We know what the facts are: one in four Australian children is overweight or obese, and these children are likely to become obese adults. Our Kitchen Garden Program shows children and their families how to delight in, share and celebrate great food at school and consequently at home.

The program is the longest and most structured intervention children and families will participate in is the education system. Experiencing pleasurable food education means children will see it as equally important as everything else they learn, and gain more from their education than we could ever hope for. The program has so many benefits including opening up to children and their communities what they could do and what they have to offer the world in a way they had never drempt of.

Our Philosophy

Wherever you travel in the world, you will see people sharing a meal. More than just food, a meal is a platform for sharing stories and culture, of experiencing the lives of the people you seat yourself with. Restaurant culture separates us from the group at the next table, and finances separate some from the table entirely.

Lentil as Anything believes everyone deserves a place at the table.

HANDMADE is a book of recipes collected from 34 widows of the war in Sri Lanka.

The women featured are from the North East of the island and throughout the book their incredible stories of courage are shared through their relationship with food.

Stunning photography is combined with the recipes that gave these women hope to provide a better life for their children.

Commissioned by Australian based charity Palmera, 100% of all profits from the sales of HANDMADE will be reinvested in rural women entrepreneurs in Sri Lanka.

You can purchase a copy in store at our Abbotsford, Thornbury (Melbourne) and Newtown (Sydney) locations or through our online store.

Winter here for us in Hawthorn East it definitely means COLD!

• cold long stretches of ‘grey’ cloudy days 

• an average temperature hovering around the low to mid-teens

• occasional frosts –  fingers crossed so far we haven’t had any this winter! 

Our tips for what to grow in winter –

• When the soil is cold, roots take up minimal moisture and nutrients and growth slows right down.

• Most seeds will not germinate until the soil warms again in spring, and young seedlings may succumb to the cold before they have a chance to start growing.

• Mid year in mostly about harvesting the traditional winter crops while waiting for the weather to warm up in spring for the sowing and planting of summer vegetables

Many students are enjoying trying cumquat for the first time!

 Our winter vegetables that are growing well 

Cauliflower and rocket – 

Cauliflower and rocket

Cabbage  –

Pak Choy –

It’s hard to believe we’re already in March, we’ve had a wonderful program this term!

Our focus has been the importance of Food Safety and developing safe and responsible working skills in the Kitchen. We’ve had an impressive harvest to cook with this term, as you can see from the pictures below.

It has been so lovely to see our students develop their confidence in the Kitchen and swell with pride when they’re complimented by their peers and volunteers on the delicious dishes they’ve prepared! All our recipes are available at the end of each class & they can be downloaded from the RECIPE link on the Blog.

We’re so grateful to all those who have volunteered this term. Our program can not run smoothly without your assistance. If you or another family member would like to volunteer in your child’s Kitchen or Garden class and supervise a small group of students in hands-on learning, please follow the Sign.up link on our Blog.

Happy Cooking!

Science Broad Bean Life Cycle Experiment …. watch this space results and observations to come…..

Summer is a very colourful time in the kitchen garden with a huge amount to harvestof all the warm vegetables and herbs. Today we picked our first harvest of incredibly fresh, healthy, flavour filled tomatoes, cucumbers, basil, zucchini and corn form our garden. We can’t wait to cook and eat it all on Tuesday! Shabbat Shalom – 4B

The plants are  “shooting into the sky” as described by a Year 3 student. The artichoke flower is a clear favourite – looking at the photo you can tell why!!! Strawberries are a  plenty are being shared among all.

Students have fun “diving” into the broad bean plants to hunt for all the hidden beans. Sampling as they went was a must! Students also seed saved some of the beans to plant next winter. This process helps them understand the science of life cycles and impacts of weather for seed germination and seedling growth.

Photo above – 4A students displaying their brilliant team work As they turn the soil and add rock dust (crushed rock containing minerals and trace elements) to replenish nutrients in preparation for summer!

I would like to take this opportunity to thank our enthusiastic and dedicated volunteers the program would not succeed without you!!

Happy spring gardening,

Julie

Lots of tasty Winter/Spring vegetables to harvest from our Year 5 garden beds – broad beans from long tall stems and root vegetables such as parsnips! Yum ! 5A

Wednesday lunchtime we were very shocked to find 2 chickens running around the school oval!!!! We quickly rounded them up and started to investigate.

There was a big gap in the wire that they had dug up as it touched the ground. We found some big wood and boxes to block up the hole. Knowing this wasn’t going to hold up, we got some wire, a drill, hammer and clips to screw the wire to the wooden pole. We wanted to make sure we blocked the hole for good! We were really proud of each other as this was our first time using a hammer, screws and drill.

This wonderful Winter harvest from our school garden was put to great use in the Kitchen at the end of Term 2.

We made delicious Pumpkin Gnocchi, Potato and Rosemary Pizza, Broccoli and Herb Frittata, Roast Beetroot, Spinach and Fetta Salad and as an end of term treat, Chocolate Chip Cookies.

These recipes provided a great opportunity to incorporate Maths into our Kitchen lesson as students had to use their maths skills to calculate how to divide their Pizza & Frittata evenly amongst the number of students in their class, as you can see below.

As always, all recipes are available to download on the ‘Recipes’ link above.