Participants of a Sunbury disability support group held a free cooking class, demonstrating the skills learnt through ongoing educational sessions covering kitchen skills and preparing healthy lunch meals.
Healthy Lunchbox Snacks Cooking Classes are held on the last Tuesday of each month by Distinctive Options Sunbury, giving participants the opportunity to share the kitchen skills that they have learnt through the organisation’s cooking education sessions in the weeks prior.
The educational program has been provided by Distinctive Options disability support worker and former chef Zak Obeid, who said that the end-of-month public cooking class initiative began as a way of the organisation finding new ways to offer support and promote connection within the local community.
For the recent class on Tuesday, August 27, participants offered a class on preparing sushi.
“It was vegetarian sushi … preparing all the ingredients for sushi, how to roll a nori roll. We do everything, so we practise and practise over again until our participants feel comfortable and confident reading and working with that recipe,” Mr Obeid said.
“It’s their choice – they choose what they want to learn and what recipe they would like to recreate or make.”
Mr Obeid said that the skills he has focused on include effective knife and kitchen safety skills.
“It has been really good because I can pass what I know and my [cooking] skills on,” Mr Obeid said.
The recipes presented in the public cooking classes so far have included vegetable and egg muffins and sushi, with a class on cooking quinoa and feta patties set for Tuesday, September 24.
Classes are free and are provided at the Dulap Wilim Hub in Sunbury.
Distinctive Options offers support services for people on the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS).
To attend the next cooking class in September, RSVP with the organisation due to limited places.
Contact: 0400 881 664
