Let’s get cooking with #HomeSportsClub

What am I cooking today? Since my life, like many others, has been turned completely upside down, this question occupies me more often than I’d like to admit. Now that regular cooking is suddenly part of my everyday life again and shopping in itself is a true test of patience, I need a lot of creativity to cook in a varied way every day.

I don’t claim to be Tim Mälzer in the kitchen – neither in execution nor in inventiveness – but I am very grateful that Julia Meyer Gebert and Birgit Schweyer are taking over the decision-making for me, at least for tonight. And I couldn’t be happier to find out that on the menu we have wild garlic feta sticks with strawberry spring salad!

These two graduate ecotrophologists offer healthy live cooking sessions on Tuesdays and Thursdays via Holmes Place to complement their live classes, sometimes as a duo and sometimes solo. Today the two nutritionists share the stream: Julia Meyer Gebert cooks and Birgit Schweyer narrates.

Necessity is the mother of invention: especially in times when more is happening online than offline, so I couldn’t see a reason not to try an online cooking course. Just like with a sports course, I get a link for the live broadcast 15 minutes before the session starts. However, because I mentally tuned into my venture two days earlier, I’ve already organized my recipe and ingredients from a shopping list they posted on Instagram.

If you can do sports online, why not cook online? “It’s not just about cooking online, but also about being able to put what you cook into a nutritional context with regard to the selection of recipes and foods and their effects,” says the passionate cook and nutritionist Birgit Schweyer, describing the idea behind her live cooking courses.

And so we begin by meditatively pulling apart and washing the salad. I directly question my exuberant motivation to want to cook something healthy for myself and subconsciously flirt with the thought of putting a frozen pizza in the oven. That’s faster, filling and will make me happy too!

But Birgit brings me back to reality: “Especially in times when we are exposed to great emotional stress, food should taste good, make you feel good and above all be fun. Not to forget that a healthy diet also strengthens our immune system. Our health is a combination of sufficient exercise, restful sleep, relaxation and a balanced diet.”

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All right then! I display my cooperative behaviour by washing and finely grating Mairübchen, washing, drying and quartering strawberries and washing and drying the wild garlic. Birgit explains in her commentator’s cabin that wild garlic is the best type of garlic – it has all the taste but is less penetrating in smell. I already feel better prepared for my new life at home thanks to Live Cooking. And not only because of my eating habits!

It’s also because of my sports routine – and this cooking course provides me with tons of valuable tips and recipe ideas to positively influence my sporting performance through a balanced and healthy diet. It’s not my aim to set new world records, but this cooking class reminds me how much my body could achieve if it were optimally supplied with nutrients, vitamins and minerals.

So, now that I’ve finished grating, cutting and grinding the remaining ingredients and have survived the risk of a household accident without any injuries, all I have to do is submerge the feta sticks in egg, bread them in wild garlic and walnut crumbs and put them in a pan. Just watching the feta sticks bubble away makes my mouth water.

But wait – I am briefly distracted by my stomach rumbling. How long do I need to fry the feta for? I feel hot. I’m not sure whether it’s because of nervousness, doing something wrong or because of the hotplate. Luckily for me, the Live Cooking sessions are interactive, so I can just ask them in the commentary section. Promptly Julia at ON answers my question with a smile on her face. 

After I’ve prepared the strawberry spring salad with the feta sticks, I don’t want to let my food get cold. The other participants on the live stream seem to feel the same way.

“Together with Urban Sports Club members, we count between 30 and 50 people in total who take part in the Live Cooking courses. A small community has already formed that regularly cooks together with us. The response to the cooking courses is simply consistently positive,” says Birgit, describing the feedback from the Live Cooking courses.

We say goodbye with a quick Bon Appétit – and see you next time!

My conclusion: It’s amazing – for 45 minutes I felt like Tim Mälzer after all! With professional guidance and invaluable background information, healthy cooking is neither difficult nor time-consuming. Cooking shouldn’t be a chore, but something you enjoy from start to finish. A healthy diet helps you do something good for your body and therefore yourself. And With Julia and Birgit, cooking is garnished with a pinch of fun and humour!

The recipe I tried out can be found here. 

Want to join in? Try one of our live online cooking courses for yourself!