St. Louis-area school district plans to serve locally grown lunch sides

ST. LOUIS -- A St. Louis-area school district plans to replace some lunch side items with locally grown food this year.

The buzzword at Maplewood Richmond Heights is "locavore," someone who eats locally grown or purchased food.

The district's lunch rooms will still offer burgers and pizza, but many of the side dishes will now be made from produce grown by local farmers.

It's a joint program with St. Louis University's nutrition and dietetics department. Several high school students interned at the university this summer.

The program's goal is to replace some processed and canned ingredients with healthy, locally grown food.

Some recipes will be developed by students.

"I learned that there's a whole lot of work that's put into farming," said Marissa Robinson, a student who interned in the program.

College students and interns from the nutrition program will prepare the lunch items in the kitchen. About 750 meals a day will be delievered to the district.

"The goal is to have 20 percent of the food served in the district from local farmers within the next three years," said Mildred Mattfeldt-Beman, chair of university's nutrition and dietetics department.

Mattfeldt-Beman said another goal of the program is to making sure farmers get a fair price for produce.

"It has to be real-world in terms of the schools' budgets, and the farmers have to get a fair price," she said. "Right now, we're trying to get them the same price they'd get from a broker, but without actually using a broker."

The program will likely buy farmers' seconds, which are less appealing looking, but still fine for cooking.

"We can use the things the farmer can't easily sell at the market," Mattfeldt-Beman said. "We can easily find good uses for cracked and bruised tomatoes or for apples that are too small."