HEALTH AND NUTRITION

In the summer of 2006 in Oaxaca, Mexico, with Dr. Ramona Pérez (Anthropology), Dr. Karen Coleman (PH) and Kim McDougall (PH) in a community suffering from similar health maladies, served as the model for this project. This model consisted of collecting local recipes and fortifying these recipes with locally found ingredients high in Iron, Calcium and Vitamin C, three minerals proven to help combat lead poisoning. Recipes were tested by a group of 6 women in the community then presented to the community through a food fair. During the food fair, recipes and samples of the fortified dishes were provided for taste testing. This model of using pre-existing recipes, fortifying their nutritional content and taste testing them amongst the community was very successful in Oaxaca and thus was used as a model for developing a recipe collection project in San Quintín for Spring 2007.