Community Kitchen Project:
Group 18- Land and Food Systems 350
Janny, Maedeh, Mana, Leanne, Dakotah
Introduction
Like food? Like cooking? Like making friends while ya do it? You’ll like community kitchens too!
We sure do. As students of Land and Food Systems at University of British Columbia, we are excited to work with community kitchen partners in Victoria-Fraserview where we will be conducting a survey to assess their infrastructure and programming. We will look at some of the current assets of the community kitchens, such as their location, status and organization of cooking spaces, and supplies available. We will then analyze our data and observations with a focus on two pillars of food security: utilization and accessibility.
,Janny
I am third year student in Animal Applied Biology and have always been interested in the health and welfare of animals. In the past I have volunteered for many local animal hospitals in which I was able to work with animals alongside many experienced workers. Moreover, volunteering helped me gain a significant amount experience and knowledge in the field. In the future, along with my career of being a veterinarian, I am hoping to travel internationally to help with wildlife by participating in protection and rehabilitation of endangered species. Other passions of mine include soccer, dancing, and going to the gym. That being said, I do believe staying active and having nutritional meals is important for living a healthy and active lifestyle. Although I am constantly trying to manage my schedule, it keeps me busy which isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
Maedeh
Hi! My name is Maedeh Dehnadi and I’m in my third year with a Food, Nutrition and Health major. I have always been interested in nutrition, as it plays a major role in living a healthy and long life. Moreover, I am passionate about working with children and I am currently working in daycare as a sub teacher. In the future, I wish to combine my two passions to help children in third world countries.This project helps me to accomplish this goal by giving me insight about different components of food security and how to address them through asset based approach.
Mana
I am a third year student in Food, Nutrition and Health. The reason for my interest in nutrition is that I enjoy how applicable it is to our everyday lives. It teaches us how to maintain a healthy body, and it is something everyone needs to be aware of. Some of my other interests are going to the gym, cooking, and traveling. My plan for the future is to work with people that are at risk due to their unhealthy eating habits, such as under/over eating. Helping people to get in shape and stay healthy is very rewarding to me. To approach this purpose, I wish to gain a better understanding of issues regarding food security by participating in this community kitchen project.
Leanne
I’m a second year student in Nutritional Science. I wish to apply to Dietetics in the future. I have always been interested in nutrition and how the body uses the nutrients from our diet for growth and maintenance. My dream is to become a dietitian and work internationally, especially in developing countries. I also love cooking and eating. I try to integrate different cooking techniques and ingredients to improve my diet. My ultimate goal is to help people to improve their diet and gain more understanding about food-related issues. And this community kitchen assessment project will allow me to gain more practical experience in this field and contribute to the community.
Dakotah
I am a third year student in Food, Nutrition, and Health. As my major probably implies, I am very passionate about growing, eating, and sharing Earth-friendly food. I have always adored cooking as an edible expression of creativity. Discovering the benefits of a healthy lifestyle brought that to a whole new level for me. That has also led me to expand explore my connection to the outdoors more through biking, hiking, climbing, and skiing. Then I found farming, the beautiful symphony of the great outdoors, righteous food, and tangible, meaningful connections to community. Now, I ultimately strive to find a sustainable and practical way to live simply in a complicated world, by gaining understanding and perspective of the food system as a whole, and my personal role in it. I truly believe real, healthy, and sustainable foods are the answer to so many of the challenges we face as individuals and as a society today, and tomorrow.
Goals and what we wish to gain from our experiences in LFS 350:
- familiarize ourselves with the existence of community kitchens in Victoria-Fraserview
- learn more about how community kitchens contribute to food security in their local region, and also in Vancouver
- strengthen our communication skills
- identify and overcome problems that we encounter as a group
- apply concepts we’ve learned in LFS 350, such as Asset-based Community Development outside the confines of the classroom
Reasons for choosing this project:
Community kitchens are a place for others to come together and cook. Learning about what goes on within one of these kitchens is important for understanding their contribution to food security. Along with that, try to get a better understanding of who exactly is helping out with the kitchens and what benefits or limitations come with that. Overall, we are hoping to gain knowledge on how community kitchens are being used positively to help participants and the community itself when it comes to having a sustainable food system.
Projects Objectives and how they connect with the goals of our community organization:
This project’s ultimate goal is to expand knowledge on how food secure neighborhoods in Vancouver are. In our neighborhood, Victoria-Fraserview, we will look at three pillars of food security. To evaluate accessibility, we will be considering how well some of the kitchens achieve their assumed goal of bringing the community together over a meal. This will include more than location (or how easy it is to get there), but also how well they are advertised to their intended community. We will also focus on utilization and economic and social sustainability of these organizations. To do this we will be inquiring about the resources accessible to these kitchens, such as equipment, volunteers, funding, and food. Then we will evaluate how sustainable the sources that allow each kitchen to run.
Describe first impressions of process to date:
Being introduced to this project, everything looked a bit tough. For example, having to go on our own time to look for community kitchens and hoping they will cooperate with us. However, once Will and Samantha went over the details of the project itself, things did not seem all that much difficult. This was because we got insight on how to approach our community partners, how to handle situations if they were to go wrong, and most importantly using positive attitude throughout this project. Ernesto Sirolli’s engaging TED talk allows us to look at problems in a different perspective. Asset based community developmenis a good example of this, and is a significant component of this project. How, when and why we communicate with our partners is important in order to understand the problems they are facing, and to possibly come up with solutions to those problems. Therefore, as Sirolli says, we need to “shut up and listen” to our partners and view their side first instead of telling them what to do, or what they are missing. We should be able to present ourselves in a professional manner, be friendly and most importantly, not bring out the negative aspects of the kitchen itself.
Also, Sirolli mentioned the importance of the word “we” instead of “I” in his talk. This is especially important to the purposes of LFS 350. Working as a group allows us to combine each individual’s unique set of skills in order to optimize efficiency of the group as a whole. Ultimately, this will help us develop new approaches towards communicating and assisting our community partners.
References:
Ted Talks. (2012, November 26). Ernesto Sirolli: Want to help someone? Shut up and listen. [Video File]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=chXsLtHqfdM
Carla Collins. (2014, October 16). ABCD animation. [Video File]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_muFMCLebZ4
