Square mile - square meal

Square mile - square meal

Cooks wanted: no experience necessary. That was the message from the government this week as it revealed a raft of catering schemes, many of them supported by top chefs, local councils and industry, to match the training made famous by Jamie Oliver on his TV show Jamie's Kitchen.

The project given the most publicity this week is, in fact, just round the corner from Mr Oliver's restaurant Fifteen in London's East End.The new eaterie, Hoxton Apprentice, has recruited staff from the local estates of Shoreditch which have pockets of severe long-term unemployment, especially among ethnic minority groups.

A brainchild of City of London-based charity Training For Life, the restaurant is staffed by a team of young apprentice chefs and is the centrepiece of the Prospect Centre, an innovative business and community development scheme backed by deputy prime minister John Prescott to the tune of £450,000.

Elsewhere, Kisha Matthews, 17, has benefited from another catering scheme for unemployed young people. She is cooking upmarket dinners at 140 Park Lane, the Mayfair restaurant housed in the five-star London Marriott Hotel. Kisha is supported by The Prince's Trust and Marriott Hotels, to work for a month in the kitchens of 140 Park Lane.

At the end of her month's training she will serve up her own creation, which will be added to the menu and trigger a donation to The Prince's Trust to fund similar projects that help other unemployed young people.

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a separate move, Corus hotels, a chain of 65, has launched a search for Britain's next generation of cooks. Its training programme, Chef School 2004, is seeking up to 60 people aged between 16 and 24 to be employed as trainee chefs. The programme will cover all aspects of work as a professional chef and the trainees are expected to reach NVQ Level 2 within 12 months. The new class of 2004 will gather for the first time on September 1, at the Westmead Hotel in Birmingham when the training will officially commence.

Corus hotels currently employ more than 1,000 catering staff many of whom have completed the course, which was developed with the Hotel & Catering Training Company (For details of application procedures e-mail: chefschool@ corushotels.com

The Hoxton project is a joint venture between Training For Life, the local welfare-to-work initiative, Shoreditch Our Way, and the Corporation of London, which has also donated significant sums of money. The training counts cookery writer and former restaurateur Prue Leith, Mike Dowding, former manager of the River Café in Hammersmith and Ben Carpenter, Senior Sous Chef at the Conran Hotel, Chelsea Harbour among its many supporters.

Gordon D'Silva, chief executive of Training for Life, says: "It is about finding a new way of helping thousands of socially excluded Londoners. Prospect Centres are not just about people getting work, they are about people taking control of their lives."

Each trainee will also benefit from being coached by an experienced restaurant professional during their six-month training course.