FRESH, FIERCE future foodies

Watching 10-year-olds on Junior MasterChef julienning like a pro and wielding a sauté pan almost as big as they are, well, it’s pretty cute. But aside from the adorable Insta opportunities, nurturing a love of cooking in our kids is more urgent than ever.

Because it seems that when it comes to kitchen skills, Kiwi adults are letting the side down. Our appetite for all things culinary may appear to be insatiable – MasterChef, MKR, TV bake-offs by the dozen, cookbooks flying off shelves like hot cakes – but new research done on behalf of Uber found only half of Kiwis cook at home daily, and only 59 per cent enjoy cooking, with dinner being the most dreaded meal.

The reason this matters? Because it’s hurting the nation’s health. Massey University associate professor Carol Wham told Newstalk ZB that people not having the skills to cook an affordable, tasty meal is leading to poor diets which are, in turn, the biggest contributor to bad health. If we don’t want our kids to fall into the same patterns, we need to get them into the kitchen from a young age.

On an industry level, there’s another reason to encourage the next generation into the kitchen. You might be surprised to hear this, with – or so it seems – a new batch of restaurants exploding onto the scene like popcorn every week. But up and down the country there is a shortage of chefs – in fact, it’s a world phenomenon. Thankfully, the New Zealand industry is busy cooking up ways to address this, from as early on as possible.

Here we talk to the founders of two of these initiatives – designed not just to nudge kids into considering hospitality as a career, but also to get