Thanksgiving Harvest on the Farm

In the spirit of the first Thanksgiving, when the pilgrims celebrated their harvest, Waikiki School students and families gathered for an afternoon of harvesting and enjoying a lovely meal together. On our gathering walk we found ripe mulberries, lemons, limes, tangerines, nasturtiums, chocolate bell peppers, mint, eggplant, kale, basil, and grapefruit. Our families turned the fresh harvest into a meal: green salad with tomatoes, nasturtiums, peppers, mulberries and lime vinagrette, kale smoothies, basil pesto pasta, wok-fried eggplant followed by fresh grapefruit and mulberries for dessert. Mahalo to all for a delicious meal!! Everyone went home with a basket of fresh fruits and veggies too!






Our dishwashing friends:

Make a Difference Day

Thank you to Hope Chapels for making a difference at our school! Over 200 volunteer church-goers and high school students from MidPac's Christian Club came out to our school to spruce up our campus. Volunteers weedwacked, trimmed, weeded, raked and hauled off an incredible amount of green waste, mostly from our fruit tree orchard. It was the hardest working crew seen on campus!

CFL exchange a success!!

Project Green and Waikiki School exchanged 3000 CFL's for inefficient bulbs during the month of October. For our energy consciousness, families not only will save on their electrical bill but our school earned $1200! Thank you to Blue Planet Foundation for providing the CFL's.

Students fight over kale snack

Waikiki students harvested kale and eggplant from the school garden. Then they cooked it using the power of the sun! When it was time to eat, they couldn't get enough.

3rd graders make bokashi

what's bokashi you ask? It's a mix of good bacteria and yeast that can be used in composting all kinds of food waste. this stuff works on meats, dairy, pasta, eggs-you name it! we used it, of course, for dealing with our school lunch waste. which brings up another question- why is their lunch waste at school's? we will have to get back to that.

anyway, the process is as follows:

day 1: prepare bokashi by mixing together mill run, molasses, and effective microorganisms (EM)-store in airtight containers
day 14: spread bokashi to dry in the sun for long term storage
day 15: use your bokashi to mix with food waste....

Hula Grill working in the garden

On May 20 and 21st, volunteers from Hula Grill joined Waikiki students to tend the gardens and fruit trees!

Waikiki Food Farm partners with Hula Grill

Hula Grill restaurant of Waikiki has partnered with Waikiki School to support the Food Farm and lunch salad bar program. For their spring menu special they generously donated $1 from each meal resulting in a $3000 donation! In addition, employees joined Waikiki students for 2 days of gardening and hard work.

thank you Hula Grill for supporting school gardens!

Fourth graders make kim chee using fresh school grown veggies

Fourth grade students wanted to grow a kim chee garden. They planned, planted seeds, and nurtured their won bok plants. When it was time to harvest they researched recipes and decided as a group how they would make theirs. They harvested their produce, washed it, chopped it, added ingredients and recorded the amounts and their observations. The result: delicious! After one week of sitting in a pickling jar, the kim chee was tasted. Students also prepared a batch of brown rice to go with it, using their new kitchen cart.

What's next: pickling cucumbers over the summer!

Zero lunch waste success- April 20, 2011

In celebration of Earth Day this year, Waikiki School students were treated to a special waste-free lunch. Each student was given a cloth napkin (donated by Doubletree hotels) and a metal reusable fork. Students were served lunch on a compostable tray (someday we will have actual plates) and all food waste was treated with bokashi and eventually buried in the school gardens. The lunch trays were soaked, torn into pieces and are currently breaking down in the school's compost piles.

The event was initiated by the school's lunchtime Earth Warriors club. The club collected and monitored waste from lunch and were shocked by what they saw.

In addition, students engaged in fun activities including an exercise station, story time, napkin and herb tying, writing messages on styrofoam trays and building a house of one day's worth of lunch waste.

'AINA IS garden party Wed, April 20th, 1:30-3:30pm

Please join Waikiki students to put the 'AINA garden beds to sleep for the summer!

Salad Bar to launch April 13th!!

Green Smoothie Recipe Contest

The after school garden club has been at it again, this time making their famous and delicious green smoothies. The students have had 2 weeks to test out their favorite ideas and will now create their final masterpieces. The rules: must contain green vegetables from the school gardens, will be judged on taste, consistency, presentation and nutritional value.

The basic green smoothie recipe:

fill blender with mixed fresh greens (swiss chard, lettuce, beet greens, spinach, kale, herbs)
add ice, mint leaves, frozen banana and water if needed to make smooth.

Harvesting cassava

Thanks to Mr. Aisea, a native of Tonga and a wonderful community partner, 4th graders harvested 50 lbs of cassava (often known as tapioca). Cassava is a staple food for much of the world but is relatively unknown in Hawaii. The plant grows easily in poor soil and has been growing on our campus for more than a year. The students are expanding the cassava growing area by covering the weedy grass with mulch in preparation for new plantings.

Favorite student recipes:

cassava chips (slice cassava very thing and deep fry in canola oil, add pepper flakes, spiced paprika or popcorn spices for flavoring)
cassava fries (baked with oil and salt or fried)
mashed cassava (boil cassava until very soft and mash like potatoes, add salt to taste)