This week, our funding success story comes from Rochdale based culinary school The Foodie Kitchen and the grant they used to establish a programme providing free, culturally appropriate food to support young people.
With a successful bid in Round 2 of the Food Solutions Fund, The Foodie Kitchen were awarded a grant of £4,876 to get the programme up and running to support young people, predominantly aged between 16-25, on an ad-hoc basis.
After learning that many food banks don’t offer the cultural food these young people want and need, The Foodie Kitchen knew there was something they needed to do. Their now established social eating programme brings communities together by demonstrating and cooking the native food they enjoy, whilst also providing vouchers so they can purchase staple items to continue making the dishes at home.
It is clear to see that the programme is having further reaching benefits than just the provision of cultural food and vouchers. Volunteers from each community are supporting each of the sessions, bringing their expertise in specialist ingredients and the best local places to source them.
The attendees also gain valuable learning and development around language and translation. Involving all of the cohort of students in the cooking process gives them valuable life skills and budgeting skills, which will help them manage their food budgets more effectively moving forward.
Case Study | Making a Difference
It was great to hear about the progress of one of the programme's attendees, Aminullah. The Foodie Kitchen told us: "Aminullah is one of the Afghani participants who is here alone and lives in a one-bedroom flat. At only 19, he is self-taught and a confident cook who led the sessions for the Afghani students. He has worked as a butcher and demonstrated how to prepare a whole chicken. He gave clear direction to the others who worked seamlessly as a team and took great pride in preparing and presenting their traditional food eaten on special occasions which reminded them of home. The Afghanis presented their food on large plates and then shared these between 2/3 people. Two participants wanted to make eggs because they hadn’t had any breakfast which they did and then took their dish to everyone to make sure they all got a few bites each – the brotherhood they showed was endearing."
See The Foodie Kitchen's Facebook post : The Awesome Afghanis
