Waitrose supports charity to fund cookery courses

Waitrose is funding The Trussell Trust’s ‘Eat Well Spend Less’ budgeting and cookery course for the next six months.

The course helps the charity tackle some of the underlying causes of UK poverty through basic cookery, budgeting and nutrition courses

The Trussell Trust runs a network of 424 foodbanks in the UK. It also provides a range of additional ‘More Than Food’ services, which aim to tackle the underlying causes of poverty by offering immediate help at the point of crisis. These include money advice, cooking and budgeting courses and holiday clubs for struggling families.

The supermarket chain’s donation will cover the core costs of running the free six-session ‘Eat Well Spend Less’ course.

The basics of inexpensive and nutritious cooking, as well as household budgeting and meal planning to help reduce food waste, are all covered in each two and a half hour long session.

The hands-on sessions see participants preparing food such as basic tomato sauce, burgers, homemade bread, and cereal bars.

Tina Varns, manager of sustainability and responsible sourcing at Waitrose, said: “We’re delighted to extend our partnership with The Trussell Trust by supporting their much needed ‘More Than Food’ programme, which helps people in need in the local community.

“We have worked with the Trussell Trust since 2012 and were the first supermarket to host permanent foodbank collection points, providing a steady flow of food to local people who need it most.”

In 2015-16 over 1,000,000 million meals were donated by Waitrose customers to help local people facing hunger.

Samantha Stapley, corporate partnerships manager at The Trussell Trust, commented: “We’re thrilled to have Waitrose’s support for our Eat Well Spend Less cookery courses. We often meet people who manage extremely tight budgets, but for someone less confident, ‘Eat Well Spend Less’ makes a real difference.

“Ending hunger in the UK is about so much more than food. It’s about building resilience and working proactively with people to make sure that when crisis hits, people aren’t left needing a foodbank.”