Emma Strachan – Health
Improvement Specialist
(Leeds City Council)
Esther Foster – Senior Community
Well-Being Worker
(Feel Good Factor)
Simon Chappelow – Project
Co-ordinator Ministry of Food
(Zest Health For Life)
Getting to
know about
cooking
Aim
This session will focus on how to deliver
cooking activities to different audiences
and introduce the services in Leeds that
teach people how to cook - including local
Cook 4 Life courses and the Ministry of Food
Why teach cooking?
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Promotes healthy eating
Develops cooking skills
Increases self confidence
Embeds long term health benefits individually and within
families
Provides a meal
Provides a sense of achievement
Helps to build new friendships
Improves independence
Inspires people to try new things – can lead to increased
motivation to seek employment
Encourages greater variety of food choice
Allows people to know what goes into the foods they
eat
Helps people understand budgeting and the real cost
of the ready-prepared food they buy
Introduces healthy eating key messages in a practical
way
Caraher and Dixon et al (1999)
suggest that cooking skills
interventions have the unique
ability to influence behaviours,
attitudes and confidence.
Cooking in Leeds
The Office of the Director of Public Health currently
commissions 2 types of cooking provision;
 Local 4 week Cook and Eat courses delivered by
11 Third Sector providers in the most deprived
areas of the city
 The Ministry of Food service delivering 8 week
cooking courses, within Leeds Kirkgate Market.
The current cooking model operates by offering the
public access to a Cook and Eat course in their local
community to build basic skills and confidence and
then the opportunity of signposting into the Ministry
of Food, which offers a quality, assured cooking skills
programme over 8 sessions.
Starting a cooking course
 Aims
and objectives
 Write a lesson plan
 How is it going to be delivered? One-off or multi
sessional
 Practicalities: Equipment/ Recipes/food access
 Procedures: Health and Safety
 Publicity
 Skills of the leader
 What are the skills and abilities of your learners
Introducing basic cooking skills
Lots of videos on line which show how to
break down cooking skills
http://www.jamieshomecookingskills.com/skillsspecific.php?skill=howto-videos
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/techniques
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Important to start with 2 most common knife
holds claw, bridge and then introduce knife
skills rock and chop, cross chop, tap chop
Important to encourage people to think
about the safest way to prepare the food
What information about your
audience is useful to start?
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How old are they?
What is their ability?
Have they cooked before?
Do they enjoy cooking?
What support do they need?
What information would be helpful?
Do they have any particular barriers to healthy
eating?
What would be the key priority for the
course/session?
Would they need any further support to practice
the skills at home?
Influences on food choice
What’s the priority message?
Who are you teaching?
What support is there
 Healthy
Living Training – to share key
healthy eating messages
 Services already commissioned all over
the city – could be co-delivered as a
training opportunity
 Leeds Choice and Access forum –
available to share good practice and
trouble shoot
 Cooking Course Good Practice guide
and other support resources available at
Public Health Resource Centre
Commissioned Activity
Cook
4 Life
Ministry of Food
Both services are able to demonstrate improvements in
eating behaviours measured before and after the
intervention. These include:
 Increased cooking from scratch
 Decreased takeaway/ready meal consumption
 Increased fruit and veg intake
 Decreased snacks and salt intake
 Improved confidence
Cook 4 Life courses
Healthy eating and cooking course
 4 weeks long
 Group cooking sessions
 Free
 Delivered by voluntary sector org’s in most
deprived areas
 Pre and post evaluations taken
 Contact Emma for more details
for your local community
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Case study
Ministry of Food courses
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Healthy eating and cooking skills
8 weeks long, or one-off taster sessions
Charges for the service starting at £1 per
taster or £4.50 per session for those in receipt
of MTB
Staff trained by Jamie Oliver’s Food Team
Centre based in Leeds Kirkgate Market, also
investigating city wide model
Pre, post and 6 month follow up evaluation
Contact Simon Chappelow for more details
Case study
Summary
 Cooking
courses/session provide a wide
range of health and well-being outcomes
 Running a cooking course requires
planning and preparation
 Lots of support available in the city to help
you deliver cooking work
 Leeds City Council commissions 2 types of
cooking provision which you could
signpost to
Any questions