For Food Service Directors
VT FEED helps school food service directors and staff to make connections with farmers and create farming contracts for local food purchases, helps to improve skills and kitchen facilities to accommodate local foods, and advocates on behalf of food service by helping other to understand the school food service environment. School food service directors are working with students on taste testing local foods and new recipes.- VT FEED worked with 45 new schools over the past two years, successfully providing students with seasonal and local foods from Vermont farmers.
- More than 100 school food service staff members attended workshops and institutes where VT FEED provided hands-on experiences to develop skills in processing and preparing meals using fresh local foods.
- The 3rd Annual Junior Iron Chef VT for 2010 was a great success. Check out the stories and pictures
- VT FEED held farmer forums where farmers and food service directors created working relationships around product the schools could use.
Other food services resources and links
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The Institute of Integrative Nutrition (IIN) based in New York City, is offering a distance learning program and ten scholarships for food service directors. Check out their website for more information: www.intergrativenutrition.com
- Download VT FEED Needs Assessment Form
- Download VT FEED Farm to School Technical Assistance Application
- Wellness Policy VT Guidelines (pdf 136kb)
- Massachusetts Farm to School Cookbook
- Center for Ecoliteracy--Rethinking School Lunch
- National Farm to School Food Service Resources
- USDA Commodity update
- VT FEED Taste Test Guide (2005) - A great way to involve students, teachers, and the community in food service and awareness of healthy food choices.
- VT FEED’s Primer on How We Feed Vermont’s School Children: An Insiders Guide to Vermont School Meals and How To Improve Them (2006) [PDF]
- USDA Farm to School Cafeteria Initiatives
- Best Practices for School Meals
from The Vermont Campaign to End Childhood Hunger - State School Foods Report Card 2007
School Recipes
Healthy Snacks! 15 Different Healthy Snack Recipes
Shared by Growing Farms/Growing Minds
Shelburne Farms
Apple Yogurt Smoothie
Shared by Jill Goodroe of The New England Dairy and Food Council
http://www.newenglanddairycouncil.org/
“Breakfast and lunch at school offer amazing opportunities to expose children to the world of foods, and to teach ... lessons that may be life changing.”