«Eating is more than just food intake»
Mr Caviezel, you are a top chef, cookbook author, run a food lab and a cookery studio. «Kids, get in the kitchen» is a project close to your heart. What is it about?
I visit schools to cook with children and young people. We've just returned from a week-long tour of schools in various cantons. For the first time, we also stopped at a home for young people with behavioural problems. Working with these young people amazed me: they really blossomed when we were cooking. They didn't need the one-to-one support they are used to, they were so committed to their work.
What is the aim of your project?
It makes me think that many children have lost touch with food and have no idea what celeriac or lettuce is. They don't learn from their parents because they are busy at work and hardly have time to cook. Home economics is also neglected at school - a subject that should be at least as important as sport.
On the one hand, children have to learn the basics of a balanced diet from somewhere, otherwise they run the risk of becoming ill. On the other hand, food is more than just nourishment: it brings people together and trains our social skills. A teenager from the youth home told me that he was only now realising how important shared meals at home had been for him - he might have had the opportunity to talk about problems earlier. That touched me.
What can classes expect in your courses?
A course lasts a good three hours and starts with product knowledge, i.e. knowledge about local foods. Then we cook a three-course meal in groups - without a recipe, I want to leave room for experimentation. We work with seasonal, local produce and use rapeseed oil instead of olive oil.
We also address topics such as food waste, for example by making a sweet casserole from stale bread and apples or a bouillon from vegetable peelings. I also incorporate elements from molecular cuisine: Making ice cream with nitrogen, making edible pearls or powder - children love it. I also run cookery courses in my Foodlab for a fee of five francs per child.
More information: www.kids-ab-an-den-herd.com
