Stone Soup Feast

Stone Soup Feast

By Lisa Derouin

Who would have thought, they’d see a whole room of children loving every minute of eating a big bowl of vegetables? I had the pleasure of attending the Stone Soup Feast this year. It was such a wonderful event! The children were all so excited leading up to it.

Starting Monday morning I went into the Primary class, and found them hard at work. The tables had cutting boards and vegetables galore. Potatoes, carrots, parsley, tomatoes, spinach, cabbage, onions, celery, parsnips, leeks, green beans. They had on little aprons and were merrily working on chopping. It all went into the gigantic pot with some chicken broth and a large perfectly round stone.

On Tuesday the classroom was filled with a delicious aroma that made my stomach grumble with hunger. The soup was simmering and I found them hard at work again, this time mixing up the ingredients to make cornbread and churning butter out of cream.

The Elementary class students were also busy at work, scooping the seeds and pulp out of a sugar pie pumpkin. Hmm, I wondered what they were up to. On Wednesday, I caught a whiff of something yummy in the oven; I went out to check what they were up to and found a delicious pumpkin pie made out of the pumpkin they cooked the day before.

Finally the Feast was to begin. The Primary classroom was all set with placemats made of pressed fall leaves. The soup was ladled into bowls, cornbread passed around with the freshly made butter and jars of honey. Mrs. Weaver thanked everyone for their hard work and they all thanked each other.

We began to eat and it was such a delight to hear all the children chatter with glee;

“Mmmmm, I taste Prestons carrots.”   “Yumm, I found one of Landen’s green beans.”   “Ohhh, here is a piece of Mrs. Weavers celery.”   “Mmmm, Finn’s spinach is good.”   “I found Sunny’s parsnips.”   “Wow, I like Teri’s onion.”   “Elena’s cabbage is tasty.”   “Here is some of George’s tomatoes.”    “I like Natalie’s potatoes”   “This broth Ella brought is delicious.”    “I see some of Delaney’s parsley.”    “Ava’s Leeks taste good.”   My favorite comment I heard was, “May I please have more soup?”

When we finished our lunch Mrs. Broback passed out the warm pumpkin pie topped with whipped cream.  I must say I will never bake a pie with the canned pumpkin again! I heard Gavin say, “I like pumpkin pie a little more every time I eat it.” 

The meal ended with everybody feeling very full, happy, and grateful for all our friends at Montessori Farmhouse School.