The Coronavirus pandemic has pushed our national healthcare system to its limits and demanded a great deal of sacrifice from those working on the frontlines. But it’s also been a time when we’ve seen incredible acts of kindness that help support those most affected.
Eliza and Rose, 13-year-old cousins, are doing just that. Last month, these two teens launched BakeKits to bring the joy of baking to their local community during lockdown. And, more importantly, raise money for the NHS.
With an aunt and uncle, as well as family friends, working for the NHS, it’s an institution that’s very important to the girls. And as passionate bakers, sharing their love of baking was the ideal way to generate donations.
The idea behind BakeKits is simple – package together the non-perishable items needed to bake bread or cookies, and sell them at a price that covers costs and includes a donation for the NHS Charities Together.
There’s four simple yet delicious kits to choose from – a basic white and wholemeal bread, a classic Italian focaccia or chocolate chip cookies for those with a sweet tooth.
How BakeKits got started
Anyone who’s been to a supermarket recently will know that flour is like gold dust at the moment – impossible to get your hands on. It’s a problem that motivated Eliza and Rose: “We know that right now baking ingredients aren’t that easily accessible in the shops, so we wanted to provide a kit so everyone who wants to can share in this baking craze.”
After checking it was possible to source flour and other key ingredients from wholesalers, it took just two days to go from idea to execution.
With the help of creative strategist Bill Griffin, BakeKits was quickly online with a mailing list and social media presence. Powered by EmailOctopus, the weekly BakeKits newsletter provides a dose of funny, helpful and optimistic updates to help get you through lockdown. Over on Instagram, their page is slowly filling up with pictures of hand-packaged kits and the post-baking results.
Since launching at the end of April, Rose and Eliza have already raised hundreds of pounds for NHS Charities Together, a collective of member charities that are currently supporting NHS staff and volunteers caring for Covid-19 patients.
Getting our bake on
We couldn’t let the opportunity pass to donate to frontline workers and enjoy homemade baked goods. So we joined in and got baking!
It was a tough choice between the chocolate chip cookies and the focaccia but in the end I plumped for the classic Italian bread.
A cute package arrived a week and a bit later with a hand-drawn ‘thank you’ note, the recipe and all the non-perishable ingredients needed to bake a rosemary focaccia.
Thankfully, the recipe was easy to follow and a few hours later I sat down to a delicious focaccia lunch with the mouth-watering smells of rosemary and fresh baked bread wafting through my apartment.
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