RTE’s GROW COOK EAT visit Tramore and the All Together Now Festival 

GIY

RTE’s GROW COOK EAT visit Tramore and the All Together Now Festival 

 
The second last episode of the 2019 series of GROW COOK EAT on RTE 1 will air Wednesday, April 17th 2019 on RTE ONE at 8.30pm and the show’s presenters Karen O’Donohoe and Michael Kelly of GIY pay a visit to Tramore’s Educate Together School and to the All Together Now Festival.
Karen O’Donohoe heads to All Together Now, a new festival held in Portlaw, Co. Waterford with sustainability as well as art and music at its core. Organisers made the festival a plastic-free zone with traders directed to only use compostable packaging – no single-use plastics allowed!
Michael visits Tramore Educate Together to serve pupils a delicious lunch as part of Eat Together, a social eating programme co-developed by GIY with the school, to help children connect with food by sitting down to eat at a table instead of wolfing down half a sandwich.
This week Karen and Michael also show us how to grow some French Beans. Michael Kelly says French Beans are one of the most straight forward vegetables to grow – both the climbing green, and dwarf purple varieties, do really well in the glasshouse, raised bed and container. This week Michael shows viewers how to grow their own.  And chef Katie Sanderson takes the freshly grown produce and makes Beans on Toast – but in a whole new way.
GROW COOK EAT is produced by David Hare of InproductionTV for RTÉ and is sponsored by BORD BIA and StopFoodWaste.ie
This practical TV series is aimed at helping people with little or no knowledge of growing their own food, but who like the idea of being able to grow something themselves.
The series is anchored at the home of GIY (Grow it Yourself), at Grow HQ in Waterford City, and each week GROW COOK EAT sees presenters Michael Kelly and Karen O’Donohoe visit expert food producers, chefs and community food growing projects all across the country.
In this second series, Michael and Karen share their knowledge on how to successfully plant and grow onions, pumpkins, sweetcorn, courgettes, kale, beans and chillis for all shapes and sizes of gardens and containers.
Every week chef Katie Sanderson uses the freshly grown produce to create seasonal dishes which are easy to make and delicious to eat.
GROW COOK EAT highlights serious issues including plastic packaging and food waste, and the series also sees  Michael and Karen visiting a large scale water harvesting project in a Dublin fire station, and a Social Eating Programme in Educate Together National School in Tramore.
Bord Bia is proud to partner with GROW COOK EAT for a second season. As part of its promotion of the Irish Horticultural Industry, Bord Bia is committed to raising the awareness of gardening as an enjoyable and healthy activity that enhances the environment we live in. Find out more about the benefits of gardening at BordBia.ie, as well as a range of delicious and convenient recipes that feature fresh produce..
The Environmental Protection Agency established the Stop Food Waste programme in 2009 and has been working since with businesses and consumers to reduce food waste – which delivers a win-win on cost savings and environmental benefits. The programme website is www.stopfoodwaste.ie which includes an A-Z of foods with tips and advice on avoiding wastage.
Presenters:
GIY
Michael Kelly is a writer, founder of GIY and grower. He has written three books on food and self-sufficiency – his latest book GROW COOK EAT (2014) was a winner in the Gourmand World Cookbook Awards. Michael is an Ashoka Fellow, a Social Entrepreneurs Ireland awardee and a recipient of the inaugural 2010 Arthur Guinness Fund. He is a member of the TASTE Council of Ireland. He has written columns on food and health for The Irish Times, The Irish Independent and Food & Wine Magazine. Michael is a passionate speaker on food issues, self-sufficiency, sustainability and growing your own food. He worked for ten years in the IT industry in Dublin but now lives the good life in Dunmore East, Co. Waterford with his wife and two little GIYers.
GIY
Karen O’Donohoe returned to rural Ireland after pursuing a successful career in the UK and completing her MSc in Nutrition, Physical Activity and Public Health. A native of East Cork, her passion for social enterprise, health and sustainability saw her start a GIY Group in her home village of Ladysbridge and then join GIY as a fundraiser for GROW HQ, GIY’s €1.4million national food education centre. Now, as Head of Community Development and member of the Leadership Team, Karen works with a number of GIY’s stakeholders to develop long-term partnerships for maximum impact. Her skills as a presenter and entertaining educator were honed during a successful career in health promotion and community development with the University of Bristol where she represented the University on a number of high profile programmes including Inspire 2012 and Healthy Universities. Founder of The Cottage Market, a community-led market initiative that has been rolled out on a national scale, Karen is passionate about rural regeneration, empowering micro enterprises and working with communities to create social, environmental and economic success stories.