A rice cooker and an electric wok are all that are needed for a handful of St Albans Primary School parents to cook up a storm once a fortnight.
Despite not sharing a common language, the parents are preparing recipes they cook for their families at school. It’s become a valuable social event for these parents, some of whom are yet to master English but want to be involved in the school community.
Organiser Hang Bui said the idea started small, with just two parents, and had since grown. Parents attend each fortnight and have so far shared their favourite Egyptian, Vietnamese, Thai, Sudanese, Eritrean and Indian recipes.
“We discovered that one of the mothers ran a catering company in Vietnam before moving to Australia,” Ms Hang said. “She couldn’t speak English, but I translate for her and she now hosts her own cooking demonstrations.”
The most common languages spoken at the school other than English are Arabic, Vietnamese and Hindi.
Ms Hang said she planned to collate the recipes into a cookbook translated into each language “so the parents can relate to it and own it”.
