Here’s our latest round-up:
* Contract caterer Wilson Vale, which operates catering services across the care sector as well as workplaces and independent schools, is continuing work at 18 of its nearly 100 contracts, including two care homes and eight schools.
Co-founder Andrew Wilson says a number of these sites have pop-up shops where Wilson Vale is providing hampers at cost for staff who can find it difficult to get to the shops when they are open.
The hampers include mostly dry and tinned goods, though some sites are able to offer home-made breads and cakes, as well as fresh veg boxes (from Reynolds) and fresh meat boxes (from butchers, Owen Taylor & Sons).
* Somerset County Council’s Support Services for Education is busy preparing meal boxes for families of eligible children in receipt of Free School Meals. The boxes include basic cooking instructions for parents or guardians and are being delivered by the services transport fleet to homes, says Brendan O’Connell, senior catering adviser.
* Compass Group and the procurement business it owns Foodbuy have donated £500,000 worth of food to help vulnerable people during the coronavirus crisis.
FareShare chief executive Lindsay Boswell, said: “These additional food supplies will allow charities to deliver nutritious meals and bags of essential supplies to people in their communities who might otherwise go hungry during this crisis.”
* Facilities services provider ISS has launched its Home Learning Resources free online to help parents and children at home while schools are closed. The company is providing a range of tools and ideas that are being updated weekly for home learning and skills development in the kitchen.
Those who use them are invited to share their completed activities, cooking creations or kitchen ‘experiments’ on the Twitter account @ISS_Education.