The event encourages schools, clubs and budding young chefs all over the UK to make a dish from scratch using fresh ingredients. And this year, it’s a pizza.
One of the Trust’s school clubs will win the chance to reveal this year’s recipe and take over one of PizzaExpress’ busiest restaurants in central London.
The winner will be treated to an all expenses paid trip to the capital where they will have the opportunity to show off their skills in the kitchen and serve up the very first batch of 2014 Cookathon pizzas.
The Let’s Get Cooking BIG Cookathon will then take place in England on 4 April 2014, encouraging as many people as possible to cook this year’s recipe on the same day. More than 300 clubs are expected to join in the fun, with participants set to make over 36,000 pizzas, using over 3.6 tonnes of pizza dough.
Linda Cregan, chief executive of the Children’s Food Trust, said: “Taking over a real, live restaurant will be a dream come true for our winning club – we can’t wait to see how they get on! This is the seventh year of our annual Cookathon and, with the help of PizzaExpress, we hope to get more people involved and cooking than ever before. The Cookathon is all about bringing people together to enjoy eating delicious food made from scratch using fresh ingredients; a belief we know PizzaExpress shares in too.”
Parveen Johal, PizzaExpress’ head of communications, added: ”We’ve been helping kids to take their first steps in the kitchen since the late 90s when we launched our School Visits programme so we can’t wait to launch the 2014 Cookathon with the Children’s Food Trust. Together, we're on a mission to inspire one million children to get cooking over the next 12 months, and the Cookathon is a fantastic way to get involved.”
To be in with a chance of winning the chance to take over PizzaExpress, schools and clubs should register for the Let’s Get Cooking BIG Cookathon at https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/BIGCookathon2014 and state why they deserve to be awarded the grand prize. The competition is now open for entries, and entrants have until 18 November 2013 to apply.