The Cooking Pot (Partnership with DOC)
The assumptions of the project are based upon the idea that food is a social and cultural opportunity to promote interaction between people of different communities. Our experience shows that through cooking, members of different communities become engaged in a collective action, working together, talking to each other, co-operation with each other, learning from each other and enjoying meals together. The outcomes of the events we have organised show that the enjoyment of food takes place in a social environment mediated by human interaction and conversation. This project will address the priorities of the Food Strand as folllows:
- The project envisages promoting community cohesion and race harmony through cooking and enjoying food together as the project is based upon the idea that food is a cultural manifestation and a vehicle of community cohesion.
- The purpose of the project is to bring communities together through learning to cook traditional ethnic food.
- The assumption of the project is that learning about and enjoying food is a shared experience that brings all communities together to understand others cultures, share others experiences and co-operate with people from other communities.
- The pride of local communites in their cultures through displaying and sharing their culinary traditions in an element that will help communities to mix together and raise positive understanding of cultural differences.
- The “Cooking Pot Project” will also involve communities in additional cultural exchange as food is just but one of the multiple manifestation of the communities’ cultures. The cultural cooking evenings proposed in the project will also bring together dance, music, poetry, tradition and pride of communities to a melting pot experience as food in not isolated from the rest of the cultural manifestations of communities.