The cookery school where pupils rustle up dishes from surplus food
THE eight-year-olds arrived mid-afternoon at Kids’ Cookery School, impatient to get to work. “What are we cooking today?” asked Douglas, looking expectantly at Cordon Bleu chef Fiona Hamilton-Fairley.
“What’s the thing you do before you start cooking?” the founder of the Kids’ Cookery School asked them. Off they ran. Minutes later, hands washed, aprons neatly tied, the eight youngsters from Berrymede Junior School on the South Acton estate stood smartly at their work stations, ready to cook stuffed jacket potatoes for their dinner and fruit muffins for dessert.
But first came tips about cutting down on salt, not cooking in deep fat oil and a quiz on the ingredients of muffins. “Um, eggs, um, self-raising flour, now can we start cooking?” demanded Douglas.
Every year, more than 3,000 children aged three to 16 are taught to cook by Fiona at her base inn Acton, or via the mobile unit she takes into community centres and schools. Sixty per cent of these children come from families in poverty or have special needs, including those who are dyslexic, blind, deaf, who use oxygen tanks or wheelchairs.
“The kids learn basic hygiene, food preparation and how to cook a meall fromf scratchh using surplus food,” said Fiona, 53, a mother of three. “We might teach them how to make a pizza, lasagna, omelette, quiche or chicken and mushroom pie. Our ingredients are super healthy and super fresh.” She gestured to several large cardboard boxes of peppers, mushrooms, leeks and broccoli. “And for that we have Felix to thank.”
Kids’ Cookery School gets 90 per cent of its food ingredients free, delivered by The Felix Project, a charity that picks up surplus food from supermarkets and takes it to charities and which has been at the heart of our Food for London campaign. Fiona’s charity is also an example of the type of organisation that could benefit from grants of up to £20,000 as part of the campaign’s £320,000 grants programme.
“Felix saves us around £70 a week, or £3,500 a year, which is a critical saving for a small charity like ours and we will also be applying for a grant because the work we do with kids is vital to tackling food poverty and food waste in London,” said Fiona.
The importance of teaching children how to cook was highlighted at last week’s Evening Standard food forum when Henry Dimbleby, co-founder of the Leon Restaurants chain, advocated mandatory cookery classes for children up to age 11. “We need to urgently improve the next generation’s cooking skills if we are to tackle food waste and food poverty,” he said.
Almost half of British 16-year-olds have never cooked a family meal, found a survey on behalf of Unilever and environmental charity Hubbub. It also indicated a growing reliance on convenience foods, with the number of British families eating a homecooked meal at least six nights a week dropping from 47 per cent 30 years ago to 15 per cent today. Researchers found that, by the age of 11, 44 per cent of children had never boiled an egg and 28 per cent had never peeled a potato.
For Fiona, exposing children to new ingredients, teaching them how to use food effectively and to embrace cooking as part of their skill-set is the key. “The fact that food poverty co-exists with supermarkets wasting good food is plain bonkers, but I have no doubt that the solution includes educating kids to be more adept, resourceful and adventurous in their own kitchens.”
FIONA was a high-end freelance caterer working for bankers and corporate types in the City before she was inspired by her oldest son to start Kids’ Cookery School. “Twenty years ago, I watched my son’s school rip out their home economics kitchen and turn it into a computer suite,” she said.
“My eldest son was five at the time and in a special needs unit for highfunctioning autism and Asperger syndrome kids. I thought, if he doesn’t eat well and healthily, he can’t learn, he can’t get on in life. So I took him and five friends and did a cookery class around the kitchen table at home. The kids loved it. And that’s when Kids’ Cookery School began.”
Fiona reckons that she has taught more than 50,000 children in the past 20 years. “Many of the kids who come to us eat junk food because it’s easily accessible. What we do is teach them how to peel a potato and how to connect with fresh food, so that they can interact with it. The children take home what they make and the recipes as well. Some of them will no doubt be teaching their parents.”
For 90 minutes, I watched as eight youngsters became totally immersed in stuffing potatoes with green peppers, coriander, mushrooms, chillies, sweetcorn and grated cheese and then popped them in the oven, before starting on the banana or apple muffins. All the while, Fiona passed on nuggets on