Cook with Me- Hands on cooking for your little one

Aim

Our aim is to create a cooking programme for children aged 18 months to school age for the use in early years settings or at home.

Welcome and thank you for taking the time to look at our crowdfunder.

Currently one in five children in the UK starts school overweight or obese – ‘Cook with Me - Hands on cooking for your little one’ is committed to reducing this figure.

Our social enterprise will provide affordable and accessible healthy recipe packs for children across the UK, aged 18 months to school age, for the use in early years settings or at home.

The evidence supporting good nutrition in early years is clear. Practitioners and public health experts agree that giving a child a healthy start in life is vital as nutrition in the early years has consequences across the life course. Early years settings have an essential role in helping to support parents to establish good eating habits at the earliest opportunity. 

Children love to bake and get creative but finding recipes that are in line with NHS nutritional guidelines can be tricky. The Cook with Me - Hands on cooking for your little one overcomes these issues, as each of the recipes have been created to fit in with the Setting the Table document and NHS healthy eating guidelines, meaning they have no added sugar or salt thus promoting a healthy and balanced diet.

Our recipe packs offer an affordable and accessible solution for children across the UK, aged 18 months to school age, for the use in early years settings or at home. Each pack has also been carefully designed to support positive wellbeing and develop numeracy and literacy skills. Children will gain practical life skills and a sense of achievement as they advance through the different stages.

What will the programme look like?

The programme will come in 5 levels ranging from ‘no cook’ to ‘pizza from scratch’. Each level of the programme will contain between 8 and 10 recipes, stickers, lesson plans and ideas on how to extend the learning and a certificate of completion for when your little one has completed all the recipes in that level. The full course will contain 39 recipes, will be based around the NHS guidance for nutrition (Setting the Table document in Scotland), and we are working with the EYN Partnership to see if they can endorse all our recipes. This gives you the peace of mind that not only are the recipes fun, educational and exciting, but also healthy. We will also provide information on how to adapt them for vegan or vegetarian lifestyle and allergies.

Early Years Packs
These packs have been designed to fit in with the academic year. This means that an early years setting can complete the full course in one year with each age group. In addition to the recipes there will also be lesson plans and ideas which have been planned by an experienced primary teacher to enhance and deepen the learning for the children.

Each year the course content will be updated and refreshed to keep it new for the children and setting. Once an early years setting has completed the full course, they can provide evidence and receive a logo which can be used on marketing to prove you are a Cook with Me setting - giving parents the knowledge that you take healthy eating seriously.

If you do not wish to implement the full course yourself then we will have passionate leaders who can come in to deliver blocks in your setting. Each block will have 6 sessions and can be used to supplement any health and wellbeing outcomes you are working towards. These sessions will be delivered by PVG's/ DBS checked staff and they will all have at least level 2 food hygiene.

Home Packs
Home packs will follow a similar set up but will contain further information about how to support healthy eating in the home, top tips on how to start cooking, and health and safety guidance. These recipe packs will be delivered directly to your door with healthy, nutritious and age and stage appropriate recipes for you and your little one to do together. Cook with Me will also be running terms of cooking classes where families can come along to their current location and cook, then play together.

Why are we Crowdfunding?

We want to grow the programme in all areas, from additional recipes to a full timetable of physical cooking classes and we need your help. The initial money will be spent on marketing materials, creating and testing recipes, website, building social media channels, buying cooking equipment for the cookery sessions, insurances and food safety training for leaders. 

We currently have a number of families who access our services who do not have a fixed abode or full cooking facilities, so it would be lovely if we could create some packs and provide these free of charge to local food banks, homeless shelters and refuges; or even provide free cooking classes to community projects too.

The harsh reality and why we need your help

Young children have too much sugar in their diet – on average the equivalent to 8 cubes per day compared to the maximum recommendation of 3-4 cubes per day – we want to help to reduce this 

Young children eat too little oily fish – on average they have just 13g per week which is less that a tablespoon – we want to increase this 

Young children have too little fibre in their diet – on average only consuming 10g of fibre per day versus the recommended 15g per day – we want to change this

Young children should be encouraged to eat plenty of fruit and vegetables in their daily diet – evidence suggests that they do not currently eat enough – we want to help them eat more 

Who are we?

We are Maisie and Amber. 

Amber has worked with families and children since she was 17. She has an HNC in early education and childcare and a BA in Childhood Studies, and since graduating university she has worked mainly in private early years settings. Drawing on all of her experience, she believes that this programme would be a beneficial enhancement within the early years sector. 

Maisie is a qualified chef and currently works in a community cafe supporting young adults with additional support needs to gain practical and certified training, in a warm and friendly environment. She has seen first-hand just how much cooking can build a young person's sense of self-confidence and provides them with real life skills. Maisie is well experienced in creating recipes for all stages of skills and has the practical knowledge to design a programme. 

We are both parents and love to cook (and eat) at home with our little ones. Creating meals together is a great way to bond, try new foods and explore senses.  

What people say about us

'Amber is creating a community to support all parents to remove the isolation that so many of us feel in addition to educating us about how we can support our children’s learning. In doing both of these it is supporting our children in the future.'

'They are working tirelessly to bring further play experiences to families in Edinburgh and the surrounding areas. The space is so tranquil and relaxing and makes it the perfect spot to go when you need a break, but the children need entertained.'

'Because it teaches everyone that you using natural resources like sticks can keep children happy for hours and gives them the opportunity to use their imagination skills'

'Focus on teaching how to PLAY which is increasingly important and missing for youngsters.'

'One of a kind play “service” using natural, loose parts and encouraging independence. Both are terrifying for parents but the benefits are well known.'

'We would recommend Nurture the Play, and will definitely be back in the future.'

This project successfully funded on 30th March 2020