Cooking Lessons

[couldtryharder]

Your thoughts please people. I'm toying with the idea of setting up cooking lessons and wanted to know if there is a market out there. I'm not a qualified or trained chef or cook, but I'm a good home cook. I'm endlessly surprised by the number of my friends who don't cook from scratch, even simple food. So I'm thinking of cooking lessons for busy mums to feed families and friends. Would people want this kind of thing? I was thinking, to keep start up costs reasonable, that I'd offer the lessons at people's own homes so that they feel comfortable - is this a good idea? I'm also wondering about lessons for teenagers/pre university so they can look after themselves. And or for younger kids to get them into the idea of eating good food. Any thoughts gratefully recieved, even if it's to tell me it's a pants idea!

Thanks

LOVE this idea, my best friend was looking for something exactly like this last year when she promised herself that whilst on maternity leave she would finally learn to cook (heating shop bought pasta and a jar of sauce was as much as she could do) in the end her MIL kindly gave her the lessons as there just wasn't this service available.

Guess cost is going to be the big point both for you and your customers. Got to charge enough to make it a worthwhile enterprise for you, including a decent hourly rate, travel costs etc. Will you provide the ingredients? If you are and you're spending time sourcing them, weighing them out and bagging them up then you also need to take into account that time aswell.

Sure I've read in old copies of Red, women offering this sort of service and setting it up as a very successful business.

Let me know if you want a guinea pig for your lessons before you start out properly!

Hi

I might be interested. I have been searching online. I am a really bad cook and really would like to improve. Whereabouts are you?

I could have written your post - it's something I have often thought I'd enjoy doing. I'll be really interested in any replies. I don't think I'd want to teach fancy cooking (though I can make anything and everything) - it's getting people to enjoy cooking and feel it's something they can do every day that I'm interested in - I am fascinated by what Jamie O is trying to do

I love the idea & would love to do it myself in a fantasy world. I'll follow this thread to find out more... Good luck!

The other question I have about this sort of thing is how it can be done practically, eg does there need to be a website, do you need to register as self-employed (I would assume so) etc, or could it be done informally?

A lady in our area also offers cooking 'parties' for primary school children which seem to be very succesful/popular.

Thank you all for your thoughts and support. Every time I think about doing it, I seem to make a list as long as my arm of things to consider. I'm thinking along the lines of 1-3 adults per session and a set fee for a session (for adults and uni students), regardless of number of people. In London I've found similar that charges £200 for 2.5hrs!!! Seems excessive to me and a price I don't think anyone up here in the Bury/Bolton area would pay. I'd have to cost it all out of course but was thinking more like £50 with a discount for students maybe - is that still too much?. I'd supply ingredients for that too and make two dishes. Think I'd ask for some info before the session (how much cooking they have done bfore, who they normally cook for, what types of food they really like, don't like, want to try etc) or provide a list and ask them to choose what they'd like to learn to cook. I'd also provide recipe cards to keep. Guess I'd start off with flyers in local places where mums gather (nurseries, play centres, library etc) and see how it goes. Eventually I'd like a website, but at the moment I think I have to start small. Need to trial it out on some friends first, but I think there's a lot of ground work to do first - getting all the recipes finalised and detailed instead of my own unmeasured approach. So much to think about. The websites I've found seem to have a profile page on the cook and they've done loads of formal training. Would it be a big issue that I don't have any do you think?

I think you would be missing a trick to charge the same amount regadless of whether its 1 person or 3- charge per person but offer a discount of £5(or whatever) per person if there's 3. then theres more of an incentive for them to ahve a 3rd person there and more money for you.

I agree about getting info beforehand about their aims and expectations. Would you offer a course over say 8 weeks where say they could make a range of staple foods- a shepherds pie, a victoria sponge,a roast...

I suppose cooking times are going to dictate session times- something like aham or whatever is going to take at least a couple of hours in the oven- but then i ghuess you could go all Jamie 30 Minute stylee and make a dessert whilst its in the oven?

I'm getting excited for you!

Sorry just read the last bit of your post. No I don't think a lack of formal training would be an issue as for many people this would be intimidating- I would sell being an 'ordinary' mum as your biggest selling point- you are just like them, etc. Would you need any kind of food hygiene qual though?

I have done this a couplf of times already, for my sister and a male friend and more recently another friend and have also though about doing something like this.

Got a food hygene cert nota so hopefully that'll do, but will investigate fully with the council just to make sure I'm not breaking any laws. Never really thought of not being a professional as a selling point, but I like how you're thinking! I guess it does come down to planning and timings so I think I've got a lot of figuring out to do before I even trial it on friends. And thanks for your thoughts on the money. Will have to start on a spreadsheet soon.

Arentfanny - how did the lessons go for you? Is it something you think you can take further? Would love to know.

Think its a great idea and I thought of doing it - you also need to check your house insurance (in case someone hurts themselves in your kitchen) and possibly get public liability insurance (in case you accidentally poison someone!).

I really enjoyed it, my sister and freind came here, they would choose something they wanted to make, which we did and stayed for supper.

With my friend I went to hers, she would pay for the ingredients. I have only done it a couple of times with her as we started before Christmas, started off simply, would make soup for lunch and then we made moussaka one day and lasagne the next, will be hopefully picking it up again, but enjoyed it.

If you were teaching a mother/father to cook, I would lean towards doing it in their house, as they will then know how there oven works.

I have a friend who had her own local cookery school, but it only ran for a year or so, the main problems were:

• she didn't teach it herself, got in experts who she had to pay
• lots of the food involved fairly expensive ingredients which she paid for
• she ran too many varied courses with not enough people on each one to cover her costs

So my advice based on that would be to keep it really simple, advertise it well, keep the sessions to a minimum and try and get a minimum number of people on them to make it worth your while, and either cost in the ingreds or make them affordable. Cook it yourself and have typed copied instructions and recipes to hand out. Ensure you have a comfortable, accessible viewing area in your kitchen

If I were doing it, I don't think I'd want to go to other people's homes. Definitely check insurance, where would people park/would it piss off your neighbours, health and safety etc.

Not sure as £50 per 2.5 hour session is enough....

Ingredients are going to be say £10 (atleast?)

Time sourcing and prepping ingredients, so lets say you spend 1 hour doing this.

Plus 1 hour travel to and from a location (if you do it in their house)

A 2.5 hour session, which realistically is going to be about 3 hours of your time to unpack stuff, set it out then clear up.

So in total that is 5 hours of your time for £40 = £8p.h gross - not a huge wage.

Plus petrol/wear and tear on car.

If they come to you that would take out an hour of your time bumping up hourly rate to £10p.h.

Think you need to charge per head as notasize said.

Other thoughts...

Are you demonstrating or do you want people to actually do the cooking? Will they get to eat it? Could you offer a kind of 'learn to cook and party' type of thing, say 3 girlfriends learning to cook but then get to eat it and drink wine at the same time, so it's a girls night out aswell?

Think it is certainly achievable but as you say lots to think about!

Nice breakdown, Holly. My friend spent a LOT more than one hour per session sourcing and prepping ingreds. Then, if its in your house, there's clearing and washing up, which you can add another hour for.

Its never going to earn big bucks unless its done on a massive scale. But I am guessing thats not what the op is doing it for. Just please make sure you cover your costs, its so easy to underestimate how much time it will take to do everything, and therefore price too low.

Will have another think about price. Pretty sure that I can't do the lessons in my house as we have a cat and the local authority have said that unless it is never in the kitchen then they wouldn't license me to do it in my home, although that was for a slightly different cooking enterprise. My thinking was that people would be more comfortable in their own home and using their own equipment. It would definately be hands on and then eat it type of thing, but very much family food, not any thing complicated. Was thinking that I could do it in the day or in the evening depending what was required. Just me teaching so no one else to pay. I'm not really looking to create an empire, just to help people enjoy cooking their food (so many people seem to think it's a terrible chore), do something I love, and make a modest income that fits round the kids. Will have a nose at your website aoliver if you don't mind.