Earlier this week I attended the Community Cooking Network event at the Heart of Scotstoun Community Centre in Glasgow. It provided updates and ideas for those interested in, or delivering the NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde (GGC) ‘eat better feel better’ cooking courses. This course was designed and piloted by the NHS’s Health Improvement Team …
Cookery skills
Cooking Skills Blog 17: What are the benefits of running a structured cooking skills course?
Posted in CFHS Blog, CFHS updates, Ideas about developing and running cooking skills courses
Areas of Work: Cookery skills, Information provision
Cooking skills blog 16: practitioner guest blog –Gail Hutchison: reflecting on two very different approaches to managing and evaluating cooking courses
Gail is a member of the CFHS cooking skills study group on behalf of both NHS Forth Valley and Edinburgh Community Food. Her role at both is to manage and deliver cooking skills courses, but each organisation runs these differently. Gail explains the challenges and advantages for both her learning and as part of the …
Posted in CFHS Blog, CFHS updates, Ideas about developing and running cooking skills courses, News
Areas of Work: Cookery skills, Information provision, Research and evaluation
Cooking Skills Blog 15 – Researcher guest blog: developing sustainable cooking courses in partnership with people using a mental health support centre
In this guest blog, Michelle Estradé, research consultant at the Scottish Collaboration for Public Health Research and Policy (SCPHRP) explores how the idea of ‘ownership’ might help develop cooking courses within a mental health support centre that can be sustained in the longer term. ‘Over at SCPHRP we love partnering with community-based organisations to learn …
Posted in CFHS Blog, CFHS updates, Cooking skills research
Areas of Work: Cookery skills, Information provision, Research and evaluation
Cooking skills blog 14. What are the best recipes to use in a cooking skills course?
One of the topics that I would like to find out more about is: What are the most successful type of recipes for community cooking skills courses? ‘Success’ for members of our cooking skills study group means recipes that are cooked again at home by participants, (and preferably repeatedly). What’s the best way to choose …
Posted in CFHS Blog, CFHS updates, Ideas about developing and running cooking skills courses
Areas of Work: Cookery skills, Information provision
Cooking skills blog 13: How can ‘significant others’ help (or hinder) the aims of your cooking skills course?
Our cooking skills study group recently met together and shared ideas about running effective cooking skills courses. One topic they discussed was the role of ‘significant others’ attending courses. That is (for example), family members attending with their child, or support workers attending alongside the person they support. Significant others can help (or hinder) the …
Posted in CFHS Blog, CFHS updates, Ideas about developing and running cooking skills courses
Areas of Work: Cookery skills, Information provision
Cooking skills blog 12: Finding out if your cooking skills courses are ‘working’: as well as asking participants, who else can you get feedback from?
Our cooking skills study group recently met to discuss how they are getting on with the challenges of thoroughly evaluating their cooking skills courses. For many people that run cooking courses (or any other type of courses), it won’t be necessary to carry out the amount of evaluation that we are expecting from members of …
Posted in CFHS Blog, CFHS updates, Finding out if your cooking skills courses are working
Areas of Work: Cookery skills, Information provision, Research and evaluation
Cooking skills blog 11. Recruiting and retaining ‘vulnerable’ course participants
Our guest blog writer this week is CFHS cooking skills study group member Gail Hutchison. Gail (ANutr) has been running community cooking skills courses for Edinburgh Community Food since 2013 and has recently begun to run these for NHS Forth Valley’s Nutrition and Dietetic Health Improvement Team on a part-time basis. In both areas, Gail …
Posted in CFHS Blog, CFHS updates, Recruiting and working with vulnerable groups
Areas of Work: Cookery skills, Information provision
Cooking skills blog 10: Finding out if your cooking skills courses are ‘working’: How can you improve your questionnaires?
Questionnaires are a popular way of evaluating cooking skills courses. If they are planned well, they are a quick and easy to use and can be used for two different purposes, i.e. to find out: What difference your course has made to participants (e.g. has it improved their cooking skills or eating habits?) or/and; What …
Posted in CFHS Blog, CFHS updates, Finding out if your cooking skills courses are working
Areas of Work: Cookery skills, Information provision, Research and evaluation
Cooking skills blog 9. The new eatwell guide, the REHIS accredited cooking skills course and ‘training for trainers’
Last week I attended the Royal Environmental Health Institute of Scotland (REHIS) event for those that teach the accredited Elementary Cooking skills course and other REHIS food and health courses. For those that are not aware of the REHIS Elementary Cooking skills course – it is short (six-hours minimum); it is suitable for people with …
Posted in CFHS Blog, CFHS updates, Cooking course resources, News
Areas of Work: Cookery skills, Food and nutrition training, Information provision
CFHS cooking skills learning exchange
Registration is now open for our cooking skills learning exchange, to be held in the Apex Grassmarket Hotel in Edinburgh on 10 November. Come and hear about our cooking skills work, learn from your colleagues and share your ideas. This event will be useful for you, if you: Plan to, or, already run, manage, or …