Need a fun weekend activity? Why not get out foraging while it’s still wild leek season! One of our EFS chefs has made a video to show you how.  Keep scrolling for the step-by-step instructions. https://edinburghfoodsocial.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/bfb11dc0bff54cd28049bdc691c9ae25.mp4 1. Locate your wild leeks (try by your nearest stream ) 2. Give them a THOROUGH wash, especially if you’ve foraged them from an urban area. 3. Blend with Scottish rapeseed oil, pumpkin or sunflower seeds, nutritional yeast, lemon juice, and salt and pepper. 4. Pour it over anything your heart des ..read more

We already know our food system is broken, but sometimes the reality smacks you around the chops. This happens to us more often than most, as we do our best to use perfectly good produce that would otherwise be binned by supermarkets because they cannot adequately manage their supply chains. Last month, during the depths of winter gloom, our community partner, FareShare, delivered us ten crates each of intercepted strawberries and limes destined for landfill. In pristine plastic punnets and still in date, we now had a challenge on our hands: how do we avoid letting any of this fruit go to wast ..read more

Our local communities are feeling the cost of living crisis. Across Scotland, the average household is facing a £643 jump in their annual grocery bill to £5,265 if they continue to buy the same items. Avoiding food waste can help keep costs down, while also inspiring kitchen creativity. Inexpensive, nutritious and versatile, tinned ingredients are a great tool in the fight against food waste – plus, recycling the tins makes them a great sustainable choice. Love Food Hate Waste Scotland has developed five recipes to try with your cupboard staples. Check out the ideas below and find out more at ..read more

Since the project launched in March 2021, we have been collaborating with Puppet Animation Scotland to deliver AnimATE workshops. AnimATE is an intergenerational project through which families can explore their creativity together, both in the animation studio and the kitchen. Coming together over the course of the day, a group of families will learn the basics of animation and collaborate together on the creation of a shared movie. At the same time, we support the families to have fun in the kitchen and learn new culinary skills in the creation of a shared meal. At the end of the session ever ..read more

It’s been a little while since we’ve shared what we are up to at Edinburgh Food Social so we thought it was high time to give you a peek behind the scenes in the kitchen. Even though 2023 has been a big year of transformation for us, our mission hasn’t changed, and we are still responding to the big challenges affecting people’s access to good food, from the cost of living to climate change crises. As ever, we are using Scotland’s bountiful larder to make delicious, nourishing, and sustainable food while supporting individuals and communities to pick up new skills and come together around the ..read more

Overall, what was your experience of the Apprenticeship? “The Apprenticeship was not just coming here and learning what to cook and how to cook it. Sure, I learnt how to cook but it was so much more than that. It’s learning how to be organised, how to work as a team, how to clean up after yourself, how to trust yourself and how to use your instincts.” What was the most useful thing you took away from the Apprenticeship? “The overall skill of how to work in the workplace was very useful for me. That combined with having a contact in the industry – someone I could ask questions and to support me ..read more

Understandably, things seem to be really up and down for people at the moment. Personally, I have felt trapped between many emotions; both keen as well as anxious to go outside, more at ease with and terrified of coronavirus in equal measure and feeling both dread and positivity about our shared future. Things at Food for Good have also been mixed at this time, with even our usually light-hearted yet productive online meeting showing signs of nerves fraying and emotions high and low.   Within the world of the third sector, ‘transition’ has become as buzzy a word as ‘unprecedented’ with al ..read more

This year, we are excited to be developing seasonal baking recipes to make the best of our local, sustainable produce. With just a week until the Spring Equinox on March 20th, we are eagerly anticipating the changing seasons, longer days, and spring’s abundant fruit and veg. This recipe celebrates glorious British rhubarb: the topping can also be used as a compote on yoghurt, granola or even served with grilled mackerel. Feel free to omit ground almonds in favour of using self-raising flour for a nut-free version of this loaf. The post Spring Baking Recipe – Orange Drizzle and Rhubarb Loaf f ..read more

Edinburgh Food Social recently supported local S6 school pupils to provide a community Burns Supper as part of the Mark Scott Leadership award. Caitlin, one of the young people organising the project tells us more about what they achieved. The Mark Scott leadership award is an award where we – seven S6 pupils from two different schools in Edinburgh – were challenged to deliver a community project to help those struggling in our community. We decided that our goal would be to help those in need of food, due to the cost of living crisis. We know that these issues are prominent in our commun ..read more

As the year draws to a close we want to express our deep appreciation for your continued support this year. Your time, donations, and allyship have ensured that EFS can keep up our work transforming the food system and changing lives. If you’d like to support us to continue this work in 2023, please consider making a seasonal donation. As promised in our last blog post, we are sharing the recipe for our Kilduff pumpkin and orange jam that went out to food banks across Edinburgh this week. We adapted this fantastic pumpkin and ginger jam recipe from FabFood4All using oranges, star anise, and ci ..read more