Saturday 9 May – Community Celebration meal with Aliyah Hussain and Chopping Club

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Aliyah is one of the commissioned artists for the dining room project and has created some beautiful ceramics, that will be part of an instillation when the building reopens . Part of the process of making these ceramics was to create sprig moulds of people favourite foods, these were made and decorated in collaboration with the Community Curators and hundreds of people from Rochdale at the Feel Good Family Picnic.

Now the ceramics are finished, but sadly the building is not,  Aliyah wanted to have a celebration meal with the community curators. This was a chance for the items to be used for their intended purpose but to also bring people together to share a meal.

Aliyah has previously worked with Chopping Club, a fantastic grass roots supper club based in Liverpool. They meet in a library space once a month and create delicious affordable food for people to prepare and eat together. They created a menu for the celebration meal based off the sprigs that are on the ceramics.

It was a delicious menu, all that was left was for everyone to roll up their sleeves and get chopping. There were five different stations with different recipes on, the community curators and chopping club volunteers decided on what table they wanted to join and created the dish together.

The tables were set with all the ceramics, and everyone gathered round to enjoy a five-course feast. It was wonderful to see everyone relaxed, having conversations, laughing and enjoying the food. It was a wonderful way for everyone to connect and learn some new recipes and bring two different groups together. It was a real celebration of the hard work that Aliyah and the community curators have put into the project so far!