What it’s like to be an Eat Club Young Leader — as told by Lottie, Eat Club’s Programme Coordinator and former Young Leader
By Lottie
I thought I’d share my reflections on all the valuable experiences I’ve gained since joining Eat Club, a youth food charity, through the Young Leaders Programme a year ago. This year-long programme is for 16–25-year-olds to gain hands-on experience, mentorship, and career skills while shaping how Eat Club serves London’s youth and communities. I started working at Eat Club after becoming a Young Leader, so my experience of the programme and my role as Programme Coordinator have blended into one. I’ve benefitted hugely from the programme, as it led me to becoming employed. In that sense, it’s different to everyone else’s experience, and I can’t see the programme as its own separate thing.
Since October 2024, eight other young people and I from across London have had the opportunity to develop specific skills in our areas of interest, such as project management, social media and marketing, operations and events, business, and fundraising. As part of the programme, we were tasked with running supper clubs for young Londoners to teach cooking skills and build confidence in the kitchen. Unlike traditional supper clubs, Eat Club style supper clubs teach participants how to cook the dishes on the menu, and serve the meal to eat together as a group after. We’ve been working on our Supper Club project for a year now, and have hosted 3 successful events during the summer, with our most recent one being in September as part of the Power of Food Festival in Tower Hamlets.
Deciding on a theme really pushed us to be creative. We settled on wanting our theme to focus on showcasing traditional lesser-known cultural dishes, specifically from South Asian countries. We named our supper club ‘The Forgotten Feast’, aimed at fostering a sense of community within young Londoners and reconnecting them with lost foods. In line with Eat Club’s values, the dishes we made were vegetarian/vegan and very nutritious. For our most recent Power of Food Festival supper club, we researched traditional dishes from Bangladesh that aren’t as popular in London, to reflect the Bengali community in Tower Hamlets. Our menu consisted of Neem Begun (fried aubergine with bitter neem leaves), Spinach Shoshori (creamy spinach cooked with mustard and spices), Moong Dal Ghonto with Kale (spiced mung lentils cooked with kale), Beguner Kolonchi (aubergine curry with a rich mustard and coconut gravy), and Narkel Puli Pitha (sweet coconut-filled rice dumplings).
Hosting these events was a challenging, but incredibly rewarding experience. None of us have hosted a supper club event before, but we proved to ourselves that we’re fully capable of doing it. Our recent one was a success once again; attendance was good, and everyone enjoyed the food, which was delicious and new for many. We had an amazing professional chef called Sascha help us out on the day. We really valued that he came on board as it made things go much smoother. We didn’t have a lot of time to prepare for this supper club, especially as we tried out a new menu from our previous one, but all our effort paid off.
Aside from giving me an insight into project management, this programme has helped me learn so much about myself and has made me really appreciate how food brings people together. I’ve met some amazing people and I’m so proud of what we’ve all achieved. My favourite aspect of the programme has been our bi-monthly forums where we would meet, prepare a nutritious meal and then eat together. Especially in the first few meetings, this was such a relaxed and comfortable way to get to know each other. And this is what Eat Club is all about – the joy of cooking and eating together!
Throughout the year, we’ve had many discussions surrounding our experiences with food, especially when growing up in London, and we all agreed on the dangers of junk food being so accessible and how it’s heavily advertised towards young people. I never expected I would be thinking about ways to change this with a group of my peers, and I’m so grateful to Eat Club for giving me this opportunity.
If you’re also a young person aged 16-25 who is passionate about creating positive change by improving young people’s relationship with food, and eager to develop your career skills, email info@eat-club.org!