Smart Raspberry Cookery School

Salad days: healthy children’s cookery classes

Basic ingredients: Smart Raspberry runs cookery classes for 5-16 year olds in South East England (from Reading to Milton Keynes) with the aim of teaching the “valuable life skill” of cooking nutritious and appealing food from scratch. Leiths-trained, Alicia Cronin, founded Smart Raspberry because she felt consistent culinary education across the country was lacking, while her area managers bring a range of culinary and childcare skills to classes. Upcoming workshops featuring festive treats such as biscotti made with chocolate, cranberries and orange zest, should provide an incentive for parents to promote this skill, if only to enjoy the delicious results. With five mothers at the helm, including one childcare professional, the shared belief is that cooking holds the key to a child’s health and wellbeing. Across various locations, the team runs workshops, classes, clubs, parties and Duke of Edinburgh courses, providing ingredients, equipment, recipes and expertise. In general, prices range from £25 – £50 in line with class duration, from three to six-hours. After-school cookery clubs range from £40-£48 for six classes and include recipes such as pizza calzone and marbled chocolate brownies.

They say: We’re a likeminded group of people, all crazy for calzone, nuts about nougat and fanatical about fajitas. We all love to cook and we’re all passionate about passing that on to the next generation. We take this responsibility very seriously, but we love to have fun and we actively encourage a hands-on approach to cooking – it’s the best way to learn!

We say: It’s a savvy business model tapping into the dearth of decent culinary education in schools. Smart Raspberry’s mission statement calls for keen, child-friendly cooks to join their ranks and spread the word across the nation; providing guidance, training and support to those who join their franchise network. Perhaps the most telling testimonial comes courtesy of their very own area manager at Milton Keynes, Asma, who first discovered Smart Raspberry when looking for a birthday party idea for her daughter. She describes her role as the “perfect business to work around her children and family life” and the decision to take it as the best she ever made.