An innovative food program involving Island Health\u2019s Campbell River Mental Health and Substance Use and The Salvation Army is proving to be a resounding success for customers and students alike.<\/p>\n
The Dinner Bell Frozen Entr\u00e9e and Vocational Training Program provides training to support individuals in need. Program trainees work with a professional chef for 6 months to learn the basics of working in a commercial kitchen and receive experience with food production. The meals produced are sold to other referred clients who receive 12 to 15 fabulous frozen entr\u00e9es each month. This part of the program helps to address the serious issues of poor nutrition and poverty among some of the clients.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe goals of the program are to support the health and wellness of Dinner Bell customers, all of whom are referred through Campbell River Mental Health and Substance Use, and to support students in developing the skills and confidence to achieve their vocational goals,\u201d Leslie MacLennan, Campbell River MHSU Coordinator of Rehabilitation Programs, said at a luncheon celebration today, to which community leaders, Provincial Government representatives, local restaurateurs and the media were invited to try tasty samples of the entr\u00e9es.<\/p>\n
Students in the program complete over 150 hours of combined vocational and experiential training as part of their psychosocial rehabilitation including Food Safe Level 1 and WHMIS training.\u00a0 Chef Connie Preston provides instruction in a licensed industrial kitchen environment.<\/p>\n
\u201cVisitors to the class are quick to notice the enthusiasm of students learning and practising skills involved in working in a kitchen environment and in the preparation of everything from stuffed roast pork loin to lemon curd,\u201d Preston said. \u201cGraduates have a solid grounding in food preparation and kitchen skills necessary to compete for a range of entry-level competitive employment opportunities in the food services industry.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Salvation Army’s definitely has something cookin’ in the community!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
An innovative food program involving Island Health\u2019s Campbell River Mental Health and Substance Use and The Salvation Army is proving to be a resounding success for customers and students alike. The Dinner Bell Frozen Entr\u00e9e and Vocational Training Program provides training to support individuals in need. Program trainees work with a professional chef for 6 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2094,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"location":[],"class_list":["post-2093","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n