Pupils keen on new kitchen

Pupils at a Newark infants’ school are having meals cooked at the school’s own kitchen for the first time in its 73-year history.

Food can now be cooked at Oliver Quibell Infants’ School after a PE storeroom was converted into a kitchen.

In the past, meals were brought from nearby Hawtonville Junior School in hot cabinets and served in TV dinner-style trays.

The head, Mrs Dawn Nicholson, said the new kitchen was having a huge impact.

Previously only 25 children, around a quarter of the school, ate school meals but this has increased to nearly 40 in just two weeks.

The menu is on a three-weekly cycle and pupils are given one choice of meal each day.

Mrs Nicholson said this was better for parents as they knew what their children were going to have in advance.

“They could book four days of school meals and have a packed lunch the other day if they know they’re not going to like it,” she said.

Mrs Nicholson said the food tasted better now it was served fresh and also looked a lot nicer.

Although the £30,000 kitchen is not much bigger than an average domestic kitchen Mrs Nicholson said their new cook supervisor, Mrs Shirley Winn, and her assistant, Mrs Christine McKeigue, were doing incredibly well.

She said they would be able to cook for every child in school if all pupils chose to have the meals.

Mrs Nicholson said: “Our new cook is very enthusiastic. We are keen to promote healthy eating and cooking what children will enjoy.

“We wanted to have meals cooked here on the premises and to have the kitchen overlap into the rest of school.”

She said they had plans to put on courses for parents and their children in the school kitchen.

The school has already been given a gold award as part of the National Healthy Schools Programme.

The kitchen, which was fitted over the Easter holiday, was paid for with a grant by the education authority, Nottinghamshire County Council, and money from the school’s budget.

It includes wipe-down walls, two ovens, a sink, a refrigerator and a hot cabinet.

A new hatch has also been installed to serve the food hot from the ovens, linking the kitchen with the main hall where pupils eat the meals.

Mrs Winn, previously assistant cook at Muskham Primary School, said: “It is very compact but everything I need is here.

“Everything in the kitchen is brand new.”

Pupils Cameron Simpson (7) and Sana Cahill (7) enjoyed a French bread fish pizza with chips, and apple crumble on Friday.

They said their favourite meal so far was roast beef and Yorkshire pudding.

Sana said: “The meals are a lot hotter than they were before and they are on nice plates now.”