VISTA Gardens hosts Home School Families

VISTA Gardens
Mar 16
2 min read

Updated: Mar 17

Tiffany Miller, Urban Agriculture Specialist, Kitchen Wit Teaching Kitchen Homegrown Hillsborough Grant Partner, welcomed Home School Families to VISTA Gardens for A Garden-to-Kitchen Experience.

VISTA’s President, Jennifer G, joined Tiffany in greeting parents and children.

On this chilly January morning many parents brewed themselves a cup of tea, while their children enjoyed a healthy drink of mango and orange agua fresca with mint.

Our Chef and Sous Chef, Corey and Ammar, expertly set up the kitchen at the pavilion and made snack and lunch preparations.

The scavenger hunt led to seven birdhouses, where children identified the vegetable, fruit, or plant located near each!

This birdhouse was found at the Monarch Waystation Butterfly Garden. Others were found in the “Black Gold Mine” Compost area, Cut-flower Garden, Herb Garden, under a Loquat tree and among growing kale and tomato plants in vegetable gardens.

Chef Corey prepared nutritious snacks featuring Moroccan-Spiced Carrot Hummus.

Hummus with seasonal vegetables and artisan crackers

Roberta O and Ann W shared a story about gardening and growing food.

Families explored VISTA’s vegetable gardens.

Children gathered soil and planted carrot seeds with Ann W.

While some planted carrot seeds, others painted rocks. These planted carrot seeds and painted rocks were ready to take home to watch the carrots grow.

And there was harvesting. Children enjoyed pulling some carrots that another group of children had planted for them several months earlier.

And carrots were cooked for lunch!

Event organizer Tiffany and Chef Corey selected this carrot recipe to share with families and included nutrition facts and instructions about caring for and growing the carrots children planted at this event.

Barb M shared nutritional facts about carrots. These families can now tell you what gives carrots their colors! They know more about beneficial nutrients of carrots and eating them raw or cooked.

Jennifer G offered an introduction to composting, including a tour of VISTA’s “Black Gold Mine” composting operation. Some of the families saved and brought their foot scraps from home, added them to the intake bins and learned about how they will turn into an enriching soil amendment.