06/11/2024
Audrey worked with NCIM (National Centre for Integrative Medicine, Bristol, UK) throughout 2022 - 2023, to deliver online cookery sessions to students and staff of both University of Bristol and University of Bath. This was thanks to a grant awarded by the Earthsong Foundation to support the mental and emotional wellbeing of students, as statistics had shown that more and more students were reporting mental health issues in the UK.
NCIM is passionate about connecting with communities through nutrition, and Audrey had joined our Clinical Integrative Team as a Nutritional Therapist offering online consultations, and had extensive experience delivering online cookery sessions.
Together with Audrey we delivered a series of 3-week online Food for Mood courses, 2-hours long, which included live cooking demonstrations, with students cooking along and sharing the meal at the end of the session together. The sessions were interactive and Audrey responded to questions as we were cooking. Audrey has a very open and approachable manner and communicated with ease with the students. She was instrumental in pulling together the recipes and sharing the health benefits of all the ingredients. We focused on stress and the effect on the body, the gut microbiome and the link to mood, pre-and probiotics and sustainable changes, i.e. meal planning, freezing, cooking with friends/family etc. Feedback was very positive from both the students and the University.
It was a pleasure to work with Audrey. She brought a lovely energy to the sessions and held the space very well. She shared her knowledge in a way that was easy to understand and put together healthy and nutritious meals. She always had top tips to share - I will never forget that she said we should see our gut microbiome as friends and that a simple tip of changing the oil you cook with during the week will contribute to eating a variety of 30 plant-based foods per week!
Thank you NCIM for such a wonderful testimonial. These valuable cooking lessons and health awareness workshops are the very thing that's needed to change the world health trajectory in combating chronic disease, obesity and mental health problems among young people. But we need much, much more of them to even make a dent in this massive problem!!!
If you want to support young aspiring students helping them to feel nourished, happy, safe and supported while they are learning, please reach out to me and we can discuss possibilities to fit your needs.
