Sun Meals Program a blessing for many

Turkey-and-cheese sandwiches – that is 12-year-old Aiden Jennings’ favorite meal for dinner. The bagels for breakfast are good, too, she adds. Arafat Aremu, 10, likes the chicken dinner, and chips when they are available.

For the 35 young campers at Tsunami Martial Arts in Windsor Mill, the breakfasts and dinners served at camp are available through the Sun Meals Program sponsored by Good Harvest Community Kitchen of St. Vincent de Paul Baltimore.

“The meals have been a blessing,” said Lisa Scott, administrator of Tsunami Martial Arts’ summer camp. “For some of these kids, it’s all they get.”

Funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Sun Meals program is a federal program administered by the state. Good Harvest applies to the state on behalf of its organizations, including Tsunami Martial Arts, for the program.

“Once approved, we can start serving meals. It is as simple as that,” said Marletha Booker, Good Harvest Community Kitchen’s director of food access and business development.

This summer, 36 programs located in Baltimore City and Baltimore and Howard counties participated in the Sun Meals program, which offers breakfast, lunch, snacks and dinner. Organizations are allowed to pick two options.

Each meal has different requirements, Booker said. Breakfast, for example, must include milk, a grain and fruit or vegetables. Dinners must have milk, protein, vegetables, fruit and a grain.

“Snacks don’t have to have milk,” Booker said. “Snacks have to have two of the five options. For us, we typically serve grain and fruit juice as we noticed students get tired of milk.”

At Tsunami, campers are served breakfast and dinner, and they bring their own lunch. Meals are served at a set time, and each child receives one serving of everything with no seconds offered. Scott has been known from time to time to add either strawberry or chocolate syrup to milk and to serve one pasta dish hot, rather than cold, because the campers prefer it that way. Tsunami also always has its own stash of bread on hand, Scott said because “kids like bread.”

“You do what you have to do to get them to eat food,” Scott said. “For the most part, they eat it all.”

For any unwanted food, the campers at Tsunmani know not to handle it and to put it in the center of the table, so others may take it.

“We call it the share table,” Scott said.

Ranging in age from 5 to 12, the campers at Tsunami enjoy a variety of events from going to the movies, swimming and visiting the library as well as outings including go-kart racing, visits to Urban Air (a trampoline park) and trips to Washington, D.C., to visit the Smithsonian museums.  As it is an eight-week karate camp, they also get instructions in the art, which is important, Scott said, because karate “builds confidence” in the students. The meal program, “is equally if not more important,” Scott said.

“For some, we know they might not get much after this,” Scott said. “People need it.”

Email Katie V. Jones at kjones@CatholicReview.org

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