This year we’re thrilled to be celebrating our 15th Anniversary. We've gone from one class fifteen years ago, to hosting nutrition and cooking classes in seven different counties throughout the Bay Area and are teaching 1000+ at-risk children per year. We're excited to be envisioning all the change we can forge in the next fifteen years, and we hope you'll help us.
Our 15th anniversary celebration, held in Mill Valley on December 4th, was both a joyful and educational event, and it was wonderful to chat with old friends and to make new ones. There was scrumptious, healthy food, prepared by our very own junior chefs, and kindly supervised by our instructor, Michelle Bryant.
Jurnee Louder from Children Now, gave us some hard facts around food inequity in the Bay Area. Children of color in under-resourced communities are the worst affected and the solution, of course, is to invest in them in order to help them have health outcomes equal to kids from wealthier neighborhoods.
YOUR donation will go straight into our classrooms, to help change lives for the better and every gift is significant. THANK YOU! On behalf of everyone at Kids Cooking for Life, we wish you a healthy and joy-filled holiday season.
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Warm wishes,
Lara Rajninger
Executive Director
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Expert Tips for Picky Eaters |
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Do you wonder why so many kids say “I hate vegetables,” or are so reluctant to try different foods? Last month food scientist, Anna Leachman, gave a talk to our instructors about How Sensory Experiences Influence Liking, in order to help them understand some of our pickier students. Anna has a masters in food science from UC Davis and over 10 years of experience applying her knowledge of sensory and consumer science for companies such as Dragonfly SCI, Amy's Kitchen, PepsiCo and Unilever. Not only are we delighted to announce that she's joining us as a grant writer but also to share her insights on picky eaters.
Firstly, children have a heightened sensory ability and a stronger bitter receptor than adults, so foods taste stronger to them. They are often afraid of unfamiliar foods, but are unable to articulate this. Their past negative experiences with a food will lead them to expect future experiences to be negative as well. Our goal is to create positive experiences for that child which will enable them to adjust their expectations, leading to acceptance of that food. This can be achieved through positive modeling and exposure. Using tactics to tap into the child's analytical mind instead of their judgemental mind decreases fear and rejection and increases likelihood of trying the food.
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Host a Family Cooking Event at Your School |
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We were delighted to hold a cooking class that emphasized bonding through cooking at Garfield School in Menlo Park this month. We hosted 15 families with children from 3rd to 6th grade. Over 40 people attended this fun and informative event, which provided a perfect opportunity not only for family bonding but community bonding too. The families at Garfield requested Asian dishes as their predominantly hispanic families appreciate multicultural exposure and new experiences with ingredients such as tofu, curries, lentils, and bok choy. Mukta Gadkari instructed, with help from some volunteer assistants, and we made seasoned basmati rice, tofu tikka masala, raita sauce, and red lentil dal.
If you’d like us to hold a similar event at your school, please do get in touch. We’re flexible about recipes and are happy to tailor them to your needs and interests.
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We want to extend an enormous THANK YOU to Gabe Burczyk, Founder and CEO of WrapManager, a financial planning and wealth management firm in Mill Valley, for allowing us to use their wonderful business premises with onsite kitchen and fun party lighting for our 15th anniversary celebration.
In Gabe’s words, “We partner with nonprofits to further advance their causes and to invest in our community. We deeply care about our nonprofits and are honored to support Kids Cooking For Life’s Friendraiser.”
Thank you Gabe for your generosity and for being part of the solution.
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Meet Our Instructor - Mukta Gadkari |
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Mukta Gadkari is a holistic nutritionist, mindful eating coach, nutrition educator, recipe creator and the owner of Mukta's Nutrition Kitchen. Through 1:1 nutrition coaching, classes and corporate wellness workshops, she supports her clients with gut and digestive health, blood-sugar balance and slowing down. Mukta studied at Bauman College: Culinary Chef School & Holistic Nutrition and The Center for Mindful Eating and is currently Board Certified with the Holistic Nutrition Credentialing Board.
Having grown up in five countries and inspired by her parents' enthusiasm for cooking diverse cuisines, Mukta taught herself to cook in college by playing with recipes and ingredients. She believes cooking is a lifelong skill that gives you the power to nourish yourself and she is passionate about empowering kids to develop their own creativity and confidence in the kitchen early in life.
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THANK YOU to Our Volunteers...
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We have many generous volunteers who work incredibly hard and in many varied ways behind the scenes to further our mission. They perform tasks ranging from classroom assisting to e-book and video creation, helping out at events and assisting with social media. Pictured with our Executive Director, Lara Rajninger, right.
are Bethany, Alex, Nylmar and Mason, all students from the Institute for Leadership Studies at the Andrew P. Barowsky School of Business, at Dominican University who coordinated our holiday Givebutter and mailing campaign.
We'd like to say a heartfelt THANK YOU to each and every one of our many wonderful volunteers. We know your time is precious. You are helping to forge vital change and to make our mission easier and more effective and we're just so grateful that you chose to give that time to us.
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Make Fluffy Pumpkin Pancakes With Apple Compote |
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The only sugar in this recipe is from apples, apple juice, raisins and pumpkin puree. Flavored with cinnamon and vanilla, this healthy pile of pancakes provides a delicious breakfast any time of the day, week, month or year, but goes down especially well during the holiday season! |
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“I love this class, because cooking is my favorite thing to do!”
Compliments from one of our elementary school Junior Chefs.
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