Schools

Dips & Sticks Cook Workshops

Thanks to funding in 2019 from Ernest Cook, the Pippin Trust and Bulmers Benevolent Fund we can visit you at your school or community group. Growing Local staff will bring along mobile cookery equipment and set up a temporary kitchen in your classroom or hall. Working in small groups children will have fun identifying locally grown fruits and vegetables, learn about seasonality and what grows in Herefordshire and prepare and sample a variety of seasonal vegetables, fruits and dips.

Under careful supervision children will practice safe knife skills chopping and slicing a variety of raw vegetables (younger children will use age appropriate ‘safe’ knives) and prepare a range of healthy dips. KS2 children will have a go at our fun ‘Design-A-Dip’ challenge. At the end of the session children will be encouraged to taste and talk about all the dips and veggie ‘dip sticks’.

1.5 Hour Workshop for a maximum of 16 children. Cook Workshops are available for booking throughout the year. Detailed lesson plans are available on request.

Enquiries to Louisa Foti louisa@growinglocal.org.uk 07902 802982.

Veg Plot Minestrone Soup

A recipe from our school Harvesting & Cookery Workshops, ‘Veg Plot Minestrone Soup’. Uber-healthy, uber-tasty and uber-easy to make. Vary your veggies as to what’s in season or you have in. There’s no rules here other than to dice the veggies fairly finely and to a similar size so they cook evenly. Cook root veggies (like parsnips, carrots, swede, turnips, potatoes, sweet potatoes) for longer than green easier to cook ones (like green beans, cabbage, kale, spinach, courgette, chard, peas etc).

INGREDIENTS, serves 4 – 6

1 tbsp Olive Oil

1 Onion, finely diced

1 Leek, finely sliced

2 Carrots, finely diced

2 cloves Garlic, finely chopped

2 medium Potatoes, finely diced

2 heaped tbsps Tomato Puree

500g fresh or tinned chopped Tomatoes

1 tbsp fresh Rosemary, finely choped

2.5 litres hot Veggie Stock (I use Marigold Lower Salt)

Black Pepper

200g French or Runner Beans, finely sliced

200g Cabbage, Kale or any other green leafy veg, finely shredded

1 small Courgette, finely diced

80g Spaghetti, snapped into short lengths

METHOD:

Wash and scrub all the veggies. Dice, slice and chop as per the ingredients list.
Heat the oil in a large saucepan. Add the onion, leek and carrot and cook for 5 minutes, stirring regularly.
Add the garlic and potatoes and cook for 2 minutes.
Stir in the tomato puree, chopped tomatoes, rosemary, hot stock and a generous pinch or two of black pepper. Bring to a simmer, cover and cook on a gentle heat for 10 minutes.
Tip in the beans, green leafy veggies, courgette and snapped spaghetti. Stir well and cook for a final 15 to 20 minutes, stirring from time to time.
The soup is ready when all the veggies are tender.

Harvesting & Cookery Workshops

Funded in 2019 by Ernest Cook, the Pippin Trust and Bulmers Benevolent Fund children harvest fruits, vegetables and herbs from the plot, learn about seasonality and growing, sow and tend crops, taste raw salads, peas, beans, fruits and herbs and then cook and eat a seasonal dish using the vegetables and herbs harvested.

Workshops are for a maximum of 16 children. We can sometimes accommodate larger class sizes or groups by offering farm walks for half of your group if you book two workshops.

We can tailor your cookery sessions to African cooking techniques and dishes if your class are studying Africa or children have previously attended our African Garden Workshops.

Harvesting & Cookery Workshops are available for booking between June and July 2019 and September and the end of October 2019.

Bookings and enquiries to Louisa Foti louisa@growinglocal.org.uk or 07902 802982.

Cookery takes place in our brand new ‘Plot Box’ field kitchen, a converted and cladded shipping container at the side of our garden. Our kitchen was made possible by the generous donations of a surplus container from the Credenhill army camp, oak framed windows from Windowise in Hereford and all timber and cladding from Gibbs and Dandy also in Hereford.