In celebration of Nutrition and Hydration Week 2023, National Care Group is shining a spotlight on a new cookery course created by registered manager Dan Burgess for Endurance Care Kent's supported living services. The course has been created for the people supported at National Care Group to learn new life skills and work towards increased independence by cooking meals from scratch themselves - some for the very first time.
Dan originally came up with the idea of creating a course as he noticed the team at Endurance Care often took the lead in preparing meals for the people they support. Dan thought it would be great to encourage independence through increased life skills by empowering them to start to cook themselves. He has created a course challenging people to create at least seven of the suggested recipes to pass level one.
The course includes important guidance on hygiene and safety in the kitchen to get started. The recipes, which are in 'easy read' format with picture instructions, include a range of ideas from how to cook a basic scrambled eggs on toast to more challenging creations such as chilli con carne, quiche lorraine, and chocolate chunk cookies.
Dan is very proud to report that each of the six people living in the service have completed the course in full and now practice their new culinary skills on a regular basis. They are working together to hold regular theme nights whereby each person creates a course, doing research on the chosen theme before selecting a suitable recipe and with colleague support, preparing the meal from scratch.
Karen Lewis, chief operating officer said: “The work that Dan and his team have been doing at Endurance Care really embodies our ultimate goal as a social care provider; to support people in gaining confidence and independence to live as full and happy lives as possible.
“Time and investment into key life skills such as cooking are pivotal to ensuring the people we support are empowered to achieve their full potential. We’re always developing our support tools and to build on this project, we have also launched a collaborative cookbook that includes recipes and training films by both our colleagues and the people we support."
Theme nights so far have included Italian, Mexican, Great British, and Valentines. The only rule being that all meals are made from scratch! Some of the great creations are shared below.
With plans to roll out Level 2 soon, the people we support are benefitting from a greater knowledge of nutrition and hydration plus having great fun making memories in the process.