A day in the Kitchen with Life Kitchen #Blog

Briony Wilson
1st June 2018

Recently we were invited across to the wonderful Harthill Cookery School to spend the day with Brian, whilst the cookery school was being used to run a daylong cookery session for cancer suffers. The classes are put on for free by Life Kitchen run by Ryan Riley.

Most of us out there have been touched by cancer in one way in another whether it was you, or a close friend or family member and you hear about certain side effects, but others go a little more under the radar, including the diminishing of your taste buds. For many people there palette changes during and after treatment but for some, they completely loose the ability to taste.

For me personally, I think this is something I would really struggle with, due to my love of food, and going through these hard times you want to be able to fall back on your comforts. That is why these course are so wonderful as they allow people to gain a better understanding of flavours and play around with them, to work with your own palette and find enjoyment in food again.

These sessions have been running around the country with the support of wonderful people like Brian allowing guests to come into his school and take part in these classes, for no charge.

We managed to steal Ryan away for a few minutes to discuss the programme and learn it little bit more about how he wants to take this wonderful concept further.

How did this cookery school come about?

‘this was Sue Perkins fault’- Ryan Riley – she couldn’t make it because she wasn’t well. She met Phil and Ian two of the event organisers whilst on holiday. She came back and told Ryan she met these two guys who could help him.  They called Brian and Life Kitchen was brought to Cheshire! This was the first class in this neck of the woods and people travelled from nearly two hours away to take part. Clearly there is value in this programme that needs to grow, so more people can get involved.

Did you know you always wanted to get into food?

Ryan Riley- ‘no, not at all, I couldn’t cook until 4 years ago. I used to make carbonara with a block cheese, and a whole jug of cream and melt it together over some pasta with some bacon. You’ve seen my carbonara today, it’s a lot different.’ This was the first recipe we tried, and it was packed with flavour, it was a massive hit; I’ve even made it since.

How far do you want life kitchen to go?

‘We are just in the process of making Life Kitchen a proper charity, hopefully it won’t be long now as it’s with lawyers. Once we become a charity, I want to write a set of courses for people and invite cookery schools around the UK to give out the course. We will fund it and market it and support and get people to the classes and work on recipe development. I want independent recipe schools like this very one in beautiful locations I can give bit more to people then a standard thing.’

One of the true delights of the day was the beautiful surrounding we got to enjoy, Harthill is in the middle of the bolesworth estate with fabulous views from all angles, it really added to the experience and allowed everyone to escape there normal routine. Brian has some fabulous facilities including the BBQ terrace looking out into the hills, it truly is a Cheshire destination.

Do you have any advice for anyone who’s suffering at the moment?

We’ve got to look at what life kitchen is doing and how we can incorporate that into peoples lives at the moment. From that really practice a recipe, pick strong flavours, things like harissa( a North African spice paste) and work with them. Our Harissa salmon dish only takes 10 minutes.

We got to experience a lady being able to taste her food for the first time in a year, with this dish, that made my day!

It shows that if you use strong powerful flavours, practice your technique, try and get flavouring and cooking right, it will make a real difference. You are looking to make interesting flavours and textures, which can work together. But never underestimate the power of presentation, the little things like vibrant colours will really encourage you to try and enjoy your food even if you don’t have an appetite.

Do you have a favourite recipe of the ones you’ve shared with us today? Ones you didn’t share with us?

There is one I didn’t share with everyone, I’ve got to wait till winter to do because it’s a bit of a winter dish. But it’s a spiced turmeric lasagne. There’s a thing at the moment that turmeric can cause cancer, but we thinks it’s the nicest spice and flavour.  We roast the mince in the oven with the spices and all the vegetable’s so instead of doing it on the hob and in a pan and frying off the mince we roast it all off and its amazing. That’s a recipe I will do later on this year.

How do you come up with the recipes, do you follow Food trends?

Its all based on whats in the research, and what is nice food. We aren’t trying to reinvent the wheel. The food I cook is based on what most people eat, we just tweak it. Just because your living with cancer doesn’t mean you have to be boring.

Whats been your favourite thing so far with the process?

We launched last year but this year was the first time we actually did anything with that power. We’ve only really been going for 4 months. And in that 4 months we’ve achieved a lot. My favourite part was the class we did at Jamie Oliver’s. Because there was 24 people in it and it was very busy, it’s the biggest one we’ve ever done in the single class and we never had a person in the class who said oh this isn’t for me, everyone enjoyed it, in particular in that class everyone was so grateful. Its just so nice to see a lot of work that’s been put in behind the scenes by me but also by a lot of other people you’ve seen today there’s like ten people who take the day off work to come help me. And they don’t need to do that, and I think it’s the appreciation from people it makes it all worthwhile.

So keep up with Ryan and the team with everything they are doing on @LifeKitchen on Twitter, and if you would like to support the cause please visit  there go fund me page. This fabulous experience needs to be available to everyone who needs it, and we can all help with that by supporting.

Once again we would love to thank Brian and everyone at the cookery school for hosting, this fabulous opportunity for everyone involve and Ryan and Life Kitchen team for bringing the opportunity to Cheshire. What more could you want from the day, great people, great food, and beautiful surroundings.