Families are spending more money to put less food in the shopping trolley, so local chef Tony Robson-Burrell is now running free courses to show how to make a nutritious dinner for four, for just five dollars.
Tony has learnt a few skills in more than 40 years as a chef and began the free Cost of Living class as a way to give back to the community.
“A lot of my food costs have gone up 50 to 60 per cent in the last nine to 12 months – I was buying oil at $37 for 20 litres and now you’re looking at $70.
“You go to the supermarket and you can’t put as much in the trolley as you could 12 months ago for the same price. I could see people struggling and mortgage interest rates going up and less money to spend on essentials.
“We want to eat really nutritious food, but the quality of the food being put on the plate is being compromised.”
So far, he has run four courses at The Food Factory with about 20 people attending his demonstration on preparing a nutritious meal.
“I can create a really wholesome meal out of not much, really. That’s the skills of a chef with 40-odd-years-experience and it’s important for me now to pass on the skills I’ve learnt.”
He admits most of the meals are meatless to keep costs down, though he says most people do not miss meat when there is plenty of flavour in the meal. Meat can be included in the $5 budget for a family, he says, by being clever with the ingredients and cooking techniques.
On the menu so far, he has had spiced vegan bean burgers and cranberry sauce, a lentil and vegetable pie, plus a ham and pineapple pizza, making the base from scratch.
“We got the children making the bread base after showing them kneading techniques and I tell the parents to get their kids kneading the bread at home.
“As generations go by, we’re losing all that knowledge like knife skills and cooking from scratch.”
Even those with cooking skills, such as pensioners, have been attending his Cost-of-Living class because he says they can no longer afford the ingredients they used to buy.
“It’s been good for them to learn new ideas and techniques, too.”
Tony says the best way to get the most out of the weekly food budget is to buy the best ingredients possible to get maximum flavour and nutrition. For that reason, he leaves vegetables such as carrots unpeeled to retain more nutrition and make the food ingredients go further. He intends to continue running the Cost-of-Living courses as long as they are needed but is looking for sponsors to help cover the cost of hiring the facility and buying ingredients.
“Some of our food prices are the most expensive on the planet. We have all this land and water around us and all this produce and most of it gets shipped offshore.”
Tony is now planning a Young Chef School that he hopes to get up and running by April and will be open to 15 to 20-year-olds struggling for a direction after secondary school. The plan is to teach them how to cook as well as some life skills and hopefully spark an interest to take up a career as a chef.
