HIDDEN PARK JAKARTA EVENT

Living in Jakarta, you're faced with hundreds of malls, and whether you like it or not, when you have kids, you sometimes have to resort to going to a mall on the weekend as there's not much else to do. I've tried going to Bogor on weekends just to find some fresh air and a park, but honestly the distance is really a problem.

Now a few weeks ago, we received an email at the office from an organization called HiddenPark and they were interested to collaborate with the YUM Organic Farm in their upcoming event, which focuses on the hidden potential of parks in Jakarta. Their first event was last year and they did it in Taman Langsat, which is a park near Barito, a park I have passed through but never entered! Can you imagine? And this year, their event takes place in Taman Tebet. The photos below are from the event last Friday when the YUM farm taught 75 school children how to plant seedlings and how to maintain them for the next month, until they're able to be harvested.

Anyway, long story short, I'm really amazed by this program, which will last for a whole month. I think it's awesome; every weekend they have activities for the whole family, from yoga in the morning, to a library in the park, to various different activities. So I think we should all go!! And even when the event has passed, I think we should all make the effort to reduce our visits to the mall and try to visit Jakarta's parks, 'cause yes, Jakarta has parks! :)

NEWS FROM THE FARM

You must know by now how much I love the YUM Organic Farm in Cipanas. It's such a beautiful place, and I can't believe that almost every week, I can get fresh organic vegetables delivered to Jakarta....

Anyway, here are a few photos taken in the nursery a few days ago... I just love taking pictures of seedlings :))

HOW TO MAKE AN URBAN ORGANIC GARDEN

I'm not a huge fan of gardening to be honest. I much prefer baking and cooking. But I do feel that we all need to know how to grow our own food. We're so used to buying our food at the market or the supermarket, that we have no idea what exactly it takes to grow food. This is especially true for people living in cities, like me :)

So when the Jakarta International School (JIS) asked whether the YUM Organic Farm was interested to conduct a 2-day training on how to make an urban organic garden, I jumped on the occasion. YUM's Organic Farm Coordinator, Oleh, was also excited to do it, and I think he did an excellent job teaching teachers and 7th and 8th grade students at Sekolah Musika.

Sekolah Musika is a school in Ciputat that caters to children from low income families. The owner of the foundation that runs the school used to work at JIS, and she would like her students' horizons to be broadened just like kids in international schools. That's why she has asked JIS and YUM's help to teach her students how to grow an urban organic garden.

Oleh starts by doing a 1-hour in-class presentation where the students are taken through all the steps in organic farming

The land is then cleared, marked and the soil is turned over

After a grueling 3-hour process, we were able to finish making 4 beds. These beds are made entirely from soil, the cheapest alternative to cement or bricks, and made in such a way that it will last up to 10 years.

The side of the beds are then covered with grass.

Finally the planting area is turned over and fertilizer (rice chaff and chicken manure) is added.

This is the fun part, when the children can start planting!

The whole gang at the end of the 2-day activity :)

HEALTHY SALADS

The weekend is here and it's usually an occasion where we can spend time in the kitchen, try new recipes and think a bit more creatively about what we want to eat. Recently I've made these 2 nice salads, with organic vegetables from YUM's Organic Farm, and thought I'd share them with you...

This one's shredded purple cabbage and shredded carrots.

Dressing: olive oil + apple cider vinegar + 1/2 tsp mayonnaise + sea salt + pepper 

This lovely red one is cherry tomatoes + big tomatoes cut in 8.

Dressing: olive oil + apple cider vinegar + parsley flakes + sea salt + pepper 

If like me you work during the week and you don't really have time to think about what you put in your mouth, then try to at least spend some time during the weekend, go out and buy some organic vegetables, cook on your own, cook for your family, think about what you're feeding yourself and your family :)

ZUCCHINI CHIPS

Today's hot dog lunch with zucchini chips

On Friday, I got beautiful organic vegetables from the YUM Farm in Cipanas, and I had specifically asked for tomatoes, beetroots, cucumbers and zucchini. However, I was feeling a bit tired of the usual ratatouille, zucchini au gratin and sauteed zucchini so I started browsing..... until I found this interesting recipe for Zucchini Oven Chips. It looked really easy so I thought ok I'll try them out and hopefully Amal will like them.... And he did!! He even said: "Mama you should open a restaurant. We'll call it ROM...Restaurant Of Mama!" :)

The recipe is quite simple.

ZUCCHINI OVEN CHIPS

Ingredients:

1/4 cup breadcrumbs

1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon garlic powder

1/8 teaspoon black pepper

2 tablespoon milk

2 1/2 cups sliced zucchini (about 2 small or 1 medium)

Cooking spray

Preparation:

Preheat the oven to 220 degrees celcius.

Combine the first 5 ingredients in a medium bowl, stirring with a whisk. Place milk in a shallow bowl. Dip zucchini slices in milk, and dredge in breadcrumb mixture. Place coated slices on an overproof wire rack coated with cooking spray; place rack on a baking sheet. Bake a 220 degrees for about 25-30 minutes or until browned and crisp. Serve immediately. Best eaten hot.

NEW COLORS AT THE YUM ORGANIC FARM

The YUM Organic Farm got a fresh new coat of paint on their entrance gate, with the help of donated paint from the British International School (BIS). The talented Kang Bram finally got to color in the signage and vegetables he had crafted into the gate's walls. 

With the beautiful mural that the Year 9 BIS students made for the organic farm, this just makes the place even more amazing to visit :)

CHOCOLATE BEET CAKE

I'm a huge fan of beetroots; I love their texture, their taste, but I especially love their color. It just so happens that the YUM Organic Farm has plenty of it so each time I go there, I bring back at least 2 kilos of beets.

I've been wanting to make Beet Cake ever since I saw this video, but never got the time to do it until this weekend. It was actually also a bit of a dare because everyone at the YUM office would look down on beets and I was trying to prove a point - that beets are yummy and can make a really nice cake :)

As you can see from the photo above, the cake turned out great: crispy on the outside and super moist in the inside. My only disappointment was that we couldn't taste the beets (which is probably a good thing!) but I guess the point of them being in the cake recipe was for the moistness...

So here's the recipe I used based on the video:

BEET CAKE

2 cups of beets, cooked and pureed/grated (this is about 2-3 medium sized beets)
2 cups flour
1 1/2 cups dark brown sugar
115 gr semisweet/dark chocolate, melted
2 tsp baking soda 
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla
220 gr butter, unsalted, at room temperature
3 eggs

Preheat your oven to 190 degrees celcius.
Mix the butter and sugar with a mixer at medium. Gradually add the eggs one at a time, then the vanilla.
In a separate bowl, mix the dry ingredients together: flour, baking soda and salt. It would be best to sift so you don't get lumps of baking soda which happens.
Add the dry ingredients to the first mixture, then add the melted chocolate and the pureed/grated beets.

Put everything in a square or round baking tray and bake for approximately 45 minutes.

LOVE FRESH VEGGIES

I love these fresh organic vegetables that come every Friday from the YUM organic farm in Cipanas, West Java. The farm produces enough vegetables to make around 30 to 40 baskets of vegetables a week. Since YUM does not yet have a marketing officer to sell these baskets, I am helping out to find orders and distribute to people who are interested in buying YUM's vegetables. Also, every other Friday, we sell our vegetables at the JIS Farmer's Market, where other vendors sell canned organic food, homemade bread, etc. If only Jakarta also had it's own farmer's market :)

KIDS LEARN ORGANIC FARMING

Last weekend, Amal & a few friends - Momo, Mabel, Sabine & baby Jiri - as well as their moms travelled all the way to Desa YUM Cipanas to learn about organic farming but mostly to learn how to harvest and get their hands dirty!

They first started at the compost area where Kang Oleh tried to explain about the steps to make compost but as you can see in the photo above, the boys weren't as comfortable there as the others. They much preferred to feed the rabbits instead :)
Finally they all went to the gardens where they first learned how to harvest carrots which were a lot of fun, though I tried and it's not as easy as it seems because some are well grounded in the soil so you have to use a fork to get the carrot out. They also harvested salad, pakchoy, corn and tomatoes.
Jiri joined the fun though only for a while because the sun was so hot and unfortunately, his cute hat fell into some mud :) The best part I think was seeing the kids wash their vegetables in order to bring them back home. They were all very keen and cleaned the whole lot without complaining! Amazing!
All in all, an excellent day... and I'm even thinking of sending Amal to help at the farm during his 5-weeks holiday in July...hehehehe :)

JIS VISITS DESA YUM CIPANAS

Ever since I started working at Yayasan Usaha Mulia, I've been more or less obsessed with YUM's Organic Farm in Cipanas. It's so interesting to know how vegetables are grown and the process needed, but even better to know that they've been grown organically, just the way Nature intended it to be grown :)

So last thursday, when 100 8th grade students from the Jakarta International School came to visit our farm, I was over-the-top because YUM was finally able to show off our beautiful farm and teach children about growing food the organic way. All YUM staff at Desa YUM Cipanas and several of us from the Head Office participated as Workshop Leaders and Coordinators.

We had 2 hours to teach 4 workshops: Composting, Transplanting Seeds, Planting & Harvesting.

Everyone worked hard to prepare the event!

Photo left: Mas Samsul, Desa YUM Cipanas' Project Manager

Photo right: The transplanting workshop in the Nursery

Photo left: Kids learning to make organic compost with, among other things, goat's manure :)

Photo right: Preparing the land before planting the 3-week old plants

Photo left: Harvesting green & red salad

Photo right: Harvesting tiny sweet potatoes

We all had an excellent time (though I was a little bit sunburnt!) and I hope the JIS kids learned something from the workshops that they can apply at home or at school. If your son/daughter's school is interested in this type of activity, please email me at vanessa@yumindonesia.org :)

COME GET YOUR ORGANIC VEGETABLES!

Today, YUM was invited to join in the Jakarta International Community Center Open House. We were very excited to join because it meant that we could promote our work and, at the same time, introduce people to our organic vegetables. We're really proud that in our 15,000m2 of land in Cipanas, we have an amazing organic farm that grows different varieties of vegetables.

How do you like the presentation of our vegetables? I was inspired by the market stalls in France with wooden boxes and labels on small blackboards. My cousins from Santaibae Design helped make the boxes, as well as the beautiful tree that hangs the pictures of the children who need school sponsorships. Thanks Sandri & Didit!

YUM will be attending a few bazaars around the month of October so I'll keep you posted and you can come and visit us :)