Food

With Britain's bees continuing to face major challenges, the St Ermin's Hotel, Westminster will be holding a series of taster urban beekeeping workshops during the Chelsea Fringe led by bee guru, Camilla Goddard of Capital Bee. The popular workshops will be held on Saturdays 16th and 30th April; 7th and 21st May, with more to follow in September during the hotel's annual 'honey month'.

Waitrose has launched its first TV advertising campaign to highlight its money-saving scheme Pick Your Own Offers.  Pick Your Own Offers gives customers the power to choose their own savings, as customers can select which ten products from over 1,000 they'd like to save 20 per cent on every time they shop. The scheme has been a success since its launch last year as a million customers now use the ground-breaking scheme to save money.

The continued success of GBBO, the demonisation of sugar and the recent discussion about whether to add folic acid to flour have all fuelled the already significant interest in baking and buying "real bread".   Since 2010, Virtuous Bread has been a leading voice in the real bread world, supplying information about and recipes for real bread and, through its network of micro bakers, has been the leading supplier of access to real bread and bread baking courses.

Waitrose has announced plans to reduce sugar in its range of breakfast cereals during 2016 by stripping out more than 7.5 million calories or nearly two tonnes in the coming year.The commitment will involve a 15 per cent sugar reduction in cornflakes, one of Waitrose's top selling lines, and significant sugar reduction in other popular products, including honey nut cornflakes and choco pops.

Robinsons will be out delivering free squash to offices across central Birmingham to keep workers refreshed during dry January as part of their ‘Enjoy drinking more water’ campaign. All that is needed is tweet @drinkrobinsons with their office location along with #enjoyRobinsons and Robinsons will do their best to deliver some squash, following a study of 2,000 Britons conducted by One Poll for Robinsons has found that almost ¾ (70%) of people questioned have gone seven hours or more in a day, without drinking a glass of water.

In My Kitchen is a brand new You Tube channel in which professional chefs are challenged to create a delicious two-course meal for six guests using only the ingredients in show creator Giselle Whiteaker's ordinary London apartment. The only concession: they can bring their own knives and one magic ingredient. This is a real chance for professionals to showcase their skills and individual style in an environment where they have much less control than usual,” says Giselle.

Food & Drink Expo 2016 will return to the NEC Birmingham in April, providing buyers from the grocery, wholesale, speciality retail, manufacturing and foodservice sectors with a unique opportunity to source new products and learn about the trends set to shape the UK food and drink industry over the coming years. The future of food and drink in the UK will be a key theme throughout the 2016 instalment of the event, which will run from 18-20 April, alongside the Farm Shop & Deli Show.

Health chiefs in Wolverhampton are encouraging people try out some healthier options as part of a new year health kick. This week marks JanUary –a week-long campaign by the National Obesity Forum encouraging people to make small lifestyle changes to improve their health and wellbeing. And health chiefs in Wolverhampton say a quick and easy way is to choose healthier food and drink at mealtimes.

Whether you're going gluten-free yourself or you're ready to add gluten-free baking to your repertoire, you are now able to come and learn everything about coeliac-friendly baking with the expert tutors at Squires Kitchen International School. Choose from three new classes coming up in 2016 – Gluten-Free Baking: Bread & Pastries, Gluten-Free Baking: Cakes, and Bake and Decorate Cupcakes Gluten-Free.

If you’d told Nadiya Hussain a year ago that she’d one day be dining with Nicole Kidman she’d never have believed it. But rubbing shoulders with Hollywood royalty is just an average weekday now for the reigning Great British Bake Off champion since winning over Mary Berry and Paul Hollywood - and the nation - in the show’s emotional final. “That’s weird, right?” said Nadiya, still incredulous after her encounter with Kidman at the Women of the Year Awards this week.

Roll out the red carpet and cue the music as the ‘Oscars’ of the fish frying industry prepare to return for their 28^th year. The National Fish & Chip Awards have cast their net far and wide having trawled the nation for the last year, and are now set to make or break the hearts of friers from around the country as they announce the UK’s best fish and chip businesses on January 20 at the Lancaster London Hotel.

As of this week, HelloFresh and Jamie Oliver are teaming up to create a new cooking experience to make living a healthy lifestyle easier than ever before. Each week one of Jamie’s recipes will be in HelloFresh’s boxes, giving the British public the best possible set-up for easy, tasty home cooking. Jamie is thrilled that HelloFresh’s service gives more people the chance to prepare his dishes: “For me, HelloFresh makes cooking from scratch even easier. Their delivery of ingredients straight to people’s doors is a hugely convenient way for everyone to try my recipes”, says the chef.

Families in Wolverhampton are being urged to download a new app and check how much sugar they are consuming – as new figures show children eat their own body weight in sugar every year. The free Sugar Smart app, launched today (Monday 4 February, 2016) by Public Health England, works by scanning barcodes to reveal the total sugar in food and drink in cubes or grams.

Assado Restaurant is setting taste buds alight this festive season as it bids farewell to the Christmas standard and introduces a fresh palate of vibrant flavours for guests to dine on. Taking a pan-Indian twist to the traditional Christmas feast, Assado Restaurant is spicing things up with a range of sparkling standout dishes.

City of Wolverhampton Council’s thriving Meals on Wheels service delivered a record number of Christmas dinners this year. Meals on Wheels provides a vital lifeline to mainly elderly residents by delivering a hot, nutritious meal seven days a week. The number of people using the service has tripled since the council scrapped old rules which meant people had to pass an assessment before they could use the service. Meals on Wheels are now available to anyone who wants them and there are currently 633 people on the books.

It may be the season of good will to all men but the festive season call also mean an abundance of calorific temptations to both men and women. Leading Weight Loss Hypnotherapist and the founder of HypnoSlimming, Michael A Cox has investigated the eating patterns of those people planning on dieting in the New Year. Even before the Christmas decorations were put up many people have already decided that January will be the time to lose weight.