Cooking Up will offer individuals referred to our charity a 5-week cookery programme designed to build confidence and skills to help people cook nourishing affordable meals for their families. 

Our vision in the longer term is to develop the idea into a template that can be replicated in other areas, with our ultimate aim to set up and run community kitchens in areas of need, operating as community hubs and helping to address both the health issues relating to a poor diet and other societal issues such as loneliness.

We are looking for up to 10 volunteers, hopefully from the Ham area, with basic cooking skills so you are more than qualified! Within that group we will need “head cooks” who could help to lead the group so this might be an ideal role for you.

Our plans are to spend the next few months getting everything in place to be able to run a pilot programme in Grey Court School in Ham before Christmas. The programme will have up to 10 “clients” and will involve a five week course with a two hour session each week. Over the course they will learn how to cook five recipes and will be provided with the ingredients and basic equipment if required. During the lessons our volunteers will be able to demonstrate the techniques and guide each client at their own pace. We have not decided on exact timings yet but as we are using the school facilities it will be outside of normal school hours.

If the pilot is a success then we aim to move into our own premises so that we can expand our offering.