The smell of fruit crumble and apple scones wafting through the 7th floor hallways attracts a number of Tapestry Retirement Community residents to the demo kitchen. Laughs and giggles of grade 4 and 5 students from Queen Mary Elementary up the street from Wesbrook Village at UBC adds to the excitement of the day.

Every Wednesday morning at 9:30 am this November, Tapestry at Wesbrook Village has hosted Project Chef, a pilot to create an intergenerational program between elementary students and Tapestry seniors.

Project Chef is a program that offers experiential programs to teach children about healthy cooking and eating. The mission is to teach children the knowledge and skills necessary to make healthy food choices and enable them to make wholesome, nutritious meals for themselves so that they may lead healthy lives.

Traditionally, children learned about healthy food choices and cooking from family members and the social and cultural aspects related to food were learned at the table in the context of family meal. Times have changed and in our fast-paced lives this knowledge and the associated skills are often not being transferred to the younger generation.

The wonderful benefit of involving seniors in this program is the sharing of their cooking experiences with the students which takes place through interviews. The benefits of seniors and children sharing knowledge and experience is immeasurable.

Wednesday, November 26 is the final Project Chef session in this intergenerational pilot.

November 19 CBC Coverage: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/project-chef-gets-children-cooking-tasty-nutritious-food-1.2841398