of charities to support that GrowingGreat just jumped off the page? By the way, on Sunday my grandson and I picked a persimmon off a tree and it was a new word and a new eating adventure for him!

In addition to generously selecting GrowingGreat as her charity of choice, Mary has also allowed us to share her award-winning recipe with all of you. Cook away, and tell us what you think!

Mary Edwards’ Fan Favorite Salmon Pozole

Preparation Time: 15 minutes

Cook Time: 25 minutes

Instructions

• Place the stock, jalapeno, tomato and garlic in a sauce pan and bring up to a boil. Turn the heat to medium and simmer for 20 minutes.
• This is a good time to clean and prepare the vegetables.
• Pat the salmon dry and rub the top with the cumin. Divide the salmon into 4 equal pieces and broil it in a preheated oven for approximately 10 minutes per inch of thickness or until the top is slightly crispy and the inside is opaque.
• Pour the stock through a strainer into another sauce pan. Taste test for heat, and according to preference, either remove the jalapeno or lightly press it through the sieve along with the tomato and garlic into the stock. Bring up to a boil and add the lime juice and corn and simmer for 1-2 minutes.
• To serve, ladle the stock with the corn into a deep, wide soup bowl, place a piece of salmon into each bowl and serve with the vegetables to be sprinkled on top. Serve with warm corn tortillas, if desired.

Serves 4

Ingredients

• 1 32 oz. box low sodium seafood cooking stock
• 1 large jalapeno, quartered
• 1 medium sized ripe tomato, rough chopped
• 4 garlic cloves, peeled and coarsely sliced
• 12 ounce skinless salmon filet, trimmed and cleaned
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin
• 2 tablespoons fresh lime juice
• 2 cups sweet white corn
• 1/2– 1/3 cup cabbage, thinly sliced
• 2-3 radishes, thinly sliced
• 3 tablespoons fresh cilantro, stemmed and chopped
• 1 tablespoon green onion, thinly sliced
• 1/2 avocado, peeled and diced
• 4 corn tortillas, warmed (optional)

The Story Behind the Recipe

Having lived in Mexico I always enjoyed pozole – it’s like having soup & salad all rolled into one. For this dish I have substituted the pork with salmon, which is so high in Omega 3 fatty acids, and by using sweet white corn instead of canned hominy I have reduced the sodium. This dish is very flavorful, yet mild enough that the kids like to make salmon tacos out of it.

Thank you Mary! For all that you have done to inspire healthy eating in children and adults. Our GrowingGreat programs will blossom more fully because of you.

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WE WON!

We know your fingers must be tired from voting, but your tireless typing has paid off! Mary Edwards was voted the Aetna Healthy Food Fight Fan Favorite and GrowingGreat will be awarded a $10,000 grant to support our school garden and nutrition education programs. We could not have done it without your relentless support!

Could it get better than this?

Yes, yes it can! With YOUR help!

The Pipkin Family Foundation has generously agreed to provide a matching grant of up to $10,000 for additional individual donations! This means The Pipkin Family Foundation will match your contribution dollar for dollar, enabling GrowingGreat to raise another $20,000 for our programs! For example, a $100 donation from you, becomes $200 for GrowingGreat. GrowingGreat’s innovative classroom nutrition and school garden programs inspire kids to eat more fruits and veggies and increase their chances of living longer and healthier lives. With $30,000 we can expand to 15 new schools and reach 7,500 more students.

DONATE HERE

Wishing you a Happy and Healthy Holiday Season!

With gratitude,
The GrowingGreat Team

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I know you are anxiously awaiting to bite into our new site, but we are working behind the screens to launch a beautiful brand new one! We hope to launch in early January but in the meantime, here is a brief overview of who we are and what we do:

Our Mission

GrowingGreat is a nonprofit school garden and nutrition education organization dedicated to inspiring children and adults to adopt healthy eating habits. Our goal is to help children and families understand where our food comes from, appreciate that food serves a purpose in our overall health and has an impact on our longevity and well-being.

Our Philosophy

• Eat a wide variety of colorful, whole foods that are close to their original source.
• Choose higher quality, beneficial foods more often.
• Select local, seasonal, organic, and/or sustainably farmed foods when possible.
• Appreciate the impact of food on our overall well-being so that we can think, feel, and perform at our best all day long!

Our Impact

• GrowingGreat currently serves 16,000 students in Los Angeles County, operating in over  30 schools in 10 school districts.
• Our curriculum is also implemented in 3 schools in Marin City, CA, 5 schools in Ojai, 1 school in Las Vegas, NV and 12 schools in Oa’hu, HI.
• Sixty five percent of the elementary schools we serve are considered Title 1.

Our Programs

• We utilize three integrated programs (Classroom Nutrition, School Garden and Harvest of the Month) to create a collaborative school, home and community education model.
• All program elements and services share unified themes so knowledge and skill building are consistently and repeatedly reinforced across all populations served.
• Students receive up to twelve hours of instruction per year when participating in all three of our school programs. We train and manage over 200 volunteers a year to deliver our school and community programs.

Our Features

• Low Cost- Our programs are extremely cost effective and sustainable for any school.

• No Teacher Involvement- We train parent and community volunteers, as well as paid docents, to deliver our standards-based nutrition and garden curriculum.

• Adaptability For Any Environment- Our garden and nutrition lessons can be adapted to any environment regardless of space or resources.

• Standards-Based and Tied-to-Core Curriculum- All of our lessons are California standards-based and tied to the core curriculum of each grade level.

Our Audience

• Schools: We deliver interactive classroom nutrition lessons, school garden plantings, and farm-to school Harvest-of-the-Month tastings. All lessons are directly linked to California state content standards.

• Homes: Parent workshops and family activities encourage adults to model positive nutrition practices and support children in making healthy choices.

• Communities: We collaborate with local businesses, civic leaders, and other non-profit organizations to educate and inspire healthy lifestyles.

Want More Info?  Contact Us

Mailing Address: 2711 N. Sepulveda Blvd. #279 • Manhattan Beach, CA 90266

Email: info@growinggreat.org

Phone: 310.939.9216

Social Networks

Facebook: www.facebook.com/GrowingG

Twitter: @GrowingGreat

YouTube Channel: http://www.youtube.com/growinggreatvideos

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Trying a persimmon for the first time

The month of November brought with it cooler weather, the Thanksgiving Day holiday and GrowingGreat’s second nutrition lesson!  In lesson 2, students learned easy, hands-on information to become individual “Label Busters”.  Students were taught how to read labels and identify “red flags” which included added sugars, hydrogenated oils and artificial ingredients.  During the lesson, students used this knowledge to investigate two different snack bars to see which ingredient list lived up to its label’s claims of being “nutritious.”  The activity ended with one snack bar being ‘busted’ by our GrowingGreat label busting students! Students had the opportunity to taste a fresh persimmon slice and snack on a nutritious granola bar provided by our generous sponsors, Clif Kid and Arnett Farms.

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