Healthy Eating at Christmas

Three days before Christmas, Stonebridge City Farm held a Mid-Winter Festival. Staff and volunteers laid on a warm Stonebridge welcome to visitors from throughout Nottinghamshire.

With financial support from the Food Initiatives Group and ONE Nottingham, the theme of the festival was health awareness and healthy eating.

Farm staff and volunteers arrived early in the morning to start cooking the wholesome and nutritious meals - served to visitors free of charge.

Before long, the enticing smell of piping hot curried parsnip and apple soup and deep roasted tomatoes drifted throughout the farm

Staff mingled with visitors to discuss cooking techniques, nutrition and sources of pesticide free food. Copies of all recipes were available to take away and we endeavoured to use as much pesticide-free produce as possible. St Anns has few accessible outlets which dispense fresh fruit and vegetables. VegeBox worker Keith Cosgrove - who is funded by Severn Trent Water - was on hand to signpost local residents to places where such food is affordable and available.

'Five A Day'

A 'Five-A-Day' theme ran through the day with staff ready to explain the benefits of eating five portions of fruit and vegetables per day. Research suggests that doing so improves health, stimulates a sense of well being, reduces sickness and enhances vitality.

Two prominent displays illustrated 'Five-A-Day' in a clear and easy-to-understand format.

We talked to parents and carers about the meals they make and we encouraged the many children attending the festival to consider eating the 'green and gooey' bits with their dinner - and not just push the offending items around their plate!

Many of our visitors considered the Smoothie demonstration - and the tasting afterwards! - to be the highlight of the day.

Jo Swann, our Horticultural Supervisor, created four fun flavours, each backed by an easy-to-follow recipe card. She gave a well attended demonstration on how to make the drink from natural ingredients.

As if by magic, strawberries, mandarins, pears, bananas, pineapples, grapefruit, coconut milk and lime juice combined to make delicious drinks bursting with vitality and goodness.

Each drink exploded with vitamins and life-giving minerals. Knowing how to make a smoothie was as important as drinking it and our easy demonstration meant that the young visitors would be pestering their carers for a smoothie with their meals for some time to come!

We made sure that there was plenty to do for all the family, apart from eating and drinking. There was a raffle for an 'alternative' Christmas hamper, a tombola and the opportunity to sponsor an animal. Families could learn together and discover the secret life of the farm on the Farm Trail.

Visitors could hand-feed the resident animals, including goats, cows, pigs, chickens and Hazel, the festive donkey.

Happy children met Santa Claus and each received an early Christmas Gift...

...of nutritious fruit and nuts!

And while the young ones met Santa, parents and carers could buy plants and farm produce including jam, chutney, pickle and honey from our own hives!

153 people came to the festival. 47 people were good enough to complete a voluntary evaluation pro-forma. Through their consideration, we discovered that:

81% of people rated the venue as 'excellent'

90% of people were inspired to try new recipes

85% of people felt they learned something new about healthy eating

87% stated that they will eat more fruit and vegetables in the future

92% enjoyed the farm trail and getting to know about the farm.

We asked visitors if they wished to make any comments: They said:

153 people visited the farm

43% Male 57% Female

57% Under 18

24% 18-40

19% Over 40

The majority of the visitors came from St Anns, the Meadows, West Bridgford, Arnold and Bestwood. We even received a visit from Redhill, in Surrey! The majority of our visitors became aware of the event through our leaflet, word-of-mouth and the Nottingham Evening Post.

Boots Charitable Trust

The Stonebridge Mid-Winter Festival was kindly supported by the Greater Nottingham Food Initiatives Group and ONE Nottingham

For more information on anything contained within the newsletter, or about anything to do with our work at Stonebridge City Farm, please contact:

Mark Barry / Jo Swann Stonebridge City Farm Stonebridge Road St Anns Nottingham NG3 2fR