(above) Alice Waters presenting senior girls with 20 various fruit trees for our new orchard
The Avoyelles Public Charter School celebrated its 10th anniversary on a fun filled spring day that started formally with speeches and dignitaries and ended with a garden food festival filled with music and dancing.
Internationally famous chef & Slow Food Vice-President, Alice Waters, and Mansura native, nationally award winning Atlanta chef Joe Truex gave speeches and commended the school for starting an Edible Schoolyard, pioneered by Waters almost 20 years ago in Berkeley, California.
In true Avoyelles Parish style, the students, officials and guests moved from the formal courtyard to the APCS Edible Schoolyard for a feast of local foods prepared by volunteers from Avoyelles and surrounding Parishes, and Cajun music compliments of Gerard Dupuy and student fiddlers, washboard and guitar players.
Local foods served were Panaroma Foods' crawfish bread, Chef Trent Bonnette's spinach salad, cracklins & boudin by Gerald Wayne Lemoine, crawfish etoufee' by Bernard's Seafood, cochon-de-lait by Kelone's, squirrel fricasse by Nathan Gaspard, Maison Louisiane's bbq shrimp & grits, Wes-Mar farms' goat cheese & milk, sweet potato ice cream by Chef Emily Kay Lemoine, seafood gumbo by Glenn Goudeau, homemade ice cream by Amy Thevis & Keith Dupuy of the Rural Life Museum, Camelot Honey gave away samples, & fried catfish by Rodney Rabalais.
Mansura native, Chef Joe Truex put on a cooking demonstration teaching interested students how to prepare and eat greens picked fresh directly from their new organic garden. Chef Alice Waters, visited with the students, autographed books, and commented that her experience with the staff and children was truly magical. But the best comment of the day from a young girl who, after tasting the crab & corn bisque prepared by Jonathon Knoll of Fresh Catch Bistreaux, looked up, smiled and said
“Boy, I really like my school!”
(top photo) Award-winning Atlanta chef & Mansura native, Joe Truex, cooks organic greens from the APCS Edible Schoolyard for teachers Melanee Trimble, Dana Nichols and students.
(above) The International Vice-President of Slow Food, chef Alice Waters, with Paige Rabalais & Polly Boersig, garden coordinators and officers of Slow Food Avoyelles.
on the web:
Alice Waters ~ http://www.chezpanisse.com/
Joe Truex ~ http://www.repastrestaurant.com/
Slow Food ~ http://www.slowfoodusa.com/
Slow Food Avoyelles ~ www.marksvillefarmersmarket.com
festival participants:
local goat farm ~ http://www.wesmarfarms.com/
http://www.maisonlouisianecatering.com/
LSU Rural Life Museum ~ http://appl027.lsu.edu/rlm/rurallifeweb.nsf/index
