Cooking demonstrations and recipes
Quick and healthy food ideas for schools
View the videos featuring former My Kitchen Rules contestants and high school teachers, Paul and Blair.
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Quick and healthy food ideas for schools (DOC, 1.5MB)
Perfect pancakes, savoury zucchinni muffins, pizzas and smoothies, chicken two ways with tabbouleh salad.
View the following online videos featuring celebrity chef and food educator, the Sassy Chef, Alison Taafe, on DoE TV.
Download the Sassy Chef's recipes:
Sandwich Designer of the Year
Congratulations to the Queensland Tuckshop Sandwich Designers of the Year:
- 2014 – Anna Keefe, St William's Primary School (Grovely) – The Tunalicious
- 2013 – Cassandre Lynch, Coorparoo State School – Rainbow Pork Roll
Nutrition in the classroom
As part of the
National Nutrition Week 2015 Try for 5 Veg campaign, NAQ Nutrition has developed learning activities that can be utilised in primary school classrooms and used to support the implementation of fruit and vegetable breaks such as
Crunch&Sip in schools.
As part of National Nutrition Week 2013 and 2014, NAQ Nutrition developed two classroom resource kits suitable for primary and secondary schools. The resources aim to assist students and teachers to cook, eat and enjoy good food, every day.
An online video to support teachers is also available.
School camps
Lunchbox lessons
All children, no matter what their weight, height, gender or age need to eat from the five core food groups every day. To do this, aim to include in your child's lunchbox, fruit, wholegrain bread, salad or vegetables, meat or a meat alternative and reduced fat dairy such as cheese.
A healthy lunch will give your child the essential nutrients and sustained energy they need to concentrate throughout the school day.
Take these lessons to make your child's lunch box healthy, interesting and appetising.
Lesson 1 – Keep it cool
Use an insulated lunchbox or bag to help keep your child's lunch chilled and fresh. Using frozen bread and rolls helps keep your sandwiches cool and fresh. Adding a frozen water bottle to the lunchbox will not only keep the lunch cool but also hydrate your child during the day.
Lesson 2 – Mix it up
Making the same lunch day after day can become a little boring for both you and your child. Try to mix it up by having some lunchbox items cooked beforehand and frozen. Mini muffins, both sweet and savoury, and mini quiche are easy to make and freeze well. Try these sandwich filling combinations for a tasty change:
- ham, avocado, grated carrot and pineapple
- lean roast meat, chutney, lettuce and tomato
- tinned salmon, reduced fat cream cheese, shallots, lettuce and grated carrot
- chicken, grated apple and celery and reduced fat ricotta cheese
- mashed banana with thinly sliced dates or sultanas.
Lesson 3 – Get clever with fruit and vege
There's lots of fun and interesting ways to include fruit and vegetables in a lunchbox. Make up fruit kebabs on paddle pop sticks. Use small cookie cutters to make fun shapes such as hearts, stars and flowers. These work particularly well with watermelon and rockmelon. Cut up vegetable sticks such as cucumber, carrot or capsicum and add to the lunchbox with a dipping sauce such as salsa, hummus or avocado. Fill celery sticks with reduced fat cream cheese and top with sultanas.
Lesson 4 – Try turning your sandwich into sushi!
With sushi being so popular, try turning your sandwich into a sushi roll in a few easy steps.
Step 1: Take two slices of wholemeal bread and cut off the crusts. Flatten bread slices with a rolling pin.
Step 2: Spread each slice with reduced-fat cream cheese or a similar spread such as avocado, hummus or reduced fat mayonnaise.
Step 3: Lay your chosen filling at the bottom of each slice – If you're using vegetable sticks such as carrot, cucumber or capsicum cut them to approximately 15cm in length. You can also let the vegetables hang over the edges for that real sushi look.
Step 4: Roll up the bread, pressing gently to seal, then cut each roll in half. If necessary, use some more cream cheese to seal the roll if necessary. Serve with chopsticks for a great lunchbox surprise.
Sandwich sushi filling ideas
Sweet chilli chicken – reduced fat cream cheese, sweet chilli sauce, cucumber, carrot and chicken.
Tuna and salad reduced fat cream cheese, canned tuna, corn, avocado, carrot, cucumber.
Mediterranean hummus, baby spinach leaves, lean roast meat or ham and capsicum.
Lesson 5 – Plan ahead!
Think about what you will need for your child's lunchbox when doing your weekly shopping. When you plan before you shop, you will know what you have on hand to pack, and what you might need to buy. It will save you time and money!