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<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif"'>This is
amazing! <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif"'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif"'>Next up …
Governor Henry? Mayors (who will be first in Oklahoma to have a vegetable
garden at city hall or at their home? Church lawns? Schools? City parks?<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-family:"Georgia","serif"'><o:p> </o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-family:"Georgia","serif"'>March 20,
2009<o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<h1><span style='font-family:"Georgia","serif"'>Obamas to Plant Vegetable
Garden at White House <o:p></o:p></span></h1>
<p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-family:"Georgia","serif"'>By <a
href="http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/b/marian_burros/index.html?inline=nyt-per"
title="More Articles by Marian Burros">MARIAN BURROS</a><o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;
line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";color:black'>WASHINGTON
— <a
href="http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/o/michelle_obama/index.html?inline=nyt-per"
title="More articles about Michelle Obama.">Michelle Obama</a> will begin
digging up a patch of the South Lawn on Friday to plant a vegetable garden, the
first at the White House since <a
href="http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/r/eleanor_roosevelt/index.html?inline=nyt-per"
title="More articles about Eleanor Roosevelt.">Eleanor Roosevelt</a>’s
victory garden in World War II. There will be no beets — the president
does not like them — but arugula will make the cut.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>While the organic garden will provide food for the first
family’s meals and formal dinners, its most important role, Mrs. Obama
said, will be to educate children about healthful, locally grown fruit and
vegetables at a time when obesity and diabetes have become a national concern.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>“My hope,” the first lady said in an interview in her
East Wing office, “is that through children, they will begin to educate
their families and that will, in turn, begin to educate our communities.”<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>Twenty-three fifth graders from Bancroft Elementary School in
Washington will help her dig up the soil for the 1,100-square-foot plot, in a
spot visible to passers-by on E Street. (It is just below the Obama
girls’ swing set.) <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>Students from the school, which has had a garden since 2001, will
also help plant, harvest and cook the vegetables, berries and herbs. Virtually
the entire Obama family, including the president, will pull weeds,
“whether they like it or not,” Mrs. Obama said with a laugh.
“Now Grandma, my mom, I don’t know.” Her mother, she said,
will probably sit back and say: “Isn’t that lovely. You missed a
spot.”<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>Whether there would be a White House garden had become more than a
matter of landscaping. The question had taken on political and environmental
symbolism, with the Obamas lobbied for months by advocates who believe that
growing more food locally, and organically, can lead to more healthful eating
and reduce reliance on huge industrial farms that use more oil for
transportation and chemicals for fertilizer.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>Then, too, promoting healthful eating has become an important part
of Mrs. Obama’s own agenda. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>The first lady, who said that she had never had a vegetable
garden, recalled that the idea for this one came from her experiences as a
working mother trying to feed her daughters, <a
href="http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/o/malia_obama/index.html?inline=nyt-per"
title="More articles about Malia Obama.">Malia</a> and <a
href="http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/o/sasha_obama/index.html?inline=nyt-per"
title="More articles about Sasha Obama.">Sasha</a>, a good diet. Eating out
three times a week, ordering a pizza, having a sandwich for dinner all took
their toll in added weight on the girls, whose pediatrician told Mrs. Obama
that she needed to be thinking about nutrition. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>“He raised a flag for us,” she said, and within months
the girls had lost weight. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>Dan Barber, an owner of Blue Hill at Stone Barns, an organic
restaurant in Pocantico Hills, N.Y., that grows many of its own ingredients,
said: “The power of Michelle Obama and the garden can create a very
powerful message about eating healthy and more delicious food. I don’t
think it’s a stretch to say it could translate into real change.”<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>While the Clintons grew some vegetables in pots on the White House
roof, the Obamas’ garden will far transcend that, with 55 varieties of
vegetables — from a wish list of the kitchen staff — grown from
organic seedlings started at the Executive Mansion’s greenhouses.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>The Obamas will feed their love of Mexican food with cilantro,
tomatillos and hot peppers. Lettuces will include red romaine, green oak leaf,
butterhead, red leaf and galactic. There will be spinach, chard, collards and
black kale. For desserts, there will be a patch of berries. And herbs will
include some more unusual varieties, like anise hyssop and Thai basil. A White
House carpenter, Charlie Brandts, who is a beekeeper, will tend two hives for
honey.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>The total cost of seeds, mulch and so forth is $200, said Sam
Kass, an assistant White House chef, who prepared healthful meals for the Obama
family in Chicago and is an advocate of <a
href="http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/l/local_food/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier"
title="More articles about local food.">local food</a>. Mr. Kass will oversee
the garden.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>The plots will be in raised beds fertilized with White House
compost, crab meal from the Chesapeake Bay, lime and green sand. Ladybugs and
praying mantises will help control harmful bugs. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>Cristeta Comerford, the White House’s executive chef, said
she was eager to plan menus around the garden, and Bill Yosses, the pastry
chef, said he was looking forward to berry season.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>The White House grounds crew and the kitchen staff will do most of
the work, but other White House staff members have volunteered. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>So have the fifth graders from Bancroft. “There’s
nothing really cooler,” Mrs. Obama said, “than coming to the White
House and harvesting some of the vegetables and being in the kitchen with Cris
and Sam and Bill, and cutting and cooking and actually experiencing the joys of
your work.”<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>For children, she said, food is all about taste, and fresh and
local food tastes better. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>“A real delicious heirloom tomato is one of the sweetest
things that you’ll ever eat,” she said. “And my children know
the difference, and that’s how I’ve been able to get them to try
different things.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>“I wanted to be able to bring what I learned to a broader
base of people. And what better way to do it than to plant a vegetable garden
in the South Lawn of the White House?” <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>For urban dwellers who have no backyards, the country’s one
million community gardens can also play an important role, Mrs. Obama said.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>But the first lady emphasized that she did not want people to feel
guilty if they did not have the time for a garden: there are still many changes
they can make. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:14.4pt'><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif";
color:black'>“You can begin in your own cupboard,” she said,
“by eliminating processed food, trying to cook a meal a little more
often, trying to incorporate more fruits and vegetables.”<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif"'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif"'><a
href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/20/dining/20garden.html?_r=1">http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/20/dining/20garden.html?_r=1</a>
<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Corbel","sans-serif"'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:150%'><span style='font-family:"Malgun Gothic","sans-serif";
color:black'>::: shauna </span><span style='font-family:"Malgun Gothic","sans-serif";
color:#913200'>lawyer</span><span style='font-family:"Malgun Gothic","sans-serif";
color:black'> struby</span><b><span style='font-family:"Malgun Gothic","sans-serif";
color:black'><o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:150%'><span style='font-family:"Arial Narrow","sans-serif";
color:#913200'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p>
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