HARPSWELL

The sunlight seemed even brighter inside The Schoolhouse Cafe on a recent afternoon, gleaming off the polished granite countertops and rows of glass cookie jars, stuffed with homemade confections.

Opened to the public in December, The Schoolhouse Cafe is a L3C — a low profit limited liability company — developed in partnership with the startup charter school, Harpswell Coastal Academy.

The cafe started providing lunch for academy students in September when the school opened, is integrated in food-based curriculum at the school and serves as a standard for locally-sourced wholesome eating with minimal waste, at minimal cost.

“If I can make something from scratch, I do,” said cafe manager and head chef Amy Aloe. “All of our bread is baked from scratch, I make all my own chicken broth from the chicken bones we have and I make all my own vegetable broth from vegetable scraps in the kitchen.”

In addition to serving cafe customers, Aloe has the task of preparing 50 school lunches with help in the kitchen from Rachel Monbouquette, whose daughter attends HCA, and assistant manager Gar- rett Gorenski, who oversees front of house operations.

Meat, in all its incarnations is, unsurprisingly, the students’ favorite part of most meals. It has also been the easiest element to source locally, said Aloe, owing to a plenitude of local farms.

“We made pulled pork this week,” from a whole pig purchased from Harpswell farmer Lisa Bryant, Aloe said. “Ray (Tetreault), who owns the Vegetable Corner across the street, was a butcher by trade and he offered to break it down for us at no cost because it’s going to the school.

“That saved us some expense, and we try to keep reasonable portion sizes,” she added, “which we have to do to keep our costs down.”

The cafe, which is open for breakfast and lunch Tuesday to Sunday, has a variety of offerings all priced below $10, which may change daily or weekly in addition to daily specials. Breakfast options range from a $3.50 breakfast sandwich to a $6.75 three-egg scramble, and lunch options typically fall between $6 and 8.75.

The full locavore breakfast with all Maine-originated product, which was available for brunch on a recent Saturday and Sunday, included two slices of bacon, two sausage patties, two eggs, roasted tomatoes and breakfast potatoes, and rang in at $9.75.

“I really wanted a menu designed so that anyone from the community can afford to have a meal here,” said Aloe. “Part of the way that we do that is if you order a sandwich, you get a sandwich. We don’t spend extra money on garnishes or a pickle.”

A pickle, side salad or other side dishes are available for purchase separately, Aloe said, but not including them in the base price “helps people come in and get out at a lower price if they’d like.”

While Aloe, formerly a chef at an Appalachian Mountain Club lodge, is used to cooking for the masses, the particular tastes of the young students has proven to be sometimes unpredictable.

“I try to include two to three servings of vegetables in each meal,” sadi Aloe. “One day I sent down chunks of roasted butternut squash and I threw kale in at the last minute to wilt it — they ate it all up.

“The next week I got these beautiful local sweet potatoes in,” she said, “and I thought the kids would love them. I did a whole tray of sweet potatoes and I mixed in some white potatoes just to flush them out — they barely touched them.”

The school lunches are served with a small treat, said Aloe, which may be fruit with starchier meals, or a mini whole wheat cookie with a lighter meal.

“All the kids desserts are made with whole wheat flour, but I don’t think the kids know that their desserts are made with whole grains,” said Aloe. “White whole wheat flour acts almost the way white flour does and it provides a better taste, I think. It has a nuttier taste, gives it a little bit more depth.

“I cut back on the oils, too,” she added. “The brownies I send out to the school don’t have any oil in them, they have yogurt in them instead.”

Some dishes have been non-starters with the students, but “for the most part now I’ve learned what works and what doesn’t work,” said Aloe.

“I learned early on that it wasn’t going to do anybody any good to challenge them too much and not give them anything that they wanted,” she said. “We had a lot of conversations with the kids about what they wanted school lunch to be like,” and some students have even gotten involved in food preparation through a weekly cooking club and internships at the cafe.

“We really wanted to make nutrition and understanding food systems a big part of what we do here at the school,” said John D’Anieri, head of school at HCA. “The connection between what students eat, what they learn and their brain development is very important, but schools are driven by the budget into getting least expensive food possible.”

The long-term goal of the partnership of the cafe, which was the brainchild of D’Anieri, with the school is for the students to grow as much of the food that they consume as possible, said D’Anieri, and also to supply the cafe with product.

At the end of the fiscal year, 50 percent of the profits from the cafe are returned to the school to fund food-related initiatives at the school.

“We haven’t completed the first year yet,” said Aloe, “so we don’t really have examples of how this will look, but some ideas we’ve had are to purchase materials to build hoop houses at the school, or if a student has an idea for a food-related project that could integrate with the cafe, the funds could go to that.”

Already the school maintains gardens at Mitchell Field, potato plots at Two Coves Farm and blueberry bushes at the school, D’Anieri said, and the reopening of the old school house, which others had previously attempted to run as a cafe, has been a boon to the community.

“It was an existing asset to the community, but it was tough to maintain through the winter,” said D’Anieri. “The community is really appreciate of having it open again — having a place where they can gather together is a big deal here.”

Unfinished food from the cafe is composted at the school, while extra school lunch items are donated to the Mid Coast Hunger Prevention food pantry in Brunswick.

“They’ve been donating to us for a while now,” said Jackson Bouchard, operations assistant at Mid Coast Hunger Prevention. “The majority of what we give out here are bulk food items, but it’s nice to have food that is already prepared and baked goods. It is always very much appreciated.”

The school and cafe are looking to develop relationships with farmers and community partners, food producers, investors, foundations and “folks who are really looking to help us build this model,” said D’Anieri.

“Over time, it will be interesting to see if what we do here can be a model for other schools,” he said. “The local food movement is not just about shortening the supply chain, it’s about having an interest in feeding our kids as well as we can, and have them understand what it really takes to feed people.

“We don’t know what the food economy is going to look like 15 years from now,” he added.

Harpswell Coastal Academy is a charter that opened in September 2013, serving grades 6 and 9. Next fall, the academy, located in the old West Harpswell School building, will expand to serve grades 6-7 and 9-10.

The Schoolhouse Cafe, located at 506 Harpswell Neck Road, is open from 7 a.m. to 2.p.m., Tuesday to Sunday. For more information, visit www.harpswellschoolhousecafe.com.

rgargiulo@timesrecord.com