'Share Your Lunch' Pops-Up To Tackle Food Poverty

An anti-poverty agency is rolling its street food truck into St Paul's Square this month and is providing a unique opportunity that people can really sink their teeth into.

Can Cook, now in its eighth year, brings the first ever 'Share your Lunch' to Liverpool, an initiative that provides local families living in food poverty with a fresh, healthy meal each time someone buys lunch from the 'Share Your Lunch' team.

The 'Share your Lunch' truck is pulling into St. Paul's Square from Monday, April 13, to Friday, May 1, and will be serving food between 11.30am and 2.00pm. Each meal will cost between £4-4.50. There's plenty on the menu to ignite those taste buds, as the truck menu will vary from week to week with a great selection of street food options including Middle Eastern, Indian and Italian.

'Share your Lunch' provides the customer with a hearty portion of street food from a menu of daily specials, and the satisfaction of knowing that their gesture has benefited an individual or a family in Liverpool.

Robbie Davison, Director of Can Cook said:

"It is shocking that in Liverpool alone, 60,000 people are living in food poverty – this includes 33% of children in Liverpool. Numbers are climbing and action needs to be taken!"

"Our target is to sell 3000 meals over the course of three weeks and in return, Can Cook will produce and distribute 3000 meals in May 2015 to people living in food poverty in the city – we need your help to make this possible, so grab a slice of the action on your next lunch-break.

"To reach our target we're also asking corporate teams to battle it out and staff our food trucks in an Apprentice­-style task. This is the first time this has ever been done in the UK and we really need the public to get behind this campaign.

"Businesses will provide teams of three who will work alongside our skilled chefs and will be responsible for their own social media campaign to drive footfall to the truck – prizes will be up for grabs to the winning teams."

Already signed up to help Can Cook tackle food poverty challenge are Agent Marketing, Santander UK, Brabners Solicitors, CBRE and Liverpool BID Company.

Bill Addy, chief executive of Liverpool BID Company, said:

''Share Your Lunch is a brilliant idea that gets to the heart of a major issue in an engaging and practical way.

"The Can Cook team have a great track record of delivering outstanding results and great food, this project is sure to be a winning recipe. It'll certainly give businesses in the Commercial District food for thought and a great reason to get to St Paul's square over the next three weeks."

To find out more about taking part, or to discover more details on the Can Cook food truck, contact david@cancook.co.uk or follow @foodpoverty and @CanCookStudio on Twitter.

ENDS

Notes to Editors – About Can Cook...

• Can Cook are a Merseyside organisation with mission to 'connect people through food'.
• Can Cook are an anti-poverty organisation and everything they do is focused on creating solutions to poverty and specifically food poverty.
• Can Cook have a range of businesses focused on creating solutions to poverty that:

1: Make good, healthy, fresh food available to everyone - including individuals and families in their own homes, nursing homes, schools, nurseries and workplaces.

2: Offer food related training and jobs that train people of all ages in food skills and get them ready to work in food/enterprise related professions. Can Cook launch their Food and Enterprise qualification this year and will employee 20 16- 18 year olds.

• The 'Share your lunch' concept will launch out this year across all Can Cook businesses and for every meal bought in any of Can Cook's businesses - part of the profit will contribute to provide a fresh meal for someone in food poverty.
• 'Cooked' launches this year – Liverpool new meals on wheels preparing 1000's fresh, healthier meals delivered directly to the customer groups mentioned above.
• The first Can Cook Food Hub launches in Kirkby (Knowsley) this summer in partnership with First Ark, Public Health and Tesco offering a new radical solution to food poverty. The first of its kind in the UK, it offers a shop retailing fresh food meals with a difference. This will be combined with a great Can Cook Café offer and cookery studio to make cooking fun again and support people to broaden their cookery skills and take back some innovative ideas to their home kitchen, no matter what their budget!

A: Can Cook, Unit 20, The Matchworks, Garston, Liverpool, L19 2RF

T: 0151 650 6444

E: david@cancook.co.uk

W: www.cancook.co.uk

Follow us on Twitter @foodpoverty/ @CanCookStudio

For further information, contact James Courtney, Communications Executive, Agent Marketing

t: 0151 707 0427

m: 07816 936 444

e: james@agentmarketing.co.uk

w: www.agentmarketing.co.uk

follow us on Twitter: www.twitter.com/Agent_Marketing

join us on Facebook: http://tinyurl.com/6erxn9b

Liverpool: 43 Jordan Street, Liverpool, L1 0BW

London: 6th Floor, 14 Bonhill Street, London, EC2A 4BQ

Registered in England – 5813665

VAT Registered - 892 5045 08