Honeypot teams up with Hotel Café Royal London
“Cook with your imagination, everyone paints in a different way. Once you know the basics you can add what you like.”
Our Operation’s team got the exciting opportunity to speak with Executive Chef Eliano Crespi from Hotel Café Royal London today. Last year, Honeypot was chosen as one of Hotel Café Royal London’s partners, Chef Eliano jumped at the chance to help with our new nutritous meals initative, offering to run workshops and sharing some of his secret recipes with our team!
Eliano has been in the business for 24 years, cooking since he was young. He enjoyed growing vegetables in his garden in Italy growing up and knows the importance of meal sharing with family. He tries to involve his children in the cooking process, making it an activity and giving them a sense of achievement. It’s not just about a recipe, it’s about making it interesting through the geography or history of the food. Eliano asked his team members at Café Royal about how they make food healthy in a way that is fun for their children. He found they spoke of seasonality, from the history of the tomato to Marco Polo bringing back spices from the Silk Road.
““It is an honour to help such a great cause, I admire the great job you do with children in need, very honrourable.””
Our nutritous meals programme has been running for the last few months in our Welsh Honeypot site in Pen y Bryn. Nikita, our Children’s Services Leader in Wales spoke through how the programme works.
“On Respite at the house we prepare the meals together teaching the children what is healthy and not healthy for them, plus, how to make food last longer. Simple tips like adding vegetables to thicken food in stews or freezing batches for the week. We make it fun! ”
“We have children from different cultures come to Honeypot, most recenty from Morocco, we encouraged her to share about how the food is prepared differently, it’s great for the other children to learn about different cultures and food”
Post Respite Break the children are invited to online workshops to discuss what they liked/didn’t and guided to continue the healthy eating initatives at home. To supplement this food vouchers are supplied to help families acquire the neccessary food through Honeypot’s Wellbeing Fund.
“Food is one thing we all have in common. It brings joy, happiness. To experience sharing food around the table is where most magic comes in the household, it’s nice that happens at Honeypot””
Some top tips Eliano shared were freezing in small batches, but avoiding adding main allergens such as nuts straight away. Putting a damp towel on mushrooms to avoid them drying out, adding vegetables to sauces and always washing fruit and veg!
The team found the session extemely useful. Thank you for talking the Honeypot Operations team through your top tips Eliano and Hotel Café Royal London.
Find out more about Corporate Partnerships and how you can get involved in helping create happy memories and brighter futures for young carers here.