Learning to cook on a shoestring

New monthly cooking classes at Lithgow Salvos are teaching people how to make tasty, healthy food on a tight budget.

With themes such as ‘cooking with leftovers’, the popular classes are full of affordable recipe ideas and give participants the confidence to cook at home rather than rely on takeaway. 

The classes are the idea of Captain Sandra Edge, Regional Development Officer for Lithgow and the Blue Mountains. 

Passionate about not giving “handouts”, Captain Edge says the classes at the Lithgow Salvos are a great way of supporting welfare clients and other low-income earners. 

 “We don’t have a commercial kitchen – we do it in our recreation room, on camp stoves – nothing flash or fancy about it, but it is lot of fun,” Captain Edge says. 

When working with single parent families in Salvation Army residential care, Salvation Army Captain Sandra Edge, realised just how important life skills were to those regularly seeking welfare. 

 “I didn’t come from a wealthy background, but we always had some flour and you made something from bits and pieces in the pantry,” says Captain Edge. 

“But I realised that when some people said, ‘I don’t have anything in the pantry’ – it meant they really didn’t have anything in their pantry. So we’re also teaching how to cook with a few pantry basics.” 

Captain Edge had dreamed for years of developing cooking and nutrition classes. When she met Adam, a local chef, she saw how to make the dream a reality. 

Adam works 50 to 60 hour weeks as a chef in a brasserie and recently completed a Salvation Army residential recovery program. He’s delighted to be able to give something back to The Salvation Army.

“The time in recovery completely changed my life,” he says.   

“I was a very heavy drinker and used to get very aggressive and violent, running from the cops and my family life was suffering. I went to Hadleigh Recovery Services Centre and everything turned around. 

“I did a trip to Broken Hill with the centre’s then manager, Captain Paul Morrice and a few of the guys. That really opened my eyes and turned everything around. So I wanted to give something back." 

Captain Edge says the classes are slowly growing in popularity and she is thrilled to see participants embracing the experience. 

“One of the girls in the class went straight home after her first class to cook what she’d learned, and posted Facebook photos of her dishes,” she says. “We get excited seeing those results. 

“From past experience this has also positive impact on the kids, as it gives the parent even greater stability and independence.”

By Naomi Singlehurst