Cooking Competition Helps School Lunch Programs

Emily Daun's Junior Project- Cookin' it Fresh

My project is focused on the Oshkosh community, educating them about locally grown food by hosting a cooking competition and supporting the farm-to-school program. According to greensproduce.com, “foods that are purchased at a local farmers market spend less time being shipped and retain more nutritional value.” This helps illustrate the health benefit of locally grown foods and how eating local foods can improve your health. The Winnebago County 2014 Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS) showed that 10% of high school students did not eat any vegetables, other than potatoes, during the past seven days, compared to 6.6% nationally. Only 8.8% reported eating vegetables three or more times per day during the past seven days compared to 15.7% nationally. My project will create opportunities for the Oshkosh community to eat more local and healthier foods. 

Although my project is only targeting the Oshkosh community it is a great way to spread awareness about the locally grown foods. As I said earlier, I am raising awareness by hosting a cooking competition.  I think this will help raise awareness because students from all over the Oshkosh community will realize how delicious and healthy locally grown foods really are, and it will get people talking about not only my project, but the benefits of locally grown foods.  My event will be taking place on Sunday, April 19th at Oshkosh North High School and will open up to the Oshkosh community at 3:30. There will be 6 student teams, 3 from North and 3 from West. Each team will consist of 6-8 students per team along with a local chef, UWO alumni and also a UWO student.