FoodPrint Youth Exchange

For the FoodPrint Youth Exchange we had four different groups of nationalities (Romania, Italy, Slovenia, Hungary) visiting our place, in Deák Ferenc. For ten days we lived, learned and laughed together. In those ten days we learned and discussed about the topic of this youth exchange. Food!

At the beginning we started with games for breaking the ice and getting to know each other. Also an explanation of the rules for the place and the youth exchange could not be missed.

Because of food as a topic we learned about the national habits related to food, by interviewing the other groups. Most of the people where the first time in Etyek and for getting familiar with the village, we planed a treasure hunt trough Etyek. In this treasure hunt the group got divided in 4 different and smaller groups. Those groups had to discover hidden things at certain locations, which they had to find by asking themselves around.

After everyone got to know the people and the place around, the challenging part began. The “Cooking Challenge”! For the cooking challenge, the four groups, already created from the treasure hunt, had to cook dinner for the next four days, but every group had a different challenge. For the first evening, the group had to cook dinner only with seasonal food, so food which grows or is typical for that season. In addition we learned that it is important to have seasonal food of your region, because if it is not, than it comes from far away where there is a different climate, or the food is full with artificial fertilizer and other not so healthy additives. The challenge for the second group was to use food for the dinner with ingredients which does not need a lot of water in the production or preparation, like peas for example. Of course not everything got eaten up during the week, so the challenge for the third group was to cook the dinner with the leftovers we had, so we would not have any waste, which is a big problem with food. For the last group the challenge was to only cook with food that comes from around, so Etyek and surround.

During the week the nationality groups where making different workshops, for example did we learn from the “Slovenian Team” how to make a sour-dough, how to feed it and made bread from it.

Also water and energy are an important aspect when you look at food. So the “Romanian Team” prepared a presentation and a workshop about how to save water or/and reuse it.

Etyek is famous for their wineries and old wine cellars, so in and around are a lot of wine yards. That is why we made a tour trough those wine yards and and the wineries to discover the local acribusinesses of the region.

A place to get good and healthy food is the Szatyorbolt, our shop in the 8. district of Budapest.

That is why on one day we went together to Budapest, where everyone had the chance to learn more about the place and its story. After that we went to a community garden, which was a big garden in the middle of Budapest surrounded by houses. It was very interesting to see that there is such a big green space right in the middle of a big city. Also in the community garden we got a healthy and delicious lunch, with seasonal and regional food.

As the youth exchange drew to a close we hosted a local food fair evening, where every nationality made something typical to eat from their country and we invited people from Etyek, to come in our garden to join us.

The youth exchange was a very interesting and joyfull event with a lot of learning, not only of the topic food but also of the different cultures, people and a lot more. With all the people we created a good non formal learning place, in which we discovered, learned and taught.

So a big THANK YOU to the volunteers from 2019 which had the idea of this youth exchange and made it work, even two years later.