BATH
In Bath, sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders are learning how to use knives and first-graders are eating “squishy” foods. And they owe it all to Healthy Maine Partnerships.
SNAP-Ed, an education program funded through a grant by the U.S. Department ofAgriculture and implemented by the University of New England, is “an effort to help people shop, cook a

nd eat healthier, while adhering to a limited budget.” 
While much of the emphasis is intended to educate adults, some of those efforts are geared toward youth in schools that have at least 50 percent of its students qualifying for free or reduced lunch.
According to p

romotional literature, the mission of the three-year-old SNAP-Ed program is to “improve the likelihood that persons eligible for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) will make healthy food choices within a limited budget, and choose physically active lifestyles consistent with the current Dietary Guidelines for Americans and the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Guidance.” 
UNE has partnered with dozens of Healthy Maine Partnerships throughout the state to offer a variety of programs for all ages. ACCESS Health is the Healthy Maine Partnership serving Sagadahoc County, Brunswick and Harpswell. 

Teens in the kitchen

At Bath Middle School, students have an opportunity to take “Cooking Matters for Teens” after school for six weeks.
Two students, Abbie Baker and Molly Cashman, both took part in the program last year. Cashman so enjoyed it the first time as a sixth-grader that she signed up for the class again this year.
Both girls say they’ve been able to put what they learned in class to good use at home, and have been able to make meals from their class-issued cookbook.
Baker, 14, tries to cook for the family every week or two at home. Her favorite meal to make is vegetable pizza. 
“They really like it,” she said. “I’ve made it a few times.” Cashman is now also able to cook for her family, trying several meals from her Cooking Matters cookbook. Recently, the seventh-grader discussed the program at her West Bath home as she cooked turkey chili with vegetables for the family.
“The first and second class you did knife skills, so that you don’t cut yourself a

nd you learned how to properly hold a knife when you’re cutting stuff,” Cashman said. “And each week you did a lesson on health. One of them we did a fast food lesson where you took Crisco and each tablespoon of trans fat was a tablespoon of Crisco and you added it up on a bun so you could see how many calories and how gross it was you were eating.”
That was an eye-opening lesson for Baker, as well. 
“I never knew how much fat was in fast food,” Baker said. She liked fast food “a little” before the class, “but I don’t usually eat it anymore after learning that.” 
“I like to make food at home,” Baker said. While she cooked “a little bit” before, “I wasn’t sure on how to cook properly, so I thought this would help me learn a little better. And it did.”
For Baker, cooking “properly” refers to learning how to mix ingredients and how to read a recipe. “It was confusing at first, but I learned how to do it.” 
Each week students made a healthy recipe. The first weeks were vegetable pizzas and fruit smoothies, respectively. 
“By the last class you got to create anything you wanted, as long as you added healthy habits to it,” Cashman explained. The class chose to make a healthier version of Fettuccini Alfredo, but “we put fat-free milk in instead and we put cream cheese (instead of butter) as substitutes so it was a little healthier.”
Cashman said she will sometimes adjust a recipe at home to make it healthier. 
At the end of each class, students were given a bag of the ingredients they used to create the meal so that they could re-create it at home for their families.
It’s all about learning how to make good choices, not necessarily starting everything from scratch. Cashman explained that they would use refrigerated pizza dough rather that making the dough themselves. She agreed being able to use some healthier pre-made items made learning to cook a little less intimidating.
Cashman noted that she enjoys baking as well, so the knife skills are particular handy for her as she often finds herself “cutting raspberries and cutting strawberries with the same techniques that you learned.”
“I like how no matter what we made, we all had to try it. And even though” it didn’t appeal to us “at first, everyone seemed to like it after,” Baker said. “So trying new things was something we did.”
She would recommend the class to others. 
“We got to learn something everyday. And then we got to cook … try it out, and bring some groceries home,” Baker said. “So it was a win-win deal.” 
Cashman recalled the second-to-last class was a field trip to Shaw’s, where students could read labels and determined sugar content, for example. One exercise had students comparing their favorite cereals with healthier options that might not have packaging that was as appealing.
Overall, “it’s an amazing program,” said Cashman’s mother, Debb. “They send the ingredients home that day and she made some of the things for dinner, like the turkey tacos.”
While Molly Cashman doesn’t get to cook and plan meals as much as she might like to, she isn’t shy about cooking when the opportunity arrives. She even will let her younger sisters, Colleen, 11, and Fionna “Coco,” 9, help if they want to. 
After completing “Cooking Matters for Teens,” Cashman seemed confident that she could plan a week’s worth of healthy meals. 
“I think I could,” she said. “Using my cookbook especially, I think I could.”
“I don’t let her (make dinner) as much as I should, but every time she does, she shows that she’s quite capable,” said Debb Cashman, adding that her daughter is able to help with a lot of food prep and browning meat on the stove, for example.
“The first time she came home and made one of the meals, I was like, ‘Wow, you’re much more advanced than I thought you were,’” the West Bath mom said.  

Trying new things

At Dike-Newell School, all first-graders can take part in the monthly Pick a Better Snack program because the school itself qualifies. In 2012-13, more than 64 percent of students were eligible for free or reduced lunch.
“The thing about the SNAP-Ed program is that the goal is to educate the community and our students in the community as a whole, so the focus isn’t whether you’re free or reduced lunch or not,” said Jennah Godo, a school health specialist with ACCESS Health. “Our purpose and our goal is to educate people about nutrition and making healthy choices now and for the long-run for better health.”
And that education includes exposing children to a variety of fruits and vegetables.
Each month, children have an opportunity to try a food, such as cantaloupe, sweet potato or asparagus, and learn about the food family, and why fruits and vegetables are important to overall health. A packet of information might include a game, such as Food Bingo in January, as well as information to share with parents. 
“Every month we focus on in-season, budget friendly produce option for Mainers,” said Tasha Gerken, a SNAP-Ed nutrition educator with ACCESS Health. The focus for April will be stem vegetables.
Recently, some second-graders spoke with The Times Record about the program and the mango they tried that day. 
“I thought it was good, and they really tasted good,” said Dennis James Brammett Jr. When asked what he liked, he was not shy. “First of all, they’re slippery and I like slippery mangos. And sometimes they’re squishy. That’s what my favorite part of it is.”
Caleb Harvey had eaten a mango before, and said he wished the school would offer it more often, since “it makes a nice snack.”
Carol Perry and Sage Shipley, both students in Janice Frey’s class, felt the fruit was tasty. 
“I had two pieces,” Perry said. 
“I really like mangos a lot. I think it is a favorite food of mine,” offered Casper Marquis. “And I also eat it, I really do. I like other kinds.”
Some of his favorites? 
“I like carrots and I like sandwiches that have the lettuce and the tomato. I like that stuff,” he said. “I think it’s a great program.”
While he couldn’t remember most of the items he’d tried as a first-grader — “I only remember that we had carrots, that’s what I remember” — he definitely knew what the healthy snacks were good for.
“They’re good for people so they can grow healthy,” he said, adding that they give energy, too.

Gauging success 

According to Joan Ingram, SNAP-Ed program manager at the University of New England’s School of Community and Population Health in Portland, the program is definitely working.
“We are reaching our priority population, providing classes to youth and adults across the state,” she wrote in an email to The Times Record last week. “Last year, Maine SNAP-Ed reached almost 32,000 individuals with nutrition education — approximately 24,000 were youth and 8,000 adults. Nutrition educators, hired by the local Healthy Maine Partnerships, delivered classes in over 300 schools and over 100 Head Start and child care sites.”
And though the program is only a couple years old, “we are already seeing some results. Teens in one of the classes we offer (Cooking Matters) reported a significant increase in consumption of fruit and green salad,” she wrote. “Adults in a similar class reported a significant increase in the consumption of fruits and vegetables, too.”

dmadore@timesrecord.com

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