About Us
& Our Work
Mission possible:
Improve
School Food
We are specialists. A team of chefs, nutritionists, caterers, campaigners, researchers and procurement specialists brought together to drive change in our schools.
Our mission is to transform the food and food education served in schools. We tackle food-related ill health through a mix of exciting projects and campaigns.
EXPERTS ON A MISSION
TO CHANGE FOOD FOREVER
fuelling the future…
Today’s children are tomorrow’s leaders, carers, workers, thinkers and innovators. They’ve got enough on their plates without having to worry about rubbish food being on them.
Everyone benefits from offering tasty, nutritious, and sustainable food. Food that inspires the mind and energises the brain. We’re on a mission to make that happen.
Our Revolution Story
So Far…
Beige…
so much beige.
Since Jamie Oliver said so long to turkey twizzlers, people assumed school food was fixed. But boring, bland food can still be the norm and food education an afterthought.
2014-2017
the early years
In 2014, Henry Dimbleby sent a tweet asking for a chef to cook in his children’s state school. Nicole Pisani replied and quit her job as a head chef at Yotam Ottolenghi’s chic Soho restaurant NOPI. She never looked back. Louise Nichols, the executive headteacher at Gayhurst, saw Nicole’s great work. So, she and Henry Dimbleby started gathering support from key people for the cause. Some of Nicole’s chef contacts joined in, adding their Michelin stars. A movement was born.
2018-19
Chefs in Schools was created
In 2018, we launched as a charity. Tiny in size and with a few dedicated people, we began to spread this new model to schools. Some early media exposure saw schools lining up to work with us and chefs applying to feed the future.
2020-21
The covid years – a school of food and delivering lunches to hungry kids
At Mandeville Primary in Hackney, we teamed up with architects Surman Weston. Together, we transformed an old caretaker’s cottage into a food education hub. The produce is now grown right on-site. When Covid closed schools, kids lost their free school meals and were going hungry at home. We gathered a team of volunteers to help feed children and their families in London.
2022
Free school meal campaigns
go live amid child hunger crisis
We joined others in the school food world to campaign for #FeedTheFuture. Our survey with Survation found that teachers were paying for lunches themselves so children wouldn’t go hungry. We were also told children were stealing food because of hunger. We continue to push for all children to access school food, regardless of their age, income, or location.
2023
Our school chef training programme spreads across the country
In 2023 we’re proving better is possible in schools. To reach more children in a shorter time, we launched a shorter, online school chef training programme. This helps kitchen staff become food educators faster. The programme rolled out in Hull, London and the South West.
2024
we celebrate a milestone: reaching over 100,000 children with our work
Only six years after we launched the charity, we improved school food for 100,000 children. This success came from our dedicated team, generous donors, and partners. Many dedicated school chefs and teachers from across the country backed our projects.
be part of our story…
We’d love your school’s food and food education to be the next chapter in our story.
ONE KITCHEN AND
A LOT OF HARD WORK
ORIGIN STORY:
HOW IT ALL STARTED
It all started with a simple tweet. The rest, they say… is history!
While he was writing the School Food Plan, Henry Dimbleby tweeted. He wanted to know if any chefs were interested in running the kitchen at his children’s state school. Nicole Pisani was the Head Chef at the well-known Soho restaurant Nopi. She took a big gamble and applied for a new role. Executive Headteacher Louise Nichols then offered her the job.
Nicole retrained the school cooks with the restaurant brigade system. She taught them to cook from scratch and bake bread every day. She also encouraged them to cook their favourite recipes. Nicole led the cooking curriculum. She taught the children how to butcher whole chickens and cook over fire pits in the playground. This work set the standard for Chefs in Schools. Now, we help other schools change their food and food education standards completely.
The charity works directly with school chefs in London, the South West, and Yorkshire. This helps reach tens of thousands of pupils everyday. We’re always looking for people who share our vision and passion for fuelling the future well.
WHO IS
Involved?
We’re lucky that our impact is spreading. As it does, our revolution is growing. More creative and talented people are joining us.
Our patrons and ambassadors include:
- Henry Dimbleby (food campaigner and
co-founder of Leon) - Dame Prue Leith (chef superstar and restaurateur)
- Yotam Ottolenghi (yep, the one with a dozen restaurants and a gazillion books)
- Kitty Tait (yep, the baking and mental health rock star)
- Thomasina Miers (the powerhouse behind Wahaca, a sustainability campaigner and food writer)
- Dr Tamsin Cooper, (the brilliant managing director of the Forward Institute)
There are many more wonderful people in our revolution; click below to find them on our team page. From headteachers to fermenters, everyone shares one goal: improving school food for good.
Our trustees include individuals from all levels of school food delivery in the UK. This includes headteachers who feed children daily and the writers of the School Food Plan and Standards.
PEOPLE WHO CARE
WHAT CHILDREN EAT
Recognition
We’re proud that our work hasn’t gone unnoticed. Recognition like this helps us reach even more schools, chefs and children with what we do.
Our awards and recognition include:
- Urban Food Awards Children’s Food Champion, 2020
- Third Sector Big Impact & Charity Partnership of the Year Award, 2021
- Chief Executive Naomi Duncan and Co-Founder Nicole Pisani named one of Waitrose’s Top 10 Women in Food, 2022
- BBC Food & Farming Outstanding Achievement Award, 2023
- One of CODE’s Happiest Places to Work, 2024
These awards reflect the hard work of our whole team – school chefs, chef rainers, campaigners, our team, and the schools we work with – and the difference we’re making to food and food literacy across the country.
We’re proud of what we’ve achieved so far, but there’s plenty more of the school food revolution to come.