NC Crunch

About the NC Crunch

The NC Crunch, co-hosted by the Farm to School Coalition of NC and the NC Farm to Preschool Network and organized by the Growing Minds program at ASAP celebrates agriculture, nutrition, and farm to school activities for Farm to School and Early Care and Education Month in October.

Annual NC Crunch events offer kids and adults an opportunity to taste and learn about locally-grown NC produce as well as honor all those who contribute to feeding our kids and communities–from farmers, farmworkers, and food hub distributors, to School and Early Care Nutrition professionals, educators, garden coordinators, bus drivers, and transportation professionals. It’s also a fun way to connect food and agriculture to all kinds of classroom curricula – from science to art.

Ideas for Participation

Ideas for farmers to participate in the NC Crunch: 

• Host a Crunch at a farmers market you sell at during October.
• Visit a childcare center or K-12 classroom or lunchroom and provide a taste test.
• Host a field trip on your farm.
• Crunch on the farm with your family/employees.
• Have a NC Crunch photo booth at your farm for u-pick customers through October.

Ideas for community members to participate in the NC Crunch: 

• Host a Crunch event at your office or business with your employees.
• Take a farm field trip to a u-pick apple farm with your employees.
• Have a NC Crunch photo booth at your office or business.
• Restaurants–feature a local apple recipe on your menu in October.

Past Participation

2021 Stories:

• Elementary students crunched into apples grown by farmer Tony Hill of Apple Ridge Farm in Hendersonville. School Nutrition Manager, Zachariah Porter, donned a festive apple costume to deliver apples to the W.D. Williams Elementary School classrooms. ~Buncombe County

• 20 to 30 students from Jackson County Early College made baked apples and fall crunch salad using local apples from Hendersonville. ~Jackson County

• Hertford County Public Library provided apple activity packs for the community.~Hertford County 

2020 Stories:

• The CTE department made school a little more normal for the students at Topsail High School. Everyone had a great time and had smiles on their faces! They have had so much positive feedback and appreciation from our staff and students. NC Crunch is an exciting outlet to promote NC agriculture and also help students find some fun in school again. ~Pender County

• The Downeast Partnership for Children decided to have a drive-thru event for the community and one of the stops was the apple crunch. 140 people drove-thru this event and a link to watch the video is here. In addition to the drive-thru Crunch, they delivered apples, water bottles and a pumpkin garden activity to 11 childcare centers in Nash and Edgecombe counties and the children and staff at each center participated in the virtual Crunch event or had their own and sent videos and pictures. By taking the “party to the people” they were able to have 396 children crunch apples together! When you add the number of DEPC staff the total Crunch total number of participants was around 550. Everyone had a wonderful time and all the participants were thankful to be able to have the event and keep everyone safe and COVID free. ~Nash County and Edgecombe County