Get Cooking: The courses designed to help families make nutritious meals on a budget

Mum Jessica Roberts loves baking banana bread for her 10-month-old son, Elijah. She’s also mastered a mouth-watering fruity chicken curry and has wowed friends with her homemade pizzas.

Her new-found passion for preparing delicious food has come from Get Cooking, a free nine-week course designed to help families in Flying Start areas learn more about cooking nutritious, yet affordable meals.

“It’s opened my eyes to easier, cheaper and healthier ways to make food,” she said. “Before I started I didn’t like cooking, but this course has actually made me enjoy it.”

Get Cooking courses are run by a team of dietetic support workers, and community workers trained by dietitians, who are on hand to provide their expertise. They ensure participants learn more about the nutritional value of certain foods and put fresh, simple ingredients to good use.

“The purpose of Get Cooking is to teach families how to make healthy, balanced meals on an affordable budget,” explained Lisa Darrell, a Dietetic Assistant Practitioner for Flying Start. “It allows people to upskill themselves and break that generational cycle of parents who perhaps didn’t cook from scratch themselves.

“The price of food is really becoming an issue for some families. The less healthy food tends to be cheaper in the supermarkets, so it’s easy to understand why people go down that route. But in the Get Cooking courses we put particular emphasis on budgeting, using ‘value’ items and not using any fancy ingredients.”

At Jess’ course, on the grounds of Glan Yr Afon Primary School in Llanrumney, Cardiff, the learners spent each Wednesday reflecting on the recipes they’d made the previous week by writing in their workbooks before heading into the kitchen.

“By week three or four they know the drill and they’re straight in there,” Lisa added. “We tend to make two meals during each two-hour session, from light meals and snacks to main meals and deserts. There’s lots of variety.

“And then at the end it all gets divided up and the learners get to take some home with them to share with their families. They can then decide whether it’s worth making again at home.”

Lisa said one of the best parts of the job was to see the confidence grow in the learners throughout the nine weeks. The Flying Start Get Cooking courses also benefit from a creche facility, so their young children can be looked after while the parents cook.

“Sometimes you get people coming to the course who are initially very anxious about leaving their children, or even just doing something for themselves. Being a parent is all-consuming and you don’t tend to give anything back to yourself, so it’s nice that they have that two hours to build their knowledge and friendships.”

Jessica said she found out about the course through a mum at her son’s Stay and Play baby group. She said she is now a far better cook and can give Elijah the balanced diet he needs.

“He’s allergic to milk protein, so I was trying to find ways to cook and put in milk alternatives. That was a big challenge for me,” she added. “It was so nice to speak to other people on the course, learning about what’s healthy and what’s not and how to add healthy food to meals.”

Another mum who has greatly benefited from Get Cooking is Sophie Pooley who attended the course with her 11-month-old daughter Mila.

“I learnt to do quick and easy healthy meals, which I really struggled with before,” she said. “I’ve made friends who I still speak to now, and we were guided through the course every step of the way. I no longer have as much food waste as I used to either.” 

Get Cooking, part of the Nutrition Skills for Life programme, is available across parts of Cardiff and the Vale of Glamorgan to Flying Start families who have children under the age of four. There are also Get Cooking courses available to other groups too.

The course is also accredited at level one and is worth two credits (20 guided hours of learning).

To find out more about the courses, please go to the Keeping Me Well website here.

For more about Nutrition Skills for Life please go here.