Mount Kisco Child Care Center’s Feed Me Fresh program is a year round garden to table nutrition program which offers a hands on approach to both cooking and growing food. Children at the center are involved with weekly cooking and gardening adventures.
This is the time of year when tomatoes are ripening faster than you can cook them. The kitchen at Mount Kisco Child Care Center was overwhelmed with buckets of tomatoes from local farms this week. What a perfect time for teachers and children to make a cool summer soup.
Each toddler, preschool and afterschool classroom receives the same ingredients and recipe for Gazpacho. But somehow, each classroom creates a unique result.
One toddler class pureed the soup into a tomato sauce by heating it up in an electric skillet and serving it over pasta. Another class served their gazpacho cool over pasta.
The remainder of the classes enjoyed their gazpacho as a refreshing soup.
While they were making the recipe, children harvested pepper and tomato seeds that we’ll save and plant next spring.
Playgrounds at the MKCCC have cucumbers, peppers, tomatoes, parsley and basil growing right now. Teachers and children are planting spinach and kale seeds this week for a fall harvest.
Feed Me Fresh Recipe: Gazpacho
Ingredients
1 cup tomato juice
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1/4 cup olive oil
2 large ripe tomatoes, chopped
1 cucumber, peeled, quartered
1 small onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, smashed
1 sweet green bell pepper, seeded and chopped
salt and pepper, to taste
Optional ingredients:
Add any of the following ingredients will give your gazpacho a twist!
basil leaves, fresh thyme and/ or oregano, cilantro, dill, chives
Procedure: Using the hand chopper, chop tomatoes, onion, cucumber and pepper into small, bite sized pieces. OR Blend in pulses with food processor or blender until desired consistency.
Add smashed garlic and liquid ingredients.
Stir or blend and add salt, pepper to taste.
NOTE: You can transform this soup into a tomato sauce by putting it into an electric skillet. Serve over pasta.
To enroll your child at MKCCC, or for additional information about the Feed Me Fresh Garden to Table nutrition program, please contact Dawn Meyerski at dmeyerski@mkccc.org or 914.241.2135 x241
