TORONTO, ON – Real Food for Real Kids (RFRK) – Canada’s leading healthy kids catering company and nationally renowned ‘edu-caterer’ – was selected as one of the 50 recipients of the 2014 Regional Premier’s Award for Agri-Food Innovation Excellence at a ceremony held on November 18, 2014, hosted by MPP Arthur Potts, Parliamentary Assistant to the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture.
The Toronto-based caterer will be dedicating its $5,000 grant to Real Food Forward (RFF), which is its charitable function. RFF will turn the provincial grant into 1,250 free lunches delivered to kids who need a helping hand across the GTA.
Having been recognized by the Premier’s office, peers and local dignitaries for its innovation, sustainable practices and food advocacy; RFRK decided to use the grant as an opportunity to highlight the need for making nutritious and delicious food accessible to all kids. “Kids who are fed real food are better able to learn,” says RFRK’s Founding Mom and Chief Food Innovation Officer, Lulu Cohen-Farnell. “Our mission is to enable and inspire a lifetime of healthy eating, starting at a young age, so that when kids grow up, they have the tools and knowledge to make informed choices about how, when and what they eat. Real Food Forward (RFF) provides us with a great platform to extend our ability to make this mission a reality for all kid-kind!”
Since its inception in 2009, RFF has served over 21,000 subsidized or free lunches (approx. value: $106,891) to kids in schools throughout the GTA. The bulk of these donations have come from the self-subsidizing structure of RFRK’s “Real Food School Lunch Club”. For every 20 kids enrolled in a Lunch Club, RFRK donates a free meal to a kid in need throughout the school year. Other inspiring sources of support for RFF come from student-led initiatives that RFRK matches dollar for dollar and from parents at Lunch Clubs who donate their kids’ absence credits.
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About Real Food for Real Kids:
Founded in 2004, Real Food for Real Kids (RFRK) has become Canada’s leading healthy catering company for kids in childcare centres, elementary schools and camps — making the list of Canada’s 100 Best Workplaces for two years running, and frequently winning awards of excellence with the Green Toronto Awards. RFRK prepares and delivers nutritious and delicious hot lunches and snacks, made fresh-from-scratch for over 10,000 kids daily throughout the GTA. RFRK focuses on wholesome nutrition and global flavours, while using as much Ontario-grown and organic food as the seasons and customer’s budgets allow. RFRK’s mission is to enable and inspire healthy eating, and to have a rockin’ good time while doing it!
About the Premier’s Award for Agri-Food Innovation Excellence:
The Premier’s Award for Agri-Food Innovation Excellence recognizes innovations that improve existing products, create jobs and drive economic growth.