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Sustainable Culinary Skills: Fostering Vegetable-Centric Cooking Practices Among Young Adults for Health and Environmental Benefits – A Qualitative Study
Roy, R.; Alsaie, A.; Malloy, J.; Kemper, J.A. Sustainable Culinary Skills: Fostering Vegetable-Centric Cooking Practices among Young Adults for Health and Environmental Benefits—A Qualitative Study. Sustainability2024, 16, 928.
Roy, R.; Alsaie, A.; Malloy, J.; Kemper, J.A. Sustainable Culinary Skills: Fostering Vegetable-Centric Cooking Practices among Young Adults for Health and Environmental Benefits—A Qualitative Study. Sustainability 2024, 16, 928.
Roy, R.; Alsaie, A.; Malloy, J.; Kemper, J.A. Sustainable Culinary Skills: Fostering Vegetable-Centric Cooking Practices among Young Adults for Health and Environmental Benefits—A Qualitative Study. Sustainability2024, 16, 928.
Roy, R.; Alsaie, A.; Malloy, J.; Kemper, J.A. Sustainable Culinary Skills: Fostering Vegetable-Centric Cooking Practices among Young Adults for Health and Environmental Benefits—A Qualitative Study. Sustainability 2024, 16, 928.
Abstract
With young adults (18-30 years) exhibiting the lowest vegetable intake, primarily due to in-adequate cooking skills, this study aims to explore the usability and desirability of educational tools such as written recipes and cooking videos to foster sustainable eating habits. Employing a descriptive, qualitative, and user-centered design, three focus groups were held at a major urban university campus in New Zealand, engaging students, and staff within the target age group. Discussions with 15 participants identified key facilitators for vegetable-based cooking, including access to ingredients, ease of recipe visualization, and cost-effectiveness. Conse-quently, 13 vegetable-centric recipes and instructional videos were created, incorporating nu-tritional value, affordability, and preparation efficiency. These resources, tailored to young adults' preferences, were designed to mitigate the identified barriers to vegetable use, con-tributing to sustainable food practices. The application of a user-centered approach in devel-oping educational content yielded a set of recipes and videos that not only address the gaps in cooking skills among young adults but also promote the broader goals of sustainability in food consumption patterns. This approach offers actionable insights for practitioners and food marketers to enhance vegetable utilization and sustainable eating behaviors in this demo-graphic.
Keywords
young adults; vegetables; cooking; user-centered; nutrition education
Subject
Social Sciences, Behavior Sciences
Copyright:
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
