Learning to be... FEARLESS in the Kitchen

Sarah Rodi attended Jen Roach’s meat-free meals course, providing ideas to inspire people to eat more plant-based, home-cooked, easy and delicious food for their health. Here’s how she got on

- Sarah Rodi

I ’ll admit, I’m not the best cook in the world, but I can whip up a lasagne, a bolognese or a chicken dish for my girls’ weeknight tea. But this year, along with so many others who watched The Game Changers, worried about climate change and wanting to reduce our consumption of meat and dairy, I’d like us as a family to eat more plant-based meals. So, when I came across Jen Roach’s cooking school in the beautiful Berkshire countryside, I signed up for a course.

The Fearless in the Kitchen school is set on 4 acres in Warfield, near Windsor and Bracknell, with an orchard, herb and vegetable garden.

I pulled up outside the picture-postcard cottage, with its white picket-post fence, and anxiously knocked on the door, not knowing what to expect. But Jen instantly put me at ease, welcoming me into her lovely kitchen with a hug and a cup of coffee. I was introduced to the other eight people attending the course, and they all seemed friendly and eager to learn some cooking tips.

Jen was 100% vegan for 15 years, but she’s now plant-based, which means she occasionally eats dairy and meat but mostly plants. “My vegan period for 15 years was actually during the ’80s -’90s.... some of you may remember macrobiotic diets, pescatarians and what was then known as

‘non-dairy vegetarianism’ – there just wasn’t the vegan products around that there is now. I turned to a lot of Middle Eastern and South Asian cuisines (think Vietnamese, Chinese, Japanese) for vegan food, and I recommend you get to know chickpeas, hummus, falafel, lentils, tahini, Za’atar, Dukkah, pomegranate molasses, miso and tofu.