Ms. Palo's class visits the Three Sisters Garden

On August 25, Ms. Palo's class visited the edible garden. In addition to looking at the Three Sisters Garden, they reviewed some of the Chumash plants they'd studied last year and looked at a monarch butterfly in the butterfly garden.

 Last years' third graders had planted a Three Sisters Native American Garden in June. The three sisters are corn, bean and squash. They are called sisters because they all work together. The corn functions as a support for the beans and the squash covers the ground and acts as a mulch to keep the ground cool. The corn uses nitrogen from the soil as it grows and the beans put nitrogen back into the soil. Numerous tribes around the country have their versions of this garden, from Arizona to the Midwest to the East.  Many tribes had festivals in August to celebrate the harvesting of the corn.

Corn was a big staple of the Native Americans. There is evidence of it being grown in 1 A.D.! (so over 2000 years).

The students ate succotash that was made from corn, zucchini and beans. Succotash (from Narragansett sohquttahhash, "broken corn kernels") is a food dish consisting primarily of corn and lima beans or other shell beans.

Monarch butterfly in our butterfly garden.

Succotash (for 28)

5 ears of corn
5 zucchini
12 oz. beans
cherry tomatoes
3 T. each of unsalted butter and olive oil

1. Cut kernels from the cob and place in bowl. Scrape the remainder of the corn from the cob into a bowl as well.
2. Slice zucchini in 1/2" pieces. Set aside.
3. Cut beans in 1/2" to 1" pieces.
4. Melt 3 T. butter in pan and add 3 T. olive oil.
5. Add zucchini, corn and beans and cook until soft, approximately 10 minutes.
6. Add cherry tomatoes the last 2 minutes.