Are celebrity chefs a good or a bad thing?

There are many ways in modern society to get rich and famous with what seems like relatively little effort – join a band, become a model, TV presenter, or… a celebrity chef! Just recently, there seems to have been a huge spate of kitchen-lovers on the TV, not least due to the vogue for old-fashioned British cuisine.

Mary Berry, Jamie Oliver, Nigella Lawson and Gordon Ramsay are all good examples of chefs riding this trend.

On the one hand, they may inspire people to cook different foods or motivate them to be healthier. People can be exposed to different cultural foods through cooking programmes or cook books, and try something they never would have discovered on their own, like Moroccan food.

Some people might not have been brought up to enjoy cooking, because they may have had parents who were too busy to cook, preferred not to or didn’t know how. Celebrity chefs may provide a much-needed role model to get people to think that, they, too, can do it.

Jamie Oliver spearheaded a health campaign in the UK, promoted in his television show Jamie's School Dinners with the aim of improving school dinners for schoolchildren. A particularly infamous aspect was his call to ban the turkey twizzler. This campaign permanently changed food standard requirements across the UK, influencing government policy, and the show crossed the Atlantic to the to try to improve American eating habits.

On the other hand, overly complicated recipes and exotic ingredients may put off the average person. Too many kitchen appliances, unpronounceable dishes or five-hour long recipes. Watching cooking shows on TV is not quite the same as doing it yourself, and the irony is consuming a greasy take-away whilst sat in front of Ready, Stead, Cook. Trying to copy a celebrity chef can end up in a bit of a mess, too.

Equally, the cult of celebrity means that some people may become celebrity chefs without actually possessing a passion for cooking – or love being famous even more than food. Chefs have been accused of promoting ‘money-saving’ techniques, which come across as hopelessly middle-class and miss their target audience.

It can become a race to be the next big thing, and obscure the fact that the origins of the joy of food comes from eating a delicious, well-prepared meal  - with people you love. Contrary to popular opinion, it is not that expensive to cook with basic, fresh ingredients. A single onion shouldn’t set you back more than 10 pence from the grocer, or a 1k bag of pasta can be less than £1 from big supermarkets.

Be your own celebrity chef, and develop a cooking style all your own.

By Catherine Heath

Summer cooking tips!

By Debbie Valentine

For a lot of us (especially the men), cooking in the summer means only one thing: the barbeque. Whilst there is always a time and a place for a barbeque, summer is a great time to get into the kitchen and cook up some exciting, healthy and delicious food that you can hopefully enjoy al fresco.

It’s perfectly understandable that no-one wants to spend a lot of time slaving over a hot stove when the sun’s out, so it’s a great excuse to make some tasty summer food.

The staple of summer eating is often a big salad, but it doesn’t have to be a big bowl of lettuce leaves! As well as the tomatoes, cucumber and radishes that might go into your seasonal salad there’s all sorts you can add. New potatoes are in the shops in the summer and they’re equally good hot with dinner or cold in a potato salad. Why not add some chicken and some cous-cous for a Moroccan inspired salad? Different cheeses can really spruce up a salad – Feta is great with tomatoes, and parmesan gives a kick to chicken. Experiment with a big bowl and make it a family dinner. Don’t forget the croutons!

There are all kinds of fantastic veggies in season over the summer, so it’s really easy to get your 5-a-day. Beans, peas, broccoli, aubergine and courgette are all thriving in the sunshine. If the sun’s out, it’s a great opportunity to try some easy one-pot dishes you can pop in the oven and leave. Chicken and fish dishes lend themselves well to this, add in a colourful variety of veg and you’ve got a delicious dinner. Pasta dishes are always an easy family favourite, but don’t forget you can also have them cold in the summer. Make them with a lighter sauce – maybe add some sundried tomatoes, or courgettes for a twist on an old favourite.

My favourite course – pudding – can really come into its own in the summer. There is so much delicious fruit in season and available cheaply at markets and supermarkets. Strawberries and raspberries are my favourite, equally delicious served with cream (add some meringue to make an Eton Mess) or in something more adventurous. Plums, currants and blueberries are all in season over the summer as well. If you venture out of the city you can even visit a pick-your-own farm and make sure you get the best of the crop!

Finally, if you do decide the crack out the barbeque, don’t forget to make sure all your meat is cooked properly (you can cheat by starting meat off in the oven and just finishing them on the barbeque!). With a cold drink, a tasty salad and lashings of ketchup, what a great way to enjoy the British summer.

Enjoy the sunshine!

Image: piedmonte peppers, by Lydia Gerratt

Volunteers cook and learn!

Clockwise from left: Monisha, Ingrid, Sophie, Eric, Annie, Oliver, Nicola and Catherine

The Copleston Centre is a church in Peckham that normally hosts our Fit Foodie, Creative Therapies and Family Cooking sessions, but today was just for Mini Cooking Club staff and volunteers.

This week's team meeting saw a big collection of our volunteers coming together for a healthy eating lesson, kitchen hygiene and safety reminder, and finally eating a home-cooked meal.

We made sure we were all up to speed on kitchen safety and hygiene essentials like always washing hands before handling food, and never running with knives. But you all knew that!  We covered the Eat Well plate, essentially a nutritional guide for eating a balanced diet, which must include carbohydrates, protein, some fat and lots of fruits and vegetables (big surprise!).

Cecilia Belier, the Mini Cooking Club founder, cooked everyone delicious mandarin pasta (mixed with rocket, green beans, and seasoned with olive oil and Parmesan). This was followed by freshly sliced pineapple, which was bursting with flavour due to the fact that it is now in season.

Led by Cecilia, this meeting shows just how complex the charity has grown. From a small organisation consisting solely of Cecilia and two others, the staff and volunteers included people from the cooking, fundraising and media sides of the charity.

Cecilia reminded us of why the Mini Cooking Club is all about food. In previous roles working in the public health sector, she experienced a lot focus on nutrition and not nearly enough on cooking. Cecilia started the charity with the aim of teaching children and adults the joy of cooking, and the benefits of a healthy lifestyle.

Near the end of the meeting, discussions moved a little sideways onto the Great British Allotment Challenge and the importance of 'digging for Britain' during the war. We talked about the sustainability of food, and whether any of us would reduce our meat and dairy consumption to cut emissions from farming.

We wondered if it was even necessary to eat meat at all, given the unethical treatment of livestock and poultry, and thought widespread community growing initiatives were probably the way forward.

There was a real sense of community and shared spirit that arose from the evening, and the conclusion of our debate was, quite simply, 'everything in moderation'. Thank you to Annie, Oliver, Monisha, Ingrid, Nicola, Eric and Sophie for coming, and thank you Cecilia for teaching and cooking - what a great evening.

Deskilling Our Generation

Having walked the aisles of many supermarkets I have recently seen an upsurge of raw food convenient products. The pre-sliced vegetable section has grown since my last visit!

These pre-packaged vegetables are attractive as they provide an element of convenience in our already busy life. I mean who wants to spend 30 seconds grating a carrot when you can just buy it prepared.

But who is benefiting from this type of product? At what cost is it coming to us not just in terms of money but in terms of skills? What about the energy and resources used to package the products? What about the waste from the packaging? What effect does this kind of product have on our future generation and their ability to cook for themselves?

I bought a package of the already grated carrots and some loose carrots. I was curious to see what they tasted like and was also curious to compare the actual monetary cost.

The picture above speaks for itself. But, let me just say that when I opened the bag fresh was not the first word that came to mind! I didn’t even think to wash it as the product states that it is already washed.

As I stood there munching away, I noticed the allergy advice: may contain celery, egg, gluten, milk and soy. I ask why on earth would a carrot contain all these products?

Are we really saving that much time when we buy such products? And what are we doing with the time we save?

Buying convenient raw food products is coming to a cost, monetary and skill wise.

If you are interested in your child attending a free six-week cooking course, and live in the borough of Lambeth or Southwark, please visit the Mini Cooking Club website for more information, or email us.

By Yancy Jensen

Clearspring: Bringing Japanese Food Home

Japan is the land of the rising sun, of rice fields and chopsticks. As exotic as it gets, only in recent years has sushi travelled across the Pacific onto British shores, and into local London eateries across the city.

That’s what most of us think of first when it comes to Japanese cuisine, anyway.

Japanese food is can be tricky to cook, not least because it requires an array of specialist ingredients. For anyone interested in cooking this type of food at home, Clearspring are here to help by providing a quality range of affordable products, to help you reproduce some delicious Eastern dishes.

The Mini Cooking Club attended the Clearspring 20th anniversary event at Icetank, Soho. There were geisha makeovers, kimono loans and lots of free Clearspring food and drinks. The highlights were seaweed cocktails and tempura broccoli. There was also a formal Japanese tea ceremony at the venue, during which attendees could witness the traditional, elaborate way of consuming this ancient beverage.

All of their products are organic, GM free, vegetarian and ethically produced. Clearspring has a long history of working closely with its suppliers and developing strong relationships across the industry, that support sustainable organic farming and benefit local communities. They want people to enjoy the same quality and taste of food that our grandparents enjoyed, and their goal is to "get organic food back on the dining table."

Clearspring artisans have also developed lots of unique recipes for you to try, including make your own sushi and summer fruit jelly.

You can buy their products directly from Clearspring online, or you can visit one of their many stockists in person.They also sell many other organic goods which are not Japanese, but equally as healthy and delicious. Follow them on Facebook for recipes, giveaways and updates.

There’s something about the formality and politeness of Japanese culture that remains alluring even in the global society of today. The neatly packaged parcels of food and careful rituals create a mystique around an otherwise every day experience.

By Catherine Heath

Surgery and Sautéing

An essay called ‘Michelin-Starred Theatres,’ by R. Newton, et al, draws attention to the parallels between fine dining and surgical practice. Some of the similarities between the chef and the surgeon’s working day include long hours, top standards, intensive training and an emphasis on teamwork.

Cooking and surgery are both related to the promotion of good health. Though restaurant food can be full of unhealthy ingredients like fat, sugar, and salt, chefs play a key role in nourishing the nation’s body. Similarly, surgeons are specially trained to help the body if something goes wrong.

Though we may not all be Michelin chefs, each individual needs to learn vital cooking skills in order to feed him or herself. Everyone must go through the process of learning how to boil an egg, make pasta and maybe eventually sauté potatoes.

Unpronounceable ingredients and difficult recipes on cooking programs can scare the average cook out of the kitchen, but cooking doesn’t have to be complicated or fancy. There is a need to get back to basics, and just have some fun in the kitchen.

Here are some easy recipes to get you started:

• Spicy Salami and Tomato Pasta Sauce

• Easy Oven Frittata

• Black Beans and Rice

On the other hand, surgical practice is quite a bit more difficult, and should only be performed by qualified professionals! Happy cooking.

The Mini Cooking Club runs a variety of cooking workshops aimed at families and children, teaching members practical skills and essential nutrition knowledge. If you are interested in booking a free place for you or your children, please visit our website for more course information. 

By Catherine Heath

The Nutrition During Pregnancy Programme: Week One

It’s been a busy week for the Mini Cooking Club since the launch of our brand new Nutrition During Pregnancy Programme, which started on Monday 13^th May at East Dulwich Community Centre. I went down there to check it out.

It was off to a bit of a wobbly start when we discovered that the community centre put locks on their equipment cupboards for safety, leaving us with no key. Off I popped to the local Co-op to see if they could help.

The first class was a success! The programme was created and is run by our certified nutritionist, Karen Buckley ANutr. On the menu this week was a delicious and surprisingly simple mango and lettuce salad, homemade chips and homemade burgers, both veggie and meat. Dessert was to be Karen’s signature mouth watering banana and carrot muffins.

One of our attendees

It was off to a bit of a wobbly start when we discovered that the community centre put locks on their equipment cupboards for safety, leaving us with no key. Off I popped to the local Co-op to see if they could help.

We started off baking the muffins first, much to the dismay of the weight watchers group in the next room. Next, we prepared the burger mixtures, chopping and blending to create coriander and butterbean for the veggies, and onion and minced beef patties for the meat eaters. We sliced up large baking potatoes for chips, and baked them in the oven along with the burgers.

We had a break for the nutrition class, during which Karen taught the students about the stages of pregnancy and associated physical changes, weight change, The Eat Well Plate, and the necessary nutrients to stay healthy.

After our work was done, we sat down to eat and get to know one another. Thankfully we had cutlery, as the salad covered in lemon juice would have been impossible to pick up with our hands! Sitting down to eat together at the end is one of the key elements of the programme, because it encourages the attendees to discuss their experiences. According to all involved, the first class was a success! You can view more photos here. We headed for home, tired but happy.

As a brand new programme, Nutrition During Pregnancy holds much promise and is the first of its kind. Our aim is to reach out to people who might not otherwise have taken an interest in the food they eat and teach them useful information at such a crucial stage of their baby’s development. It’s also an important way for mums-to-be to network with one another, and make friends.
 

If you are pregnant and looking to learn about the best nutrition for you and your baby, or know someone who is, please email Karen, or call 07779129371. Places are still available.

Our two nutritionists and an attendee

By Catherine Heath