The Newcomer Cookbook: Cooking, Community Cultural Exchange

Our Newcomer Cookbook project embraces cultural diversity and assists newcomers in adapting to life in Edmonton. Featuring favorite recipes from newcomers and cooking staff, the cookbook offers user-friendly instructions, pictures, conversion tables, and suitable ingredient substitutions. It includes Canadian recipes tested by our Newcomer Community Kitchen, promoting community, cultural exchange, and culinary exploration.

Written in accessible English, the cookbook uses plain language and features illustrations, photos, and measurements to help readers identify Canadian ingredients and estimate pricing. This inclusive resource reduces barriers for those new to Canadian shopping and cooking practices.

Complementing the cookbook, a basic cooking box will be provided to 50 low-income households, containing staple items and a cookbook copy, encouraging families to cook nutritious meals and foster cross-cultural understanding at home.

To ensure project viability and sustainability, we will collaborate with partners such as Edmonton Public Library (EPL) and Edmonton Immigrant Service Associations (EISA) ensuring the cookbook is inclusive, appropriate, and tailored to newcomers' specific needs in our city.

This project directly benefits newcomers and refugees facing challenges adapting to Canadian food systems. Drawing from our newcomer cooking classes, the cookbook caters to entire households, with demographics including adults (60%), youth (20%), and children (20%). Research indicates that newcomers often rely on food banks during their initial years in Canada due to financial struggles and unfamiliarity with local food practices. The Newcomer Cookbook addresses this by serving as a practical and cultural bridge, providing accessible instructions, ingredient substitutions, and preparation photos for confident cooking.

Beyond nutrition, the cookbook acts as a socio-historic and cultural document, preserving traditions and fostering a sense of belonging for those resettling. By highlighting youth perspectives and celebrating culinary traditions in Edmonton, it promotes cross-cultural understanding, diversity, and inclusion.

Additionally, low-income households of all cultural backgrounds can benefit from a basic cooking box with staple ingredients and simple recipes, ensuring families can prepare affordable, nutritious meals using Canadian staples.

From a research perspective, cookbooks can be a source of original information, skills, and practises built into the recipes themselves: ingredients, technologies, cooking methods, and instructional format. In the creation of a cookbook, many traditions and other parts of culture can be preserved through food and food education. This project strengthens food literacy, reduces barriers to healthy eating, and enriches the diversity in the Edmonton community as a whole.