Recipes for Health: A Community-Based Nutrition and Culinary Intervention

Abstract

Background: Obesity is a major public health concern in the United States, especially since it has been associated with an increased incidence of multiple co-morbidities. Positive eating behavior modifications learned through nutrition education sessions are the main interventions proposed to target overweight and obesity.Objective: The aim of this study was to determine if nutrition education and hands-on cooking classes will result in improvement in eating habits and cooking skills to manage chronic disease.Methods: A convenience sample of 21 participants were recruited from primary health clinics in Miami-Dade, Broward, and Palm Beach counties. A total of eight weekly virtual lessons were conducted, which included both a culinary and a nutrition education portion. At baseline and post-intervention, participants filled out a validated questionnaire with questions related to nutrition knowledge and behavior, fruit and vegetable consumption, and cooking skills. Weight was self-reported. Statistical analysis was conducted using IBM SPSS Statistics for Windows, Version 27.0 (Released 2020; IBM Corp., Armonk, New York, United States) and included descriptive statistics and a paired t-test to compare pre-and post-intervention data.Results: Throughout the eight weeks, subject attendance ranged from 61-95%. Nineteen participants completed the post-intervention questionnaire. Results showed a statistically significant mean weight loss of 3.74 ±5.26 lbs (p=0.006) and a statistically significant mean BMI change of -0.66 ±0.86 (p=0.004) at postintervention compared to baseline. In addition, subjects reported increased confidence in dietary habits and culinary skills post-intervention. Conclusion: Our results show exciting data in support of this project's objectives that a healthy cooking intervention can increase nutrition knowledge, increase confidence in healthy food choices, increase confidence in food preparation skills, and improve weight and BMI in participants.

Assessing Acceptability: The Role of Understanding Participant, Neighborhood, and Community Contextual Factors in Designing a Community-Tailored Cooking Intervention

“…The selection of a hybrid delivery method was recommended to both maintain social connections that are fostered through in-person settings and to provide an opportunity for implementing recipes within one's own kitchen through virtual classes. The opinions provided by the focus group participants fit with recent observations in the literature on the effectiveness of virtual cooking interventions in dietary behaviors and health outcomes [50,51].…”

Redesigning Recruitment and Engagement Strategies for Virtual Culinary Medicine and Medical Nutrition Interventions in a Randomized Trial of Patients with Uncontrolled Type 2 Diabetes

“…Culinary Medicine delivered using an RD offers an alternative approach to MNT that provides both nutrition education and experiential cooking. By learning nutritional principles in a "hands-on" manner, participants can improve diet variety and healthy cooking practices and build confidence toward food-related behavior change and kitchen self-efficacy [10][11][12][13]. Culinary medicine has been widely evaluated in academic settings as part of medical trainee curricula [14][15][16][17].…”