San Dimas students load up on fruits and vegetables through new salad bar

San Dimas students load up on fruits and vegetables through new salad bar

SAN DIMAS - Bernard Maroun loaded up his plastic tray with a mound of romaine lettuce, a handful of English peas, broccoli florets, and slices of kiwi and strawberries.

Bernard, a third-grade student at Shull Elementary School, said he's always loved vegetables, but recently discovered a new-found love - crisp, green English snap peas.

"I love them," he said, as he broke one in half, dunked it in some ranch dressing and crammed it into his mouth. "I also love this salad bar because I know I'm getting a healthy lunch."

Since early January, Shull Elementary School students twice a week are treated to a full salad bar with locally grown produce.

The salad bar program was put in place with help from Advocates for Healthy Living Inc., a non-profit group headquartered in San Dimas.

Maurice Cuellar, the organization's founder, approached Shull and nearby Gladstone elementary school officials, and Bonita Unified School District officials a few months about piloting the salad bar.

A $5,000 grant awarded to each school paid for extra kitchen utensils and a stylish navy blue food bar complete with small compartments of varying sizes to be filled with different fruits and vegetables.

With his association with 15 different farms throughout Southern and Central California, Cuellar's long-term plan is to expand the program to more than two days at the schools, and to have salad bar programs in low-income schools in the
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San Gabriel Valley.

"I believe the better brain food, the better the students perform in the classroom," he said last week during Shull's lunch time.

Cuellar rattled off the origins of all the vegetables and fruits available to Shull students that day - the strawberries were from Industry, the broccoli, carrots, naval oranges and English snap peas came down the road from from Cal Poly Pomona, kiwi from Redlands, spinach came in from Costa Mesa, and the romaine lettuce was brought in from Santa Maria.

"Everything's local and fresh," he said, adding that otherwise the students would be getting bagged vegetable from Texas or Florida or worse - canned varieties.

ChrisAnn Horsley, Shull's principal, said the new salad bar fulfills a long-term goal of hers.

"We have always wanted something like this," Horsley said, adding that school officials are enforcing a rule of fresh fruits and vegetables at all times. That means high fat and sugary cupcakes and other treats are out.

Horsley said that most amazing part is seeing just how much students enjoy eating vegetables.

"It's just incredible to see how much they put on their plates," she marveled.

As he watched Shull students pile romaine and spinach leaves on their plastic trays, Cuellar stood by and encouraged students to sample slices of blood oranges. The deep red color was off-putting to some students, he said.

"Try it. It's just like a regular orange. It tastes the same," he said.

Third-grader Tsai Arellano grabbed a blood orange wedge, and just to be safe, a naval orange slice, too.

"The color is a little weird," Tsai said, eyeing the crimson colored blood orange slice.

After taking a bite, Tsai's verdict was "it's good."

"However, I think I'll stick with naval oranges anyway," he said.