tips/advice on starting a cooking club?

Question

anyone have any tips and advice on starting a cooking/baking club in a high school?

thanks for all the advice guys :)
so basically we're only going to have meetings where we bake simple desserts(cookies, rice krispies, etc.) and we can't sell any food we make to fund raise. The membership fee is only going to be $4 though, so we're in need of fundraising ideas :(

Answer 1

Never heard of a cooking club, but it doesn't sound like a bad idea. Some things you make think of are

1. Put together a cookbook. This could be something done throught the whole of the year or on more of a quarterly basis. If it's done on a quarterly basis maybe you pick a theme for each quarter. Themes could be things like main dishes, vegetarian, celebrations, desserts, breads, ethnic cusine (ie cuisine from certain countries), etc. The book, or books, could simply be made just for members of the club or for sale to raise funds for the club. Also, all recipies should probably be made by club members and tasted by all members of the club before being put in the book, or books.

2. Do kinda an Iron Chef type of thing every so often. Two club members square off and have to prepare X number of dishes using a secret ingrident and other members (or maybe some teachers) get to judge.

3. Each of you try making dishes that other members are good at.

4. Try cooking historical recipes.There are reprints of historical cookbooks and cookbooks that have recipies (either original or slightly modernized) from certain periods. This type of cooking can be intresting in that it helps learn what cooking was like from various periods in time.

5. See if you can convince the school to hold a dinner (or series of dinners) for honor roll students that your club can then cook for.

Answer 2

Well, if there are more than 8 people interested in creating a cooking club I congratulate you. And, I would not take it upon yourself to be the selection committee, no offense but you are the newcomer. Let the interested parties divide themselves into convenient groups and 8 is not a convenient number for a cooking club, waaaaaaay too many people in the kitchen, anyone's kitchen. I say, groups of 3-5 max, one for each course of a meal and the more groups the merrier. You can all get together every six weeks or so, in the common area or rec facility and create a great party for the whole condo. PS. Don't discriminate against someone who isn't young and anyone who isn't up for fun won't respond. You sound a little bit judgmental so my best advise to you would be to accept everyone who wants to be involved, make as many groups as are practical and forget you ever thought about placing conditions upon joining. What would you do anyway, fire someone for not being fun? Interview them? Please, lighten up, you are way too young to be this wrapped up in yourself.

Answer 3

Cool idea! Get a sponsor; do you still have Home Ec teachers? They'd be the natural sponsor.

You could get together and work on 1 skill per meeting, like chopping, sauteeing, braising, etc.

You coudl have canned food drives for your local food bank or charitable group that provides food to needy.

You could make "mixes in a jar" to sell for fundraisers.

You could have special speakers come from gourmet grocery stores (or go there as a group) to learn about cheesemaking, organic farming, sourdough bread baking, and so forth.

I encourage you to find a teacher willing to sponsor it, and together you guys plan it!

Answer 4

I actually really want to do the same thing! Go to the guidance counciler's office, they probably have a form for you to fill out. At our High School, you have to get a lot of signatures to get a club approved.

Good luck.