Bourne to Cook: Simple, Cheap, Delicious Recipes - In memory in Kevin

Kevin, someone we had the privilege of supporting for several years, has sadly passed away. Kevin received health engagement support to help him recover from an illness while living in emergency accommodation, and was a regular attendee at our drop ins and activities. Our thoughts are with all those who knew and loved Kevin.

In his memory, we’d like to share the cookbook that he developed alongside Justlife to help people living in emergency and temporary accommodation, often with very little access to cooking facilities, prepare healthy, cheap meals.

The cookbook has some amazing recipes in it, from aduki bean casserole, to Thai green curry, to how to make your own dumplings. If you try one of these recipes in memory of Kevin, please tag us on Instagram or Twitter @JustlifeUK

Here’s Kevin’s introduction to his book and part of his story…

You never know what is going to happen to you. 41 years of constant employment with fairly good pay and then bang, illness, depression, early retirement and a payoff that runs out after 3 years. Eviction. Living on the streets. Scared. I ended up in hospital but was lucky enough to get housed on the first day, alright it was a dingy emergency accommodation room, but it was a room. I couldn’t cook and there was no microwave, I had very little money so only ate bad, cheap food.

After a little while Justlife started running cooking workshops with the brilliant Veronica and Dave, where I learnt to cook loads of dishes from different countries that don’t cost the earth and taste great! It was here that I came up with the idea of writing a cookbook with simple but mouth-watering recipes which you can cook on one hob.

In emergency and temporary accommodation you don’t get much in the way of cooking facilities, so I wanted to create a cookbook that could be used by people who are in the same position I was in not so long ago. It was just a thought, but Lucy and Kate at Justlife helped me to run with the idea and now you’re reading it! I hope the meals in this book help to put a smile on peoples faces!

Good luck in your future.

Kevin Bourne
(Co-Author... and the brains behind the book)

People can have limited access to cooking facilities while they’re living in emergency or temporary accommodation, which makes it difficult for them to prepare healthy meals. Earlier this month we ran a ‘Cooking on a budget’ workshop with Fran from The Brighton Nutritionist, to help people learn how to prepare nutritious, affordable meals using everyday appliances they are likely to have. If you're interested in supporting us to work with more people like Kevin, please donate here.