Team spotlight: Julie

The second in a series highlighting members of our team.

What better time to catch up with Julie than straight after our very successful first Christmas Pudding party, to find out more about her role and the variety of the work she does for Inn Churches Cooking – keeping cooking skills alive.

Can you share a bit about your role within Inn Churches and what it entails?

Most of my role is with the food and cooking side of Inn Churches. Most days I have groups in for cookery classes. This might be schools who bring students to learn to cook – we have some schools we’ve been working with for a few years now, and it’s great to see students developing their skills, knowledge and confidence. We also run Jamie’s Ministry of Food courses for adults: these are eight-week courses where we teach people how to cook healthy, nutritious meals from scratch. Anyone can attend these courses and we’ve taught many people to cook over the years, from people who have never cooked before to people who already enjoy cooking but just want to learn a few new recipes. School holidays are probably our busiest times of year when we run kids’ holiday classes: it’s hard work, but great fun and very rewarding.

What inspired you to get involved?

I initially started as a volunteer, working at Jamie’s Ministry of Food before we joined Inn Churches. I had just changed careers and was new to catering, so alongside the course I was doing at college I thought volunteering would be a great opportunity for me to gain some new skills, as well as giving a little of my time to help others. After a while as a volunteer, I started working in a casual role teaching classes alongside a full time job in a school kitchen. Eventually I left my kitchen job and took some time off from work before returning to teaching classes with Inn Churches.

Could you describe a memorable experience or moment you’ve had whilst at Inn Churches?

There are loads of great memories and moments over the years, but one of my favourite experiences is when we were asked to cater for a wedding with mostly surplus or re-purposed food. As we never know what surplus food we will be receiving, we didn’t have a clue until a couple of days before what we’d be making on the day. In addition to providing the catering, in the weeks leading up to the day, we dried lots of donated flowers – every few days we’d tie bunches together and had them hanging around the windows to dry. We boxed them up to send to the wedding, not sure how they’d be used. On the day we went to the church with the food we’d prepared, and all the flowers were decorating the church and looked amazing.

What challenges does your role bring and how have you overcome them?

One big challenge that springs to mind for me is working with kids and young people with such varying abilities, often in the same group, so I have to consider how to meet different needs so that everyone has a good experience and enjoys their session with us. We work at a pace that suits everyone, and some people might need a little extra support, but it’s important to us that everyone enjoys their time with us and gains new skills and knowledge.

Are there any upcoming projects or initiatives that you are particularly excited about?

At the moment I’m looking to expand my role a little and try to do a bit more outreach, so in the new year I’m hoping to start working with some of the pantries and visit to do some cookery demonstrations, maybe making use of ingredients people might be a little unsure of, or some cookery classes for pantry members to join in.

How has being part of Inn Churches impacted you personally?

One of the biggest impacts I’ve felt is my increase in confidence working with children and young people. I don’t have kids and in the past haven’t always had opportunities to spend lots of time with them, so initially felt quite nervous teaching and working with young people. Now however, seeing the impact we have on the groups we work with, their increase in confidence, the kids and their families who return time after time for classes and the feedback we receive from them makes me realise how much I enjoy what I do.

If you could have a superpower to aid your work within Inn Churches what would it be and why?

I’d love the ability to make everyone we work with excited about trying new things, and instead of saying “I don’t like that” (often before even trying something!), we heard more of “I can’t wait to try that!”. We did have a little success over the summer getting kids to try new things by introducing a ‘What have I tried new today?’ board. Every time someone tried something new we added it to their list – it became quite competitive!

Are you willing to share a quirky or interesting fact about yourself that  your fellow team members might not know?

I’ve enjoyed travelling quite a lot in the past, and been to over 40 countries, I’ve been to all seven continents, including Antarctica, where I spent a night sleeping out on the snow near a small colony of noisy penguins, it was probably around 0.C overnight, so not that cold for Antarctica, but an amazing experience. I’ve seen some stunning places around the world and feel really lucky to have seen so much.

Finally – if you could swap roles with another team member for a day, who would it be and why?

Maybe Clare or Maria, just to get more insight into the work of the pantries, I think we’re all aware of what each other do, but there’s so much more in everyone’s roles that we don’t see.