Meet Carol McMath - a Kibble Success Story

On 23rd November 2011, Kibble’s Catering Cook Trainer, Carol McMath, will travel to Birmingham to attend this year’s BBC Food and Farming Awards ceremony as a finalist in their Best “Dinner Lady”/Public Caterer category.

Carol works in our Secure Unit kitchen providing three meals a day for its staff and eighteen young people, aged 12 -16, 365 days a year.  Carol excels in her daily management of the kitchen and staff training responsibilities and it is testament to her outstanding contribution that she has been nominated for this award.

With over 20 years’ experience working in catering within the NHS, Carol has built up a wealth of knowledge about cooking and is constantly striving for improvement.  She enjoys finding and trying new and interesting recipes as well as enhancing existing ones.  For the last four years, she has worked tirelessly to provide healthy, nutritious and on-budget meals for our young people who have lived chaotic lives with very poor diets.  Many of them are not willing to try “strange” or “healthy” food, such as vegetables.  Carol said:  ‘The boys like to eat food they are familiar with - fish and chips, curries, burgers and fried chicken.  We give them a similar type of food, but we make sure it’s a healthier version than what they would get in a fast food outlet’.

Carol has turned around the diets of the young people at Kibble, and they now request and enjoy eating healthier foods.  Her meals are much more than “just food”.  Our Executive Chef, Donald Munro said: ‘The boys used to ask for takeaways when they were getting a treat for someone’s birthday, but now they ask Carol to cook a special meal for them.  Carol really cares about the boys and she’s got them thinking about what foods are good for them’.

In addition to this, Carol works with our in-house nurse to ensure adequate calorie and nutrient intake and, crucially, to encourage them to eat food that does not exacerbate behavioural problems.

Carol also insists on using the best local producers, where possible, particularly for products such as meat and fish.  Fresh salad and vegetables are guaranteed, as they are grown a mere 50 yards from the kitchen.  Carol meets with our head gardener regularly to enable her to plan seasonal menus, utilising as much of the produce as possible.

One of Carol’s key strengths is her genuine care and concern for the young people in our Secure Unit, and she invests time and energy in their emotional and nutritional well-being far beyond expectations.  She recently tutored a young person in our employment and training programme, KibbleWorks, through their SVQ Food Technology to such a standard that they were nominated by Skills Development Scotland for the Young Apprentice of the Year Award.

Throughout the last four years, Carol has also helped to raise the standards of the food produced in the kitchen to restaurant standard under the tutelage of our Executive Chef Donald Munro, who has worked in a range of fine dining restaurants. This was reflected in our recent Care Commission inspection where we received a grade 6, the highest level, for quality of care and support.

As a result of her hard work and dedication, Carol is now one of the final three nominated in BBC’s Food & Farming awards in the Best “Dinner Lady”/ Public Caterer category.  Each year the awards celebrate the people and organisations behind the best of British food. They have all been nominated by BBC audiences.   

The winner will be announced on Wednesday, November 23 at the BBC Good Food Show, in the NEC, Birmingham. The event is being hosted by Sheila Dillon, presenter of the BBC’s The Food Programme.

Carol is the only Scottish nominee left in her category and is competing against a school café in Berkshire and a chef at a university in Shropshire.  So we hope that the judges make the right choice and make Kibble Education and Care Centre and Scotland proud.

Read the Evening Times article about Carol here