Can I have thirds?

by Heide Zelmer, Garden Worker

One of my favorite programs this season was the ‘cold roll program’ we offered to the children at Rose Public School in the North Garden. It involves pea shoots which is a micro green you can grow in a cup on your window sill. We are teaching children from a young age that you can grow your own food, in your home – even if you do not have a garden or even a balcony!

Our pea shoot program is being taught to children as young as Junior/Senior Kindergarten. Everybody gets a paper cup that gets decorated with crayons, then filled with soil and pea shoot seeds and finally watered. The children will take this cup home and – keeping it moist and on a window sill – will harvest in a week the most tasty pea shoots which are not only delicious but super-healthy!

In the ‘cold roll program’ we immersed rice paper in warm water and then filled them with the pea shoots, tomatoes from our rooftop garden and cucamelons (a combination of melon and cucumber). The children loved it, and came back for seconds. For me the high point was one of the children asking us: Can I have thirds?