by Ian Elliot
Northern News Services

NNSL (Dec 08/97) - Cooking can be difficult, even for the most eager of cooks.

But for women who may not know that before eggs can be used in a recipe, the shells have to be broken or have never measured a cup of flour or even tried to cook from a recipe and have a family to look after, the challenges can seem insurmountable.

A number of projects taking place across the NWT and Nunavut, from Baffin Island to the South Slave, are attempting to remedy these problems among women of childbearing age, and by doing so, make up for shortcomings which can exist in the Northern diet.

In prenatal cooking classes, women are being taught the basics of cooking and progressing until they are producing intriguing combinations of traditional and store-bought food -- caribou pizza, for example.

Cooking is only one of a number of topics taught through the program, others run the gamut from stress management to the benefits of breastfeeding. But food is a key element because of its critical role on the health of mothers and their children.

"Some of the younger women don't have any knowledge of cooking at all," says Cheryl Bonnetrouge, who runs the Sa Naeah Prenatal Nutrition Program in Fort Simpson. She can sympathize with her students' difficulties because she was similarly unfamiliar with cooking until taking a class.

"Even something like measuring ingredients is something they may never have done before."

Brenda McIntyre, who oversees programs in Iqaluit and in the nine Baffin communities that have them, says the secret to success is to introduce novice cooks to recipes that are easy to follow, have ingredients that can be left out or substituted if they are unavailable and use familiar foods that are easily available in the North, both traditional and store-bought.

"When I've used a recipe that calls for broccoli, I've had women say to me that they've never had broccoli before. If you're trying to feed a family, you're not going to gamble $3 on something you're not sure they're going to like," she says.

Women, who are traditionally responsible for the family's nutrition, may never have cooked before either because they live with their parents or rely on store-bought canned or prepared foods, which are convenient, but are often loaded with salt, sugar and fat.

And for someone who has never learned to cook, intimidation only begins to describe the feeling when shopping for dinner.

"Try to think what it would be like if you were plunked down in a country where there are all these different foods and spices and you didn't know how to use them," says Jill Christensen, the regional nutritionist with the territorial government's Health Department.

Traditional foods, when available, play a big part in all the prenatal programs because they are cheaper and healthier than store-bought ingredients, which can vary in price, quality and availability.

"We concentrate on inexpensive recipes that are easy to prepare," says McIntyre.

"Something like caribou stroganoff may sound complicated, but it's really popular with the women here."

The programs are funded generously by the federal government and money flows through the territorial government. Unlike many government programs, though, the effects of the prenatal programs are immediate and long-lasting.

"It's a fun, tangible sort of program to do," says McIntyre.

Bonnetrouge says she has seen new mothers go from no knowledge of cooking to calling her to come into their kitchens to help with a particular recipe, and that will result in better-fed children and families in the future.

"We have had a number of success stories," she says. "It's a big job, but I love it."