Nourishing Partnerships

Nourishing Partnerships 

Sept 26, 2024 

Kelly Sandlin MS, RDN 

Hi, I’m Kelly and I am the registered dietitian nutritionist here at Teen Kitchen Project. 

We are grateful for the splendid fresh fruits and vegetables that are grown in Santa Cruz County, and it is important to us that we can use so many locally sourced items and be mindful of our carbon footprint. It is also our pleasure to form partnerships with local growers and purveyors and to support business in our area. It is a fine thing to be a part of this group effort to bring medically tailored meals and groceries to our clients, and to support better health in our communities. 

One such partnership is with Lakeside Organic Gardens in Watsonville.  Our relationship with them helps us keep the fresh food flowing. We are lucky to have such a wide variety of tasty offerings from a local organic grower. This terrific helper donates a portion of our produce order each week. We feature many of their gorgeous products in our Medically Tailored Meal program and in our Medically Tailored Grocery program. 

 Another of our special relationships is with the team at the fabulous Live Earth Farm, a food and education non-profit that uses the farm for integrated learning experiences. They promote knowledge about the environment, food, and sustainable agriculture. Live Earth also has a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program that offers organic produce boxes that can be customized. They supply the produce boxes for Teen Kitchen Project. 

For grocery items, Ryan, the manager at Grocery Outlet in Santa Cruz is helpful and responsive. He is sourcing many items just for Teen Kitchen Project. We get whole wheat tortillas, whole grain bread, dry beans, lentils and split peas, and low or no added salt canned tomatoes and soups. Our tofu, canned chicken, ground turkey, and almond butter are proteins that we order from them.  We also purchase cheese, and no sugar added applesauce. We appreciate all that the wonderful folks at Grocery Outlet do to help us find just the right healthy groceries for our clients. 

Teen Kitchen Project is famous for the delicious meals that are lovingly prepared by our chefs and teens in the kitchen, but did you know that we also offer groceries to Medi-Cal clients who qualify? Our Medically Tailored Grocery program provides healthy groceries for our clients who are able to cook for themselves at home or have help with meal preparation. TKP will deliver a reuseable bag once a week filled to the brim with delicious and nutritious foods with an option for a vegetarian bag as well. Regular bags sent out might include a combination a dry and canned goods, fresh foods and fresh vegetables such as: Ground turkey or tofu, white beans, lentils, quinoa, whole wheat tortillas, yogurt, cheese, applesauce, green chard, cilantro, celery, Granny Smith apples and mandarin oranges. 

For those who prefer to only receive produce, Teen Kitchen Project offers a produce box from our partners at Live Earth Farm. An example of such a box might include: broccolini, shishito peppers, lacinato kale, lettuce, cucumbers, parsley and carrots. 

Sharing the bounty of this good earth is a key part of our mission here at Teen Kitchen, and we are proud to feature such high-quality products in our various offerings.