Community Food for Thought – JIG-SO Children’s Centre

Outreach services to tackle child poverty and in-work food poverty. The project will introduce a rural support kitchen service to four test areas in North Pembs and allow a large number of parents/grandparents to access the support for family food ingredients and training service.

Project Outcomes:

The project has supported local families living in food poverty to have healthy and nutritional meals and snacks (especially during school holidays as many rely in part on food supplied by schools, either free school meals or breakfast/after school clubs). It has delivered basic cookery skills, alongside some more advanced preparation and presentation skills. Regular advice from staff has been given to support the production of healthy meals on a budget. Healthy food, particularly seasonal fruit and vegetables have been available to taste enabling children and parents/carers to explore new flavours without having to commit to a purchase that may not be then eaten. Sessions delivered by staff and supported by peer-to-peer discussions have included meal planning (e.g. batch cooking), smart shopping, budgeting and basic health messages, understanding food labelling, understanding sugar levels, the importance of 5-a-day and what counts, to ensure that parents also understand the link between childhood obesity and poverty when healthy food is less accessible. A total of 99 project sessions have been supported by the Community Food for Thought project, with a total number of 141 participants over the project as a whole. 63 families have attended at least one of the 99 sessions held as part of the project.  The sessions focused around Food Poverty and Food Waste, Healthy Lifestyles and Intergenerational Activities.

“I very much enjoyed the sessions with the Jig-So Leader project. Getting to help with sharing hints and tips I’ve picked up was very rewarding, and I know that for myself and my daughter we find the social aspect invaluable. I do hope to see these sessions again as they are such a fabulous resource to lots of people in the community.”

Lessons Learned:

It took longer than anticipated to engage in new areas.