Prue Leith Opens New School FEAST Kitchen at Doncaster
College
Prue Leith Opens New School FEAST Kitchen at Doncaster
College
Celebrity chef Prue Leith opened the
new state-of-the-art culinary facilities at Doncaster College on
Wednesday 13th January. They provide the latest in the
national School FEAST training provision for the school food
workforce.
The college is one of 29 specialist centres
and partnerships comprising School FEAST (Food Skills and
Excellence Training), the national training network. It became a
regional training centre for the School FEAST network in November
2008 after a successful bid with partners, Doncaster School Meals
Service and NHS Doncaster. As a result, a brand new
state-of-the-art training facility has been built at the
college.
The new centre will provide training and
continuous education for cooks, kitchen assistants, lunch-time
supervisors, school business managers, school governors, senior
leadership staff, pupils and their parents. Across the network,
School FEAST offers a core list of training and qualifications.
Added to this core offer are many localised, bespoke training
courses. At Doncaster, this includes Food and Drink Service,
Customer Service, Hospitality Supervision and Leadership level 3,
Chef Diploma level 1, and Professional Cookery.
Prue Leith Opens New School FEAST Kitchen at Doncaster
College
Prue Leith said; “This college is a joy to
come into,” she says. “The new facilities are just wonderful. What
I like about the feast centres generally, and this one in
particular because it’s so wonderful and new, is that they are
designed for school cooks, so they have all the equipment that they
would find in a school. It’s specifically designed for them.”
The School FEAST network was established in
October 2006 by the School Food Trust and is critical to ensuring
school cooks have the skills they need to transform the quality and
provision of school food.
Doncaster’s School FEAST purpose-built
kitchens will provide a readily accessible supply of high quality
training and ensure the school food workforce is motivated and
encouraged to take up the training needed.
This is especially critical since the
introduction in September for all schools to follow new government
guidelines for food and nutrition-based standards.
Gill Parkes, Academy Director of Doncaster
College, said: “The new School FEAST kitchen facilities at the
college will allow us to live up to our name and become a ‘Hub of
Activity’ for the raising of standards and the up-skilling of the
local school meals workforce. It will enable us to reach a wider
audience of school leadership groups, school children, families and
local community groups."
Doncaster College also offers a wide variety
of catering courses if you would like further information, please
call our Learner Services team on 0800 358 7575 or check out our
website at www.don.ac.uk
Updated 04/02/2010