02 Track 2

Unit 1

All About Food

Chapter 1

A Restaurant for Change

Page 13

A restaurant for change

Jamie Oliver wants to change peoples’ lives and he is using food to do it. Oliver, a chef, is well-known for sharing his secrets of cooking healthy food through his magazine, cookbooks, and television shows.

He is also changing lives through his Italian restaurant, fifteen.

fifteen started in London, England, as a place to train young adults to work in a kitchen. Oliver’s idea was to create a professional kitchen that can help young people get a fresh start and a chance to become professional chefs.

Every September, a new group of 18- to 24-year-olds start work at fifteen. When they start, they are usually not qualified for restaurant job, but that will change quickly.

In the 12 months of training, the student chefs study cooking at college and get hands-on training at the restaurant.

Besides learning kitchen skills, they learn the importance of using fresh ingredients and how to create their own recipes. And their education doesn’t stop with preparing and serving food.

The students also learn how to manage money and deal with difficult customers. Overall, the program encourages them to believe in themselves and enables them to look forward to a future in the restaurant business.

The restaurant’s name, fifteen, comes from the number of students the restaurant had when it started in 2002.

Today, Oliver has three of these restaurants and a few hundred students have finished the program. Around 90 percent of the graduates are still working in the food industry.

Some own restaurants or work in some of the best kitchens around the world. Others are now starring in their own TV shows.

They’re all great examples of what young people can do if they’re given the opportunity and support.