Hello,

We are Cleverchefs, your school caterers. Let us tell you a little bit about ourselves.

We are passionate about making amazing food. We always make sure we go that extra mile to give you that real "wow" factor whilst making food nutritious and delicious.

Cleverchefs was founded in 2015 by Nick Collins, whom you may have seen on Masterchef the professionals a few years ago. Cleverchefs was brought to life with a dream to produce fun and vibrant food worth talking about in the hospitality sector.

Our ethos is about providing perfection as a standard. This means that we promise to use the freshest local ingredients, cooked and served by dedicated professionals, whilst doing our best to be sustainable in every area of our business.

We hope that we can bring a new lease of life to the lunchtime and provide dishes that your children will love and talk about when they go home.

Please feel free to get in touch with us at feedme@cleverchefs.co.uk if we can be of any assistance.

We understand that the first few years of eating at school can play a huge part in shaping a child's relationship with food.

Starting out in the right way, seeing healthy fresh food as the norm is so positive for their future eating habits.

We are on a mission to provide food that children want to engage with and, most of all, enjoy, encouraging our young students to try new foods and enjoy the vibrancy of different textures and tastes from across international cuisines.

We are also realistic in what we provide for our young customers, it has to be recognisable, so where we can make food that naturally appeals better for them, we will, like using wholemeal pasta & wholemeal flour in our bread, reducing sugar in our bakes and fortifying sauces with vegetables. All of our primary schools use 95% fresh produce.

Pretty much everything except peas is fresh in our kitchens.

Eating Well - Doing Good

At Cleverchefs, we encourage everyone to participate in our healthy eating ethos.

We understand how important it is for our food to appeal to your children. But more than that, we know the importance of making meaningful connections. We focus on engaging with your children daily to ensure that the food they receive is satisfying and nutritionally balanced.

We have some simple but impactful guidelines for our school food offer, ensuring our meals have good sources of protein and starch, accompanied by lots of vegetables, salad & fruit.

Our kitchens will always be staffed with real chefs, so if your child has a food allergy or food intolerance, our well-trained team will put procedures in place to ensure we provide those meals safely and meet dietary needs. 

A message from our founder

Our approach to food in our education sector is simple. We make sure we source the very best British ingredients.

Nothing processed, and nothing added.

We ensure our kitchens are led by real chefs with a background in fresh food, our training is second to none, and they are fully briefed on our mission to provide first-class food & service.

We will always strive for something perfect. Cleverchefs is chef-led by me, and I understand what real food should look like, and that message filters through to the whole team. When you step onto a Cleverchefs site, you can feel the passion for incredible food.

Our menus have been carefully crafted to consider the seasons—our pupil's tastes and preferences.

We are on a mission to make school dinners fun and healthy.

You are in safe hands with us in your kitchens.

Nick Collins

CLEVERCHEFS BY NATURE

 

How much does it cost?

The cost of the school meal is £2.70 per day. Payment should be made online via your child's personalised IPAY account, which is provided to each parent when their child joins Northmead.

Those parents in receipt of Universal Credit, Income Support, IBJSA or some forms of Child Tax Credit may be entitled to free school meals. Application forms to check entitlement to Free School Meals can be found here or are available from the school office.  Please note we are unable to provide free meals until the relevant documentation has been received.

What if my child would prefer a packed lunch?

To support our children with various nut allergies, we are a nut-free school. It is vitally important that we remain vigilant about this and reduce, as far as possible, the chances of children who have nut allergies coming into contact with any form of nuts. We must insist that children's packed lunches do not include any products containing nuts. This is also a good opportunity to remind everyone that morning snacks must only be fruit or vegetables.

We also ask that you support us in helping your child to make healthy choices and keep crisps and cakes to a minimum. We do not believe sweets, chocolate or fizzy drinks should be included in a healthy packed lunch, and we request that you keep these treats for after school. In this context, we also ask that packed lunches only include low-sugar squash, juice or water. For obvious reasons, please do not send your child to school with thermos flasks, glass bottles or anything which easily breaks.

For ideas and inspiration on providing a healthy choice of packed lunch, please visit the NHS Lunchbox ideas and recipes page.

Break time snacks

We encourage children to eat a piece of fruit during the morning break. However, please remember that ‘fruit winders’ or similar, in our opinion, do not count as a break time for break time fruit. Please ensure your child has a clean, named water bottle in school. We have drinking water readily available in classrooms so that bottles can be refilled during the school day.

Try more, learn more, achieve more.