ABOUT GLENDA

I’m on a mission – I want to get more kids food savvy – knowing enough about food to make good choices and take good care of themselves. I am a mother of three children, two of which are teenagers, and I have spent my entire career working on strategies designed to foster better eating habits.

A little bit about my qualifications

I have a Degree in Home Science (food and nutrition) from Otago University NZ, a Diploma in Teaching (NZ) and a Diploma in Food and Wine (Leiths London).

The work I have done:

I taught Home Economics to teenagers for several years.  I was a contributing food writer and later a food editor for a couple of magazines. I established a national nutrition education for the school food programme for the Heart Foundation and also established their “nutrition for under fives’ programme – (not surprisingly when my children were about that age!) I have written about 15 cookbooks and manuals – for both Heart Foundation and produce industry many of which have won awards.

I have been involved in the NZ produce industry for many years writing all their education strategies including production of many resources – check out www.vegetables.co.nz if you want to see samples of my work.  Recently I have been involved with the potato industry – check out www.potatoes.co.nz . I been lucky enough to win awards for public relations and for best marketing / public relations for potatoes. I was also  awarded the best food, health and education writer at the 2009 Guild of Food Writers Awards. I have been involved in a unique education strategy to improve the nutrient profile of chips and was awarded the NZ Food Industry Award for Excellence in Leadership this work – see www.thechipgroup.co.nz. In 2010 I was also awarded the Chairmans Award for outstanding contribution to the potato industry.

In summary…

Most of all – I bring a wealth of experience in nutrition education and a huge amount of passion and enthusiasm to inspire my child to inspire your child to cook.  I am immensely proud of Claire – she has loved working on this project as much as I have and I think she is doing a great job!

Developing this strategy has been one of the steepest learning curves I have ever been on.  The use of the internet as a communication tool is so exciting with so much potential – but at times that huge potential has been a bit overwhelming!! As a family it has been an awesome working together – all of us have had roles, my husband John and both the boys have been involved. Team building stuff!

ABOUT CLAIRE

Claire is my teenager daughter who has worked with me on this strategy… she is now 17 years old and is the ‘face’ of  It‘s my turn to cook tonight! We have been working on this project for a couple years as we have shared Claire’s food discovery with other children. Check out this video to meet her – or go to Claire’s website to find out more!