Submission Details ------------------
Nominee Summary
Councillor Geva Blackett’s Christmas hampers and Wild Cooks initiative combine community support with practical rural skills. The hampers deliver wild game and festive food to local families, helping those who may be struggling at Christmas, while Wild Cooks introduces young people to game cooking and food preparation. Together, the projects celebrate local produce, reduce waste, and build confidence, skills and community spirit. They also highlight the value of rural partnerships in turning game into nutritious meals and creating positive opportunities for learning, giving and connection across the community.
In no more than 350 words, tell us why you think you/your work should win this award. You may wish to consider factors such as what inspired you, the challenges involved, the impact of the output, and what makes your work stand out?
What started almost fifteen years ago as a now-renowned and much-welcomed annual giving of venison and other game donated by local Deeside estates to those struggling to make ends meet at Christmas has progressed into a formalised program designed to provide young people with the skills to cook and eat local game, providing better life chances both in terms of health and potentially in future employment as chefs. With 2.4K followers, one of Cllr Geva Blackett’s Wild Cooks’ posts on her Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/CouncillorGevaBlackett) reached almost 18,000 people of all ages, and each week of the competition drew more positive comments such as: “M had such a brilliant experience. He has learnt so much, and we are off to buy a venison box to keep up the momentum!!!”. “Exciting to see some future chefs in the making and also teaching young people about the provenance of food” “Absolutely fantastic! So important that people know fully where and how their food comes to their plate and make decisions based on the knowledge gained. Absolutely brilliant, well done to everyone involved". Over the eight weeks, there was not one negative emoji and, unusually for social media, few silly comments on any of the posts but plenty of encouragement to keep going. Brilliant!! This kind of project needs to happen everywhere… The Deeside Piper faithfully reproduced the social media posts every week, making sure the project’s aims and achievements were available to an even wider audience. Partners such as Eat Wild also shared the posts on their social media, extending the good news reach. With the continuing generosity of Aberdeenshire’s Estates, the Wild Cooks CIC Project will continue to make venison and feathered game available to teach skills, improve health and bring communities together in the years to come – spreading the word through social and other media outlets.
Please include here a link to your work online. Alternatively, if this is not possible, please email your work to us at hih@scottishlandandestates.co.uk
https://www.facebook.com/CouncillorGevaBlackett
