Food for Life School and Jeanette Orrey Win Excellence in School Food Awards

Only the very best submissions were shortlisted in each category, giving applicants a chance to ‘step forward and shine’. The prestigious event was held at the Nottingham Belfry Hotel on 3rd March 2022, where a Food for Life school and Jeanette Orrey were presented with two sparkling trophies.

Stokes Wood Primary, a Food for Life School, wowed the panel of judges and MPs with their excellent demonstration of a creative initiative to serve healthy food to children within the school setting. They won the Schools category, standing out among over 25 national entries.

Lisa Didier, the Food for Life Local Programme Manager of Leicester City, nominated the school for their commitment to improving school meals and the health and wellbeing of their children and families. The submission was also supported by a letter from their local MP Liz Kendall.

The school has been working with the Food for Life Award programme and achieved a Silver Award for the whole school approach to food. They are passionate about improving the health and wellbeing of their pupils, as well as the wider community.

Before the coronavirus pandemic, Stokes Wood Primary took part in the Food for Life Cook and Eat programme. Aiming to support families experiencing food poverty and improve eating habits, the programme encourages parents and children to cook and eat healthy recipes at school. When in-person contact reduced during the pandemic, the school maintained vital connection with these families to help them eat healthy food at a low cost. They teamed up with the Chroma Church Foodbank, the Nida Foundation and Giving World - this was the first time the school had worked with the local food bank.

The school undertook a four week project that supported families to cook healthy meals from fresh ingredients, using food contributions from Chroma Church food bank and specially designed recipes provided by Food for Life. The parcels consisted of staple kitchen cupboard foods, such as dried spices and herbs, flour, soy sauce and stock cubes, fresh vegetables, salad and fruit. The families were provided with a different recipe every week, a folder to keep the recipes in and an evaluation form to complete at the end. 

Going a step further, Stokes Wood Primary sent home activities for parents to do with their children, including ideas for growing and cooking at home as well as instructions to promote these activities. The programme was a huge success and received great feedback from all the families that took part, such as: “it gets the kids involved and eating food they wouldn't try before". 

This is an amazing example of the Whole School Approach to food, which is something Food for Life is driving home and has been acknowledged in the National Food Strategy.

Food for Life are proud to support Stokes Wood Primary to serve better food in their school, alongside empowering food education to pupils and families through our School Awards Programme. We were also pleased to have their participation in our Food and Mood project, where pupils took part in a short film to explore the links between healthy diets and positive mental health & wellbeing.

Former school cook and Food for Life co-founder Jeanette Orrey also bagged an Excellence in School Food Award in the Individual category. 

The award acknowledges Jeanette’s outstanding dedication to improving school meals for all and tackling food poverty. It coincides with a large milestone for Jeanette, who at the end of last year decided to ‘hang up her apron’ and take a step back from her role at Food for Life after almost twenty years.

Jeanette has steered Food for Life from its initial Bristol pilot of 6 schools to an internationally recognised programme with 10,000 schools, acknowledged in the School Food Plan, National Food Strategy and Hospital food review. Now over 2 million good and healthy meals are served in public food settings a day through the Food for Life Served Here scheme. 

We'd like to congratulate both Stokes Wood Primary and Jeanette for your incredible impacts on school food and the wider community.