CATERING FOR HEALTH
RECIPE OF THE MONTH
COOKING BY NUMBERS
DID YOU
KNOW
Get Cooking,
Strathbrock
Co-op and
Cafe Mistura
regularly team
up
with the
LOVE FOOD
HATE WASTE campaign.
This promotes eating more local produce, reducing our impact on the environment and gives ideas on healthy recipes that use produce you can currently buy in the local food co-op.
To find out more about how learning to cook can reduce
your food waste and help save you money, go to wasteawarelovefood.org.uk
BACKGROUND
“get cooking” started life in 2003 as a 3-year Big Lottery initiative undertaken by the West Lothian Health Improvement Team. Since then the project has been so successful that a bid to mainstream it into the work of the Team within West Lothian Council Social Policy section was approved in April 2007.
The project aims to improve confidence and skills to prepare healthy food items by organising local cooking skills classes based on healthy eating on a budget. The objectives of the programme are to deliver practical cooking classes and to build capacity by training local people and workers to develop the skills and knowledge to deliver cooking classes within communities.
The classes are run in targeted geographical areas associated with poorer health outcomes and with identified vulnerable groups in West Lothian. Forty-six sets of 6-week practical classes have been run in the past 3 years. Additionally, an annual ‘Nutrition Skills’ training programme that equips individuals to develop knowledge and skills to set up and deliver cooking groups in their own communities has trained forty people to do so.
‘get cooking’ has worked with a wide variety of vulnerable groups and communities in its lifetime. These groups include -young mums, 50+ women, students, young people, people with disabilities, young girls (aged 11-14 years), alcohol misuse groups, older people, older men, mums attending the YWCA, Looked After Young People, homeless people, groups with mental health problems and young mums-to-be.
