March is National Nutrition Month, a campaign sponsored by the American Dietetic Association (ADA).  The ADA is the nation’s largest organization for food and nutrition professionals and has more than 70,000 members. This year’s theme is “Nutrition from the Ground Up.”  To celebrate National Nutrition Month, The ADA has been invited to ring the closing bell at NASDAQ stock exchange, the largest electronic equities exchange in the U.S. 

According to ADA, the NASDAQ closing ceremony is broadcast live at 4 p.m. Eastern Time on CNBC and Bloomberg TV, and on NASDAQ’s Web site at: http://www.nasdaq.com/about/marketsitetowervideo.asx.  If you can’t catch the ceremony live, you can view it later in the NASDAQ video archive section at http://www.nasdaq.com/marketsite/marketsite_events.stm.

I love the theme “nutrition from the ground up” because it embraces the goodness of eating locally grown foods and/or growing your own food.  This weekend, I had the pleasure of doing both.  It was a gorgeous gardening Saturday in mountain Maryland and I got out in my backyard garden and raked and turned and dug in the dirt and planted onions and peas.  Gardening truly is therapeutic and yields delicious returns.  I’m already anticipating the tasty fruits (or should I say vegetables) of my labor.

On Sunday, we visited the Pennsylvania Maple Festival in nearby Meyersdale, PA. This year the festival celebrates its 63^rd year.  Famous singer, Kate Smith, pronounced the local syrup to be the “sweetest she had ever tasted” on her radio show in 1947. According to local historians, this publicity furnished the impetus to promote Somerset County maple syrup and the festival was born. 

A few interesting maple facts:

• A maple tree is usually 30 years old or more before it is tapped.
• The ‘mapling’ season may last for 8 to 10 weeks, but during this period the heavy sap may run only 10 to 20 days.
• The harvest season ends with the coming of spring’s warm nights and the first stages of bud development of the trees.

For more information, visit www.pamaplefestival.com.

How do you  celebrate healthy eating “from the ground up?”