COOKING TIME: Sandy Docherty and Titus Salt student, Aishah, cook up a treat in the kitchen
COOKING TIME: Sandy Docherty and Titus Salt student, Aishah, cook up a treat in the kitchen

Food project aims to get children eating well

Students from a Bradford Sixth Form have been brushing up on their cooking skills this past week with their own bake off superstar, Sandy Docherty, at the heart of the initiative.

Titus Salt School, in Baildon, has been supporting the BIG Cookathon project for eight years, giving students the chance to experiment in the kitchen with some much-loved recipes.

Previous British Bake Off contestant, Sandy, who runs a cooking club at the school, was on hand to assist the contestants.

She said: “It’s great to be involved in the Cookathon. Cooking is a language that everyone can understand, it should be experimental and creative and if it’s healthy… what a bonus.

“Let’s make cooking walk and take it to the world.”

The BIG Cookathon is run by the charity – The Children’s Food Trust.

They are on a mission to get children eating well, and are challenging families, friends, schools and organisations across the country to take part in their largest mass cooking event to date.  

The annual event Cookathon event aims to get people cooking nutritious, easy recipes from scratch instead of opting for unhealthy and expensive ready meals or takeaways.

Amongst the dishes made at Titus Salt were hearty cottage pies, a dish that’s perfect for families to share.

The Children’s Food Trust CEO, Linda Cregan, said she was delighted to see the project growing year-on-year.

“This year’s recipe takes its inspiration from a time when meals were eaten by families around a table at home, without the distraction of mobile phones and computer games,” she said.

“The BIG Cookathon is one way to get back a bit of that precious family time.

“We want to show the nation how easy it is to cook and how much fun they can have in the kitchen. Learning to cook is an essential life skill and when children eat better, they do better.”