Kellogg 4-Her brings home Grand Championship

Lauren Zaabel is no stranger to 4-H activities. The 12-year-old Kellogg resident and member of the Jolly Workers has been going to meetings for as long as she can remember with her brothers and mother, who is a leader of the group.

Zaabel recently competed at the Iowa State Fair in several categories including horticulture, where she entered cherry and Roma tomatoes, jalapeños and potatoes, all grown in her garden. At the fair, she came away with the Grand Champion award for “more than one inch cherry tomatoes” for the entry of her latest crop.

“With the cherry tomatoes we had a lot of them,” Zaabel said. “I picked what looked ripe or close to ripe and were the size we needed. After I picked about 30 of them I just played with which ones matched the best.”

To enter the competition, Zaabel selected six of her best tomatoes to be judged. When selecting the vegetables that would make the cut, she said she looked for how ripe they were, the coloring and if they are similar in size.

“When you are feeling them you want to make sure they are hard enough and not too squishy,” Zaabel. “When you pick them, you want to take off the stem on the top and make sure there are no cracks or splits in them.”

Zaabel’s other entries didn’t bring home any ribbons, in part because the judges felt they needed to be bigger.

Pam, Lauren’s mom, said to compete they sign up at the beginning of July in multiple categories and then wait to see what the crop brings when deciding which vegetables will make it to Des Moines.

“We signed up for a lot more than we ended up taking because the zucchini was bigger than we liked and the cucumbers were rounder than we wanted,” Pam said.

The process to get the vegetables ready for competition starts long before any produce is selected. Zaabel had to select which vegetables to grow in the garden and tend to the crop throughout the growing season.

“If they aren’t getting a lot of rain you want to water them to give them moisture,” Zaabel said. “You also want to make sure there isn’t any weeds because the weeds could suck up the moisture and overpower the vegetables.”

Zaabel started working the garden with her mom before she even started as a 4-Her as a helper and a taste-tester.

“When I was young, I would help my mom in the garden picking the tomatoes,” Zaabel said. “When I was three my older brothers took vegetables to the fair for 4-H and I really wanted to take something so I took some tomatoes. I won junior vegetable in the open class, so I was very excited.”

The produce isn’t only used for show by the family. Most of what they grow goes straight from the garden to the table for the family’s meals.

Plans for next year are already forming by way of a new greenhouse. Zaabel would also like to try a different variety of jalapeños and enter homemade salsa.

“Ours were just regular jalapeños but I would like to try the variety that won the contest next year that were bigger,” Zaabel said.

Most importantly, Pam said, it is a fun, family experience for the kids and a way to help them learn and grow.

Contact Jamee A. Pierson at 641-792-3121 ext. 6534 or jpierson@newtondailynews.com