JUST ADD CHILDREN’S IMAGINATION to the recipe for the perfect Muffin, as part of a primary schools cookery competition in Sunderland.
Pupils from the city’s primary schools have been invited to send in their recipes for the perfect muffin, along with pictures of their finished product and culinary design.
All the entries have been assessed, the ingredients and appearance taken into account, and five winning entries put forward to a ‘Bake Off’ style challenge on Friday 3 November in the school kitchens at Farringdon Community Academy.
The children will bake and then decorate their muffins for a panel of judges with the winning recipe and design to be recreated and put on schools menus across the city for everyone to enjoy during National School Meals Week (13 – 17 November).
Sunderland City Council’s Deputy Portfolio Holder for City Services, Councillor Amy Wilson said: “It’s great that we’ve persuaded the head chef from Sunderland College, Kelvin Linstead to be one of our judges, as hopefully some of the children will want to develop their skills into a career when they get older.
“We have invested a lot into providing schools with the best schools meals service and kitchen facilities that we can, and work closely with our community health partners to promote nutritional and fresh food.
“Competitions like this are a great way of capturing children’s imaginations, and getting them more involved in planning and preparing meals.”
Portfolio Holder for Children’s Services, Cllr Louise Farthing added: “We asked children to really use their imaginations and taste-buds to come up with some great looking and fantastic tasting muffins.
“Marks have been awarded for the best, and sometimes unusual choice and use of different ingredients, and a keen eye for design when decorating the cake.
“It’s sad we can only choose five to go forward to the final, but everyone who entered can be very proud of their efforts, we obviously have a lot of very talented young chefs and bakers in Sunderland.”
Kelvin Linstead and the other judges including Councillor Amy Wilson will invite primary schoolchildren Kendra Price aged 5 from Grange Park, Alfie Johnson,8, from Dame Dorothy, Harper Scott – Cousins,8, from Richard Avenue, Lennox Crosdale,7, from Hill View Infants and Samuel Bailey aged 5 from Newbottle to mix their ingredients, bake, and then decorate their muffins on Friday 3 November in the school kitchen of Farringdon Community Academy at 1.30pm – 3.30pm.