Bishop Canning's Primary School in Devizes had a positively 'souper' time on Saturday 8 October, holding the Big Soup Share Lunch for their local community. Pupils and staff from the whole school were involved in harvesting vegetables from the school garden and local allotments before turning them into delicious soup.
Mrs Steggall, Bishop Canning's Year One teacher, said: "Not only is gardening a fantastic way of bringing the curriculum alive, it also helps to get the children outdoors in the fresh air to improve their health and wellbeing."
The event was a whole school enterprise with each year group getting involved in some aspect of the community lunch, with some even involved in cooking the vast range of soups on offer.
The soups of the day consisted of broad bean and pancetta soup, roasted vegetable soup, winter vegetable soup, and a Ukrainian recipe chosen by the school's Ukrainian pupils. Bread rolls and a rosemary focaccia made by the students were also available.
For dessert, the pupils from Year Four used freshly foraged local berries to make a blackberry and apple crumble.
Sarah Reed, the schools Year Four teacher, explained that: "The children really look forward to practising their Forest School skills. Learning how to forage not only provides children with valuable sources of nutrition, it also teaches them about nature and the world around them."
The Big Soup Share Lunch, originally devised in 2018 to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Royal Horticulture Society's School Gardening Campaign, is now an annual and much loved event in the school and community calendar.
Headteacher Catherine Vardy commented that: "We were delighted to see so many of our friends and neighbours joining us for lunch. The Big Soup Share is a wonderful way for our school family to get together with our local community and share some delicious homemade food at Harvest."
The school hall was packed with smiling faces on this sunny autumn day, and over 140 bowls of soup were served up.
If you've been participating in any interesting events in your church community, let us know by email the Communications Team at comms@salisbury.anglican.org