Super-fit Gladiator Steel backs The Sun’s Cooking For All campaign which helps teach kids how to make healthy food
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HERE’S your chance to cook up a storm – we’re giving away £1,000 grants to get a cooking club up and running at your school or kids’ club.
Our brilliant Cooking For All fund will help 150 schools and not-for-profit groups set up or increase access to clubs for those aged 16 and under.
Maybe you run a school that needs help buying equipment, or perhaps you need funds to help with ingredients.
Or maybe you have a gardening or allotment project that teaches kids about growing healthy food.
Grants can be used in a range of ways to help teach children about cooking and nutritious food.
Applications are welcomed from nurseries and primary and secondary schools as well as after-school clubs, not-for-profit community groups, charities, Brownies, Guides, Scouts and Cubs.
Our groundbreaking Cooking For All fund is run in collaboration with Tesco’s Stronger Starts programme, which funds kids’ access to healthy activities and nutritious food.
It follows on from our joint Footie For All campaign last year, which gave grants to grassroots youth football clubs, and Activity For All, which funded school holiday clubs.
‘Essential cooking skills’
A report by the Food Foundation’s Children’s Future Food Inquiry in 2019 found that 86 per cent of 11 to 18-year-olds had never prepared a meal at home or in school.
Meanwhile, 38 per cent said they would like to learn more about cooking at school.
Claire de Silva, group head of community at Tesco, said: “Tesco Stronger Starts grants give over £5million to thousands of children and families every year to provide nutritious food and physical activities.
“We’re so excited to be able to do more to encourage families to cook healthy food together as well as equip children with essential cooking skills.”
Our campaigns with Tesco Stronger Starts have so far dished out £450,000 to community clubs, but this is the first time schools have also been able to apply for funds.
Few people know the value of being able to prepare nutritious food and snacks better than TV superstars The Gladiators.
They have become heroes to millions of youngsters across the country thanks to the hit Saturday evening BBC One game show, which was rebooted last year from the popular Nineties version.
To mark the launch of our new fund, we sent Gladiators Steel and Sabre to schools and projects that are applying for one of our grants to find out how the cash could make a difference . . .
WITHIN seconds of entering the classroom, Gladiator Steel has the kids screaming his name.
But he is not here to show off his muscle-flexing moves. He is teaching Year 5 pupils about nutrition, healthy eating and the importance of staying hydrated.
The buff fitness fanatic is backing The Sun’s Cooking For All campaign with Tesco, which is giving away 150 grants of £1,000 to help schools and kids’ clubs teach children how to cook and eat well.
And during his visit to Bisham Primary School in Berkshire, he showed pupils how to make no-bake fruit flapjacks and fruit skewers.
Steel, 34, real name Zack George, said: “It’s been an amazing day. As soon as I walked in and saw the smiles on their faces, it was great.
“I love teaching kids about healthy eating and having fun while doing it.
“It’s so important to me because I didn’t have that growing up.
“It’s my mission to show kids that eating healthily isn’t a chore and that it can help them to be more active and confident.”
CrossFit athlete Zack, who was crowned the UK’s fittest man in 2020, was overweight as a teenager and has previously told how, at the age of 14, he would eat McDonald’s four or five times a week and a bag of Haribo sweets every day after school.
Determined to give kids better knowledge than he had at their age, he launched his Zacktiv programme in 2024 to educate them on eating healthily and caring for their bodies.
Married Zack, who has a 23-month-old daughter Ivy and a baby on the way, started the afternoon school session by quizzing the youngsters on their knowledge of protein sources, carbs and veg.
But he reminded them that even pro athletes like him love tucking into pizza and chocolate once in a while.
He also taught the class how to realise if they are dehydrated and about how much water they should drink (answer: It depends on your size).
Then he helped them to make flapjacks by mixing oats, honey and butter before adding raisins and patting it all into a tin to cool.
I love teaching kids about healthy eating and having fun while doing it
Steel
While all this was going on, one cheeky child piped up to say: “You’re my mum’s favourite Gladiator”.
The fact the pupils were having fun is key for Zack.
He said: “If the kids didn’t find it exciting and enjoy it, they wouldn’t remember it.”
“The Sun’s Cooking For All fund is an amazing campaign.
“The amount of children it will help educated is huge and today has been really fun. I’d urge all schools to apply for a grant because it can make such a huge impact.”
After the session, pupil Maria Aquilina, nine, said: “It was very fun.”
Her classmate Dan Shuttleworth, ten, agreed, saying: “I’ve never made flapjacks before. Now I’m going to make them at home.
And Ava Gonas, also ten, added: “I’ll probably make the fruit skewers at home in summer.”
Bisham Primary offers an after-school cooking club and tries to include making food as part of the regular curriculum.
Head teacher Emma Brookman said: “It’s been a fantastic experience to have Steel in.
“The kids were so excited. Having such a popular person come in to teach the children about the importance of having a good diet is very, very powerful.
“Education is the best way to turn around people’s habits, particularly regarding food.
“We live in a world of so much processed food, so it’s very important that children understand how to cook for themselves.
‘I just love vegetables’
“The grants from The Sun and Tesco are a fantastic opportunity for schools to get involved in a campaign that can only benefit children.”
Meanwhile, at the other end of the country, Gladiator Sabre — aka Sheli McCoy — dropped into an after-school club at a community garden in her home city of Dundee to meet kids learning about fruit and veg.
The 36-year-old Scot says she was “considerably overweight” until deciding to go on a fitness drive at the age of 24.
Since then she has become a record-breaking weightlifter — able to deadlift 160kg, which is heavier than a baby elephant — and a top CrossFit competitor.
And she says it all started after her decision to adopt a healthier diet.
Sheli explained: “When I started to get fit, it was more than just going to the gym.
“I decided I needed to get healthier and really change my entire lifestyle, including my food and all my nutrition, because I was probably guilty of not having as many vegetables as I should.
“I didn’t even consider looking at the micronutrients that I needed or the vitamins as part of a big lifestyle change.
“So while I started going to the gym a lot more, I also started preparing home-cooked meals — and I made sure I had vegetables every single day.
“That has become something that is so important to the improvement of my overall health and helping me to look and train the way I wanted to.”
It’s great to see kids cooking up such delicious and colourful foods and they had great fun doing it, too
Nicky Burke
At her visit to the Maxwell Community Centre and Garden she met local schoolkids dressed as fruit and vegetables, including strawberry Arianna Ciucci, ten; stick of broccoli Olivia Thomson, eight; raspberry Eva Van Eeden, 11; and her sister Bella, ten, who was wearing a potato costume.
The community centre and garden is the brainchild of Nicky Burke, 45, from Carnoustie, Angus.
She said: “We opened the garden in 2014 because I just love vegetables and I wanted everybody else to have a love for them too.”
The centre now has an after-school club where kids learn to grow their own food. Mum-of-two Nicky added: “They’re growing up learning about vegetables — how to grow them, how to harvest them, how to cook with them — and they absolutely love it.
“They eat them as snacks and don’t think twice about vegetables as they’ve been raised with them from an early age.
“We’re showing them how easy it is. We start at the beginning, just sowing seeds and watering them, and show them how to look after the plants.
“But they also love looking for bugs in the garden and getting muddy, and that’s what childhood is all about.”
The kids — as well as the staff and volunteers — were delighted to receive a visit from their favourite Gladiator, especially Jack Wilson, nine, who got pushed around in a wheelbarrow by Sheli.
Nicky said: “Not only do all the kids love her from the show, but they also see how fit she is.
“And she promotes the same healthy living that we do.”
Sheli tried some sushi the children made from their garden vegetables and said: “It is one of my favourite foods as it is incredibly healthy.
“I had some broccoli in mine and some carrots, but they also made a really big salad with delicious little white radishes which I’d never tried before.
‘Getting muddy’
“It’s great to see kids cooking up such delicious and colourful foods and they had great fun doing it, too.”
She added: “But I think it is important for children to know that there’s a point to it all.
“It isn’t just eating your vegetables because your parents tell you to.
“It is eating your vegetables because they contribute to a healthy body. Having a super-healthy body gives you more opportunities, especially in sports.
“But even away from sport it allows you to explore the great outdoors or climb a mountain.”
The Maxwell Centre has already had backing from Tesco Stronger Starts and the garden was able to make lunches for 800 kids last year.
Maxwell youth worker Lisa Forbes, 53, said: “The funding is everything to us because all our activities are free for parents, so that means there’s no barriers for people that maybe couldn’t afford it otherwise.”
And that is why Sheli, who runs her own gym, SweatBox, in the city was keen to throw her full weight behind our Cooking For All campaign.
She said: “It’s a wonderful initiative and Cooking For All will hopefully help people look at healthier foods from a younger age.”
HOW TO APPLY
WE want to hear from YOUR school, nursery or club if you aim to teach kids about cooking, food and nutrition.
If you are a school or not-for-profit group that helps kids under the age of 16, you can apply for one of 150 £1,000 grants powered by Tesco Stronger Starts.
The cash can be used for buying ingredients and cooking equipment – such as chopping boards, slow cookers and smoothie makers – or funding projects.
Or maybe you want to make recipe cards and cookbooks for the children to take home. Funds could also be used to teach young children about where their food comes from.
Maybe you want to buy gardening equipment or a polytunnel to help grow fruit and veg at your allotment or gardening club.
Grants of £1,000 will be made on a rolling basis and applications close at noon on Friday, May 30.
For full terms and conditions and to apply, visit tescostrongerstarts.org.uk/cookingfund.