Thanks Bi-Rite!

Wow. What a day we had, at our first annual Bi-Rite/Nextcourse Community Day. We are SO grateful to Sam Mogannam, owner, and genius behind, Bi-Rite market. One of his own customers insisted today - Sam should be Mayor!

Indeed, Sam welcomed our dedicated Nextcourse board members into the store a few months ago, to plan and plot for this day, which celebrated the nutrition, cooking, and food systems work we do in nearby Mission High School, in conjunction with Pie Ranch.

Early today, our Mission High students started rolling in, dawning “Eat Ur Veggies” tee-shirts, designed by our own Midget Beltran.  They got to work chopping produce, seasoning salsa, and scooping up Bi-Rite Creamery ice-cream tastings, to lure people into our “Advice Cream” mini nutrition consultations.

It was exciting to watch the co-mingling of our students, the Bi-Rite staff, and the members of the vibrant Mission community, around this healthy food. Sam shared his expert knife skills with one of our young chefs. Passers-by stopped to ask and give tips for, preparing their favorite produce. Even one of our Women’s Reentry Center students, came with her children, to join the food festivities. It seemed everyone was off to a BBQ, on this hot day.

At day’s end, we drew a raffle winner. One lucky entrant took home a basket of Bi-Rite goodies, and a copy of the SoupsOn! cookbook. Along with this gift basket, the divine ice cream, and baskets of fresh strawberries Bi-Rite generously donated for this day, they also gave 5% of today’s food sales, to Nextcourse.

People were asking - when can we do this again!? Hopefully soon.  Thanks to everyone, our board members, our students and the entire Bi-Rite/Mission community, for supporting healthy food!

Google, You Owe Us!

For three years, we’ve been unbelievably lucky to have Rania Long - a chef, educator, dear friend, and remarkable human being - working with us at Nextcourse. This month, she will depart for an incredible opportunity to be the vegetarian chef in the kitchen of Google’s new SF office.

The staff and students of NC, Pie Ranch and Mission High School are already feeling the loss of her boundless enthusiasm, passion, and love for healthy food, learning and people.

She leaves us with some pretty big kitchen clogs to fill, but we know she’ll thrive in her new endeavor!

Easter Meatloaf and Chicken Soup

While some families gathered to share Easter dinner, we were invited into the home of one of our Mission High students to prepare a secular Sunday feast.

We’ve been wanting to connect with our students’ families, to spread our healthy food message beyond the high school walls. One willing parent, Leah Smith approached us at Parent’s Night this winter; she assured us she could corral a group of her daughter, Cory’s friends to join us for a cooking lesson. Indeed, Cory and her friends helped plan and execute an eclectic menu of a chicken noodle soup, meatloaf, and profiteroles with homemade pate a choux and chocolate sauce.

Feeding Future Environmentalists

Last Saturday, Nextcourse partnered with Crissy Field to feed 150 young adults at Eco Career Day - where youth gather to find out what’s available in the environmental work arena. Have a look:

Now this was a kind of catered lunch I NEVER saw growing up in the 1970’s Midwest. These kids ate homemade lasagna with sauteed organic veggies.  Add to that, deluxe salads, prepared by the students themselves, filled with every imaginable (and unimaginable) veggie, fruit and legume. The kids outdid one another, tossing greens with frisee, shredded beets, sliced radishes, blanched tri-colored cauliflower and garbanzo beans…

An assortment of citrus rounded out the meal.  All of which, fueled the students as they consulted with educators, activists, builders and scientists, to find out how they might turn their own concerns for the environment, into a career.

What does Pie have to do with good health?

Last week, we took a new group of Mission High students to Pie Ranch to see what was being sown. These students, mostly new to this country from Panama, China, and El Salvador, got to experience first hand, a source for the kinds of foods we’ve been talking about in our 4-week classes – nutrient rich whole foods, locally grown.

I can cook! I can cook!

This, “I can cook, I can cook!” from a student who, 90 minutes prior, was insisting she cannot cook. Oh yeah?

Here, cut this stinky onion, heat a little oil in a pan, and throw that onion in the hot pan. Now watch the golden color come out of that onion. You are witnessing “caramelization,” the sweetening of a savory food. Now salt and pepper a chicken thigh (yes trust me, a thigh. it’s cheaper than a breast and has WAY more flavor), and throw it in the same pan. That hisssssss, lets you know there’s some good searing going on. You’re locking in the flavor. Now put this tender little chicken on a bed of your sweet onions and say it, “I can cook. I can cook!”

We’re Reaching the Parents too!

Recently, we snuck into Parent’s Night and were amazed to see so many Mission High parents in attendance. Parents are busy, so we salute those who show up to support their kids. I was SO honored when a man approached me, grinning and taking my hands in his, “My daughter says you are great teachers!” Wow, I assumed she must be a long-time student of ours. Nope, his daughter is Gloria, who had taken only one of our classes before Parent’s Night.

We’re pleased to know we can make such an impact in such a short amount of time. What’s our secret? The not too boring nutrition lessons? Maybe. Delicious healthy food the kids learn to prepare themselves? Absolutely.

Special thanks to our return students and Peer Leaders, who helped prepare food for Parents’ Night. I set them up with cutting boards and ingredients, then had to run around finding buttermilk for our Healthy Ranch Dressing. When I returned, 20 minutes later, all the veggies were sliced, the dips were made, and the kids were in final stages of seasoning the Ranch. We’re turning out some stellar prep cooks!

Fruits and Veggies go Back to School!

(Rania authors) This school year we want to reach more students and parents in the Misson High community. To this end, we recently joined “Back to School Night”.

Who needs a kitchen to cook?

Cheese quesadillas, spicy catfish, corn bread pancakes…were all coming out of our makeshift kitchen at the Women’s Reentry Center this summer. We’re tailoring our cooking and nutrition classes to meet the needs of young women who are piecing their lives back together following incarceration. Many of our students are in transition without use of a full kitchen. We say, who needs one? We’re working off one burner, preparing delicious healthy, affordable food.

Gym Class Raid

Mission High gym class students didn’t know what hit last week, when they showed up to find us setting up carrot picking, potato peeling, juice squeezing, bread crumbling and banana relay stations.