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14 February 2025
Schools in Lancashire have been making good use of Food for Life’s wealth of resources to run cooking clubs. They’re able to access these expert resources thanks to Lancashire County Council commissioning Food for Life to make good food the norm across the county.
Ellie Crompton, a teaching assistant at St Stephen’s Church of England Primary School, attended Food for Life’s Cooking Confidently in the Classroom training day, together with 12 other teaching staff from across Lancashire. She was pleased to incorporate her learnings from the day into her school cooking club, teaching pupils the safe ‘bridge and claw’ knife skill, cutting herbs safely in a jug, and making flat breads and tomato salad with the children.
The cooking club will run over three terms this year, with children from Year 3, 4 and 5 benefitting so far. Pupils have also enjoyed being adventurous and trying new ingredients such as pepper, cucumber, avocado and red onion while making their own pizza and salad, veggie skewers and coconut dahl. Several even recreated the recipes at home with their parents!
Cottam Primary School have also held their own cooking club, organised by Year 1 teacher Nicola Ward, using cooking equipment purchased so they can deliver Food for Life activities. They have made use of several recipes from the Food for Life website, including open-topped sandwiches and sausage hotpot, and also used the cutting skills videos in lessons to support learning.
For their final cooking club, parents were invited in to cook with the pupils, all sitting down to eat together in the hall. Children have reported that their parents have bought plastic chopping knives to use at home, just like they have used at school!
