Students favor local flavor

ST. LIBORY, Neb. — Joyce Rice kept count as she piled cantaloupes into the school van.

“We're half there, guys,” she called, setting No. 20 in place.

Minutes before, Broderick Helgoth of Helgoth's Roadside Market had wheeled in a loader carrying two boxes, each holding 150 fresh-picked melons.

Minutes later, the van was loaded and Rice signed her tab for 40 cantaloupes, 30 watermelons and a box each of tomatoes, cucumbers and green peppers. She pulled out for the 25-mile drive to her kitchen at Central City Middle School, where she planned to serve the produce to students over the coming week.

“The kids'll eat wonderful,” said Rice, food service manager for Central City Public Schools.

Admittedly, it's a bit unusual for a lunch lady to go directly to the fields to purchase produce. She is part of a national movement to put more fresh, locally grown produce on school lunch trays.

Local products are seen as more nutritious because they can get from field to table quicker, with less time to lose nutrients. Less fuel typically is used in transporting them, and local markets mean opportunities for area farmers.

“It's definitely a growing trend,” said Alexis Steines, a spokeswoman for the School Nutrition Association, which represents school nutrition professionals.

The nutrition association's recent survey indicated that 34 percent of schools nationally are bringing in locally sourced foods. That includes schools that use them every day and those that do so occasionally. An additional 22 percent aren't yet but are trying to figure out how to do it.

In Nebraska, there's no count of how many schools are using locally produced fruits, vegetables, meats and eggs.

A task force is wrapping up work on a study, authorized by a legislative resolution last session, to find ways to connect schools and farms.

“There's so much in the news about health — obesity, juvenile diabetes — that I think the public is really ready to look at how we eat and our local food economy,” said State Sen. Annette Dubas of Fullerton, who sponsored the resolution.

That's not to say that getting more local foods into schools is a piece of, er, watermelon.

There are plenty of hurdles, including cost. The region's prime growing season does not coincide with the school year, and many schools lack staff and equipment to peel and chop fresh produce.

Edith Zumwalt, director of nutrition services for the Lincoln Public Schools, said she has never been approached by a local producer who can supply the quantities she needs. The district serves 28,000 meals a day at 60 sites.

Consistency is another concern. Apples, for example, need to be a certain size to meet federal serving size regulations.

The district buys from five distributors. Zumwalt has told her produce supplier that she likes Nebraska produce, and the district has gotten a lot of locally grown cantaloupe and watermelon.

But suppliers must find farmers they feel comfortable with and make sure that growing and handling practices meet various food safety guidelines.

“It's not just as simple as raise it, pick it and serve it,” Zumwalt said. “I wish it was.”

Nonetheless, Zumwalt, who serves on the state task force, said she thinks such hurdles will be overcome. “It's an area that's definitely going to grow.”

Nationally and locally, a number of groups are working to make that happen.

“The overall goal for us really is to be able to come to the point where farm-to-school is somewhat easy to institutionalize,” said Marion Kalb, co-director of the National Farm to School Network. “Over the years, it's become more popular. Ultimately, we would like it to be the norm, not the exception.”

One of the network's regional leaders for Western states, for example, recently got a call from an architect who was designing a new school. He wanted to make sure it was farm-to-school friendly, with a kitchen equipped for food preparation and appropriate storage and cooling facilities.

Slow Foods USA, a group that promotes the use of all-natural, fresh ingredients, recently launched a “Time for Lunch” campaign to raise awareness about the issue. It held eat-ins across the country over the Labor Day weekend, including several in Nebraska and Iowa.

Pam Edwards, a legislative task force member and the assistant director of university dining services at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, advised starting programs with baby steps.

The university has been offering its Good, Fresh, Local program since 2005. Special meals prepared with local foods are offered once a month in two dining halls, and different locally produced items — pasture-raised ground beef for lasagna, eggs for various dishes — are mixed in on a daily basis. She gets some local products from distributors and buys others directly from producers. Some items are more expensive, she said, but she budgets them in.

The special meals always draw more students than the usual meals. At Cather Dining Center, a regular dinner might draw 600. On local nights, the count can top 800 students.

“The important thing is it tastes good, and when it tastes good, they eat it,” Edwards said, who is working with a professor on a checklist for producers on good agricultural practices.

Rice, who also serves on the task force, started buying locally six years ago because she wanted to support local growers. She likes knowing where the produce comes from and how it's grown. Local growers' children attend the schools, and they pay taxes that support them.

On the day she picked up her produce, Helgoth's already had delivered melons to Grand Island, Wood River and Centura schools.

“I'm a farm wife,” Rice said, “and I want people to buy my products.”

Becky DeBoer, who works in the kitchen and has two children in Central City schools, said kids love the watermelon and cantaloupe.

“My kids don't really eat canned fruit, so this way they get their fruit,” she said.

Rice tracked what students ate for six weeks during the 2008-09 school year when she bought local produce and for six weeks when she bought from distributors and local stores.

Students ate nearly 200 percent more fruits and vegetables when she was buying locally, and the produce cost less. Her kitchen serves the middle school, elementary school and a preschool, about 500 students.

After she picks up her produce, students start getting it within 24 hours.

“I can see the benefits,” she said. “The students are eating more healthy.”

Contact the writer:

444-1223, julie.anderson@owh.com

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