Scotland has a strong history of community food initiatives, from lunch clubs and food co-ops to youth cafés and gardening projects, all working to improve health and wellbeing in low-income areas and to address the needs of different groups of people.
How does food and food work contribute to criminal justice programmes? Apex Stranraer show us how they involve their service users in community food activities, working with Fareshare and a local farm to source food.
Read ‘Apex Stranraer – using community food to help ex-offenders move on’ here
Anne Royle of Pathfinder Dogs recognised a need to support blind and partially-sighted people with basic meal preparation. She began by running ad-hoc sessions and was awarded CFHS funding to develop a series of workshops.
Read ‘Pathfinder Dogs – Cooking Blind workshops’ here
Edinburgh Community Food’s Chris Mantle was a member of CFHS Cooking Skills Evaluation Study Group. This case study describes now that group and networking with others shifted his thinking in how he and his colleagues run cooking skills courses.
Read ‘Edinburgh Community Food – learning from others’ here
The Forth Valley Sensory Centre in Falkirk has been running popular cooking courses for people with visual loss. The classes began last year, led by the Centre’s Café Cook – David Black, who is blind himself. This case study looks at what he achieved and what challenges he had to overcome.
Read ‘Forth Valley Sensory Centre – cooking courses for people with visual loss’ hereFiona Matthew from the NHS Grampian Confidence to Cook programme took part in the CFHS cooking skills evaluation study group. In this case study, Fiona explains what she learned most from being part of the study group, what learning she passed onto others and in turn, what impact it had on their work.
Read ‘Confidence to Cook – sharing evaluation skills to improve cooking skills courses’ here
A cooking skills course for young asylum seekers and refugees in Glasgow has enabled Youth Community Support Agency (YCSA) to integrate a wide range of skills into their learning, as well as social contacts and ways into getting involved with the local community.
Read ‘YCSA – using cooking to support young asylum seekers and refugees’ here
Joy and Chris from Windmills Café took part in a small group of community cafés looking at self-evaluation with CFHS. They used personal planning, relationship mapping and other tools to evaluate how successful their independent living skills training and employability service was.
Read ‘Windmills Café – evaluating their service to young people with learning disabilities’ here
Violetta and Anne from Sycamore Tree Café took part in a small group of community cafés looking at self-evaluation with CFHS. They wanted to gauge how effective the café was as bridge between the church and the community, and whether volunteers and customers felt that they belonged to the café.
Read ‘Sycamore Tree Café – evaluating their place in the community’ here
Joanne and Hazel from Open Door Café took part in a small group of community cafés looking at self-evaluation with CFHS. They wanted to find out how well their Sunday Lunch and other activities helped reduce social isolation and whether diners felt a sense of belonging.
Read ‘Open Door Café – evaluating their service to older people’ here
Fife Health and Social Care – a pragmatic approach to cooking skills
Lyndsay Clark from Fife Health and Social Care was a member of the CFHS cooking skills evaluation study group. In this case study, Lyndsay tells us what learning inspired her most and what changes she has since made to her own work to use a more pragmatic approach to cooking skills.
Read ‘Fife Health and Social Care – a pragmatic approach to cooking skills’ here