Verde Valley School’s “Earth Week Extravaganza” concluded with a community dinner prepared with almost exclusively locally-grown food.

Members of the S.E.E.D. (Students Engaged in Environmental Development) committee helped prepare the meal that included beef stew, vegetarian stew, focaccia made with mesquite flour, a frittata using eggs from VVS’s hens, and a fresh salad with vegetables grown in the school’s experimental garden.

With a short skit at dinner, they also demonstrated how to reuse, reduce, and recycle.

Food Services Director Patti Marrs explained that VVS has made significant progress in reducing our environmental impact in several ways. Patti has changed the number of truck deliveries to the school from five a week to one. She also buys food items that are in season whenever possible. Locally-grown food has fewer miles to travel to reach us, thus less fuel is used and fewer (or no) pesticides or chemicals are needed to keep it fresh.

VVS has celebrated Earth Week with a locally-grown meal every year for the past four years. This year, however, much more of our everyday meals include locally-grown food items.