On the 11th of September 2018, I brought along the children and Okasan to Medini Edible Park to participate in their park tour, radish harvesting and leaf art activity. This was also organised by mummy Jac (Thank you again Jac!)
About Medini Edible Park
A five acre edible landscape and platform for cultivating community around current ideas of sustainable living. The edible landscape is presented in various formats - gardens with inspirational design, educational workshops that encourage growing sustainable food at home and an urban farm that encourages support of local produce and sustainable farming. The park will be a hub for community to develop around new ideas of waste management, green energy, sustainable living, local produce and farm to table
{Source : Facebook}
It was another cloudy day, and I was worried if it would rain while we were there. Thankfully the weather was just nice, no sun but no rain as well. The crowd, though smaller than Kampung Sungai Melayu trip, was still quite huge. Our tour guide, Mr Akata is the main caretaker of Edible Park. He first gave us a brief tour around the park. We were introduced to many varities of vegetables and herbs such as petai cina, jambu air, roselle, basil, eggplant, long beans among others.
Then the first highlight for the children – white radish harvesting. There were a few rows of white radish ready to be harvested inside the greenhouse. The children excitedly rushed over to pull out as many white radish as they can, though I saw some parents keep telling them don’t pull all! Why? Because we need to pay for the harvest by weight LOL. I was surprised how easy was it to pull out the radish, perhaps in my mind you need to use a shovel and to loosen the soil before pulling it out. I let my children to pull out one or two carrots in person. J and R really had no idea what we going on, they were just following instructions LOL.
D, on the other hand was clearly the city girl. She kept on complaining about the insects, the stuffy greenhouse, the muddy tracks. She did manage to pull out one radish without hesitation after watching what her younger siblings did. Later, she also harvested some lettuce leaves with her friend.
D, on the other hand was clearly the city girl. She kept on complaining about the insects, the stuffy greenhouse, the muddy tracks. She did manage to pull out one radish without hesitation after watching what her younger siblings did. Later, she also harvested some lettuce leaves with her friend.
Once the harvesting activity is done, we proceeded back to the café area to have the vegetables weighed accordingly. While waiting for Mr Akata to proceed with the 2nd activity, leaf art, the kids were happily wandering around the café area, while the adults enjoyed a glass of cold naturally brewed tea.
For leaf art, Mr Akata first demonstrated how to make glue from tapioca starch. All you need is tapioca starch and hot water. Mix together until it forms a whitish sticky glue. Let it cool and you are set to go! It can be kept in a jar for future use, just don't make it too thick.
After the demonstration, the children are sent to pick and collect any leaves and flowers from around the park to make their leaf art. They then need to arrange their design on a eco-friendly disposable plate, and lastly, apply the glue onto the leaves and flowers to make their own design.
My younger two kids were supposed to take part in leaf art as well, but they found more fun to be pluck leaves or flowers and playing with gravel. It is a safe place for them to roam around and play, and I could not be any happier seeing them having so much fun.
Here is the final masterpiece from D :
As for our harvest for the day, we brought it home and cooked white radish ABC soup. It was super delicious! Probably from our first ever farm to table experience 😁
FYI - There are many activities organised by Medini Green Parks, most of them are free of charge. You may like their Facebook page to get updates about their events. I strongly recommend this place for children, and nature lovers too.
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