Van Trip!

 

  If there is anything we know that our campers like it is field trip day and riding in the van.  They like it so much they are trying to get us to have Van Day Camp where they just travel to places in the van.  Not sure about the educational value but they sure would have fun and have planned out quite the itinerary for one.  But I digress..today our challenge was to learn about different cooking opportunities in the real world.  Our challenge is to introduce them to careers and have them think about the value of food today.  Our magic challenge word is excuse me.  We are travelling to some populated areas, as you will see and invariably someone will forget to look around them and either bump into our group or members of our group will bump into them. So we thought this magic challenge word would be appropriate for today.

  Our group loaded up the vans to head to Raleigh where our first stop was at the Great Harvest Bread Company.  This franchise company uses fresh grains to make their own breads.  The variety of breads, flavors, and textures are amazing.  Our youth got to sample different types of bread and we brought back: sourdough; cinnamon swirl; potato, cheddar, and chive, dinner rolls to try from this location.  All the breads had been baked within the last 24 hours of purchase and we were excited to share what fresh breads taste like compared to store bought breads.  Our youth also got to sample several varieties of breads from muffins to scones to dinner rolls and sliced breads.  One of their favorites were the blueberry and cream scones.  During this visit our campers saw the prep going on to make the variety of fresh breads and  and different ingredients that can be used in breads.  They also learned that it is hard work to have a bakery being that bread at this location is usually baked between 2 and 4 am and it does take hard work and planning to make artisan breads.

 

  Our next stop was the State Farmer's Market in Raleigh.  Now this market is much larger and more diverse in terms of offerings than the one in Robeson County.  Because they pull from around the state they have a variety of fruits, vegetables, proteins, plants and flowers on sale.  There is also a commercial building selling packaged NC items, baked goods, and even snacks and coffee.  This location also hosts a couple of restaurants serving the freshest of foods whether it be typical country cooking or fresh seafood you really can't go wrong visiting here.  We did also make a couple of purchases for tomorrow including pumpernickel bread and tomatoes for our taco bar experience.

 

  Our campers were pretty hungry after walking and looking at food so we swung over to NC State University's Fountain Dinning Hall for lunch.  There you can find anything from pasta, to salads, pizza, to burgers, and even oriental and Indian cusine.  Of course their favorite is the fresh soft serve ice cream for dessert which is a crowd pleaser.

 

  After lunch we stop by another local establishment to pick up a niche food item for the youth to sample when we got home.  Crumbl Cookies is a franchise cookie chain that makes large (honestly can't eat one in one sitting) cookies that are baked to order and each week the flavors change although they always keep a version of chocolate chip and some type of sugar cookie on the menu each week.  The cookie flavors are very different for example this week we could choose from PB&J, butter, chocolate chunk, chocolate pretzel pie, lemon,  and honey bun.  

  When we got back to the office and started waking up from our food induced comas, everyone wanted a snack.  Thanks to Ms. Wendy's fine knife skills everyone was able to sample up to four different flavors.  They told us that they lemon was surprising sweet rather than tart.  The honey bun really tasted like a honey bun and for those who sampled the chocolate pretzel pie and like the sweet and salty that one was really good.  However I must say that the chocolate chunk sort of won everyone's heart, after all who doesn't like a chocolate chip cookie?

To see the photos from today's adventure please click this link and stay tuned for our final day in the kitchen.  What will we be up to?