Theo Michaels, who reached the semi-finals of the BBC show MasterChef and grew up in Broxbourne, delivered the session to Year 7 and Year 8 at Sheredes School, Hoddesdon, recently.
In what is now an annual event, Theo recreates MasterChef – a show featuring amateur chefs – for schoolchildren in an effort to get them eating healthily and thinking about their food.
“I find it so frustrating that there are children when you do these sort of things who don’t know what the ingredients are,” he said.
“All the ingredients are fresh and we try to teach them why that is important.”
At yesterday’s session, Theo opened a box of ingredients, similar to what the show’s contestants have, and introduced them to the students.
He then gave a demonstration of a few simple dishes that can be made from those ingredients, including Mexican fajitas, Greek meatballs and pizzas made from tortillas.
The students will now work in pairs and practise their cooking talents over the next month before Theo returns to the school to judge their efforts.
He said: “It was brilliant. I think all the kids were really engaged with it.
“I think lots of them got a bit of inspiration from it. There were a few conversations about what they could cook afterwards.”
The kids were lucky enough to sample some of Theo’s cooking afterwards, and he said all the food had gone in five minutes.
“I left happy but very hungry. The kids were really engaged and got really into it,” he said.
“They were all asking questions. Some were really quite on the ball with it and knew what everything is, and for some it was all new.”
For Theo, it is all about educating the kids how to cook, but also how to eat healthily.
“We live in a world where you get year-round produce and the supermarkets stock everything,” he said.
“Every time you open the paper you read about childhood obesity and it’s a problem.
“I don’t want to be too political about it, but bottom line is, eat healthily and exercise more.”
The chef has just returned to TV, albeit in an online setting, by signing up to Simply Good Food TV.
The online cookery channel will feature a weekly programme in which viewers can see Theo cook one of his signature Greek dishes.
Theo returns to Sheredes on Wednesday, July 8, and will judge the children’s efforts alongside the two winners of last year’s competition.
The children will work on their own or in pairs using the ingredients they are given and a small number of others.
They must cook a “healthy, tasty lunch” and a winner will be chosen.
Hertfordshire Mercury