FoodCorps Service Members Julia Munson and Rebecca Cohen serve in Arizona. Here, they talk about their experiences with culture on the Tohono O’odham Nation and share their recipe for avocado and agave chocolate pudding.
By Julia Munson and Rebecca Cohen, FoodCorps service members
An excited chorus of “Are we cooking today?” greets us when we walk into the cafeteria of Indian Oasis Elementary School (IOES). A group of students swarms around us, jumping up and down and offering bear hugs. At IOES, one of the schools we teach in as second year FoodCorps service members, students have proven that contrary to belief, children are not picky eaters. In fact, they are some of the most open-minded taste-testers you can find. Especially if the dish in question is something they helped cook with their classmates.
We serve on the Tohono O’odham Nation, a reservation roughly the size of Connecticut where saguaro cacti, creosote bushes, and mesquite trees dot the dusty landscape. We spend much of our time at IOES as part of our service site Tohono O’odham Community Action’s (TOCA) School Food and Fitness Program. TOCA’s programming focuses on creating cultural revitalization and sustainable community development on the Nation, and the elementary school is perhaps the most important place to start.
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