The Infants and Juniors have all been busy in the kitchen this term exploring some seasonal produce as well as learning new skills. There has been a bounty of homegrown apples around and both groups have used them in their cooking. A big hit has been ‘Apple Dappy’, a fun recipe involving a simple pastry mixture rolled up with an apple filling and then cut into swirl buns. Both groups enjoyed making these and taking them home to share with their families. Everyone agreed they were very tasty! Baked apples were also on the menu in the Infants class and the children honed their chopping skills with this simple dish that combined the complimentary flavours of raisins and cinnamon with the apple.

Earlier in the term the Juniors had a go at making their own bread rolls. They learnt about yeast and watched their rolls grow bigger as they proved. They all felt a great sense of achievement in the end result of real tasty bread that they had made themselves.

After the half term break the Infants learnt about pumpkins. They carved them with faces and used the insides in their cooking too. They found out how this versatile vegetable can be used to make both sweet and savoury dishes and sampled some different spices that compliment it well. They made a spiced pumpkin soup as well as pumpkin passion muffins with a yummy cream cheese icing.

The Juniors have taken on a big challenge, and tried some warming autumnal flavours, in making a delicious chicken and paprika stew with herby dumplings – flavoured with the school’s own homegrown rosemary. Lots of skills were combined to create this dish as well as having to face the hurdle of the dreaded onions as some have found it harder than others to fight back the tears!

Skills in peeling, chopping, grating, weighing, measuring, mixing, sieving, kneading, frying, stirring and rolling have all come together to create these culinary treats this term. It’s been wonderful to hear some of the pupils asking for the recipes to try at home and we hope that this is the first step towards being able to produce nutritious meals for themselves and their families.