Celebrity chef joins Army to promote healthy eating

22/01/2013

Cooking healthy meals can be tricky when you move to a country where many of the foods are unfamiliar, you don't speak the language or your budget is tight.

It's an issue faced by many immigrants in Western Australia and it's one being tackled by The Salvation Army with the help of celebrity chef Dale Sniffen.

The Army has enrolled Chef Dale to make a DVD which explains how to cook enjoyable food healthily and cheaply.

Dale demonstrates eight LiveLighter recipes on the 60-minute DVD, with the emphasis on keeping it simple and ensuring that meals are nutritious and easy to make.

"The way I cook, I let the food do all the work and use as little fat as possible," Dale said.

He adds that cooking can also be simple — "It's much easier to make it than go out and buy it" — and he emphasises that every LiveLighter meal on the DVD is made completely from scratch.

Maurice Swanson, CEO of the Heart Foundation (WA Division) said the DVD is a practical resource which will help people make healthy choices for themselves, and their families.

"All of LiveLighter's recipes are developed by health experts who genuinely enjoy good food. It makes healthy eating easy for everyone, even if you aren't a chef," he said.

Joy Smith of The Salvation Army Morley said 500 copies of the DVD would be distributed free to its clients and to migrant service programs.

"We have been working with a lot of new migrants and saw their dietary habits and unfamiliarity with Australian ingredients and ways of cooking, so we came up with the idea of something they could view," Mrs Smith explained.

She said the decision to choose a DVD rather than a recipe book was influenced by the poor English literacy of some new migrants. Watching a meal being made on a television screen didn't require great knowledge of the language, she said.

"We've always tried to promote healthy diets and healthy cooking and though we started off with the idea of focusing on migrants, we also realised a lot of the people who come through our doors do have a problem with even simple cooking," Mrs Smith said.

"They don't have the skills; so the DVD is aimed at them as well. It's useful for everybody.

"A lot of people say they can't afford to buy fresh food and vegetables but when you look at the cost per kilogram they can see it's actually less expensive than packaged foods."

The recipes on the DVD are interspersed with LiveLighter's hard-hitting television commercials to further emphasise the importance of leading a healthy lifestyle.

This National Partnership Agreement on Preventive Health initiative is funded by the Australian Government and supports the aims of the national Swap It, Don't Stop It campaign and the Western Australian LiveLighter campaign.

LiveLighter is funded by the WA Health Department, and implemented by the Heart Foundation (WA Division) and Cancer Council WA. The campaign aims to improve the health of Western Australian adults by encouraging them to make simple changes to what they eat and drink, and to be more active, to become healthier.

Local film production company Mago Films produced the DVD.

Chef Dale will be demonstrating some of the healthy recipes at the DVD's launch, on Saturday February 2, between 3878am and 1.30pm at Coventry Village, Morley.

Call in and watch Dale demonstrate how to make the perfect salad nicoise, crunchy stir fry and fluffy spinach mushroom omelette.

For more recipes, and information about healthy lifestyle changes, visit www.livelighter.com.au.

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For more information, please contact:
Media and Communications Manager
T: (08) 9382 5913
E: media@livelighter.com.au