TV's Dipa helps cook up tasty treats for Shrewsbury Town stars
Cooking for hordes of hungry footballers was all in a day’s work for chefs who were hard at it in the kitchen at Shrewsbury Town’s Sundorne training ground.
Dipa Jakhu, who made it through to the finals of Britain’s Best Home Cook, donned the apron alongside head chef Dave Hindhaugh.
The pair were busy prepping the dishes of the day – chicken breast Nicoise with green beans, egg and leaves and pasta with spicy tomato sauce and a dash of cumin.
They worked as the team were being put through their paces by new town manager John Askey and were building up an appetite.
Dipa, a 44-year-old civil servant from Wolverhampton, was featured on the BBC show cooking roast chicken for the show’s presenters, Mary Berry and Chris Bavin.
She said she was more used to cooking for her husband and children but was delighted to have been invited along to cook alongside Dave.
“I am not used to cooking on this scale,” she said. “And although we are cooking for about 40 people I am nowhere near as nervous as I was cooking for Mary Berry.
“This sort of food is not my typical style. I like to cook spicy food so that is why I said to Dave about adding cumin to the tomato sauce.”
Dave said that the diet of a footballer had to be carefully managed. Through the week he had been increasing the amount of carbohydrate-rich food for the players to make sure they are match fit for their game against Bristol City on Saturday.
And while the diet is not as strict as that for teams in the Premier League, he works closely with local producers, including butchers and fishmongers, to ensure that the players, physios, coaches, the manager and medical staff get a fully balanced diet.
“I use a lot of fish and make fish noddles, fish in parsley sauce and other dishes. They also like chicken which is a great way of getting them to eat protein,” he said.
“It has been great to work alongside Dipa and learn some of her tricks. It will make the meals a bit more varied for everyone.”
For Saturday's game, Dave and Dipa made chicken noddles and high protein flapjacks for the team to eat before their journey down the M5, which saw the Shrews earn a a 1-1 draw.
