Health Futures Australia

01/09/2026

Mission critical to our Healthy Lunch Kitchen is developing partnerships with many other local small businesses keeping our supply chain close by and helping each other out. We are so lucky to have developed an amazing partnership with micro business Quince & Cakes in Ballarat.

Owners Dusica and Marco have created the most beautiful high quality products for our community - for us it is a wholemeal and spelt pastry in which we sneakily hide 2 serves of green vegetables! No surprise - they are a huge hit this week with our little customers at Phoenix P-12 Community College with comments like "I don't eat green but I eat these", 'I've had two helpings and want more, and I don't like green stuff". Thank you Dusica and Marco for creating a beautiful product that helps us increase veggie consumption! Ballarat Wholefoods Collective Ballarat Foundation Ballarat Neighbourhood Centre

13/08/2026

A big winner is back in the Healthy Lunch Kitchen this week: beautiful spelt pasta from Ballarat Wholefoods Collective with tomato and veggie sauce, vegetarian and an extra protein with chicken option - shhhhh don’t tell anyone but there’s 2 serves of veg in every bowl ❤️ ❤️ 🥬 🥕 🧅 🧄 🍅 🫑 🍠 AND served up by the amazing year 12 students at Phoenix P-12 Community College 🎃 Ballarat Foundation VicHealth Healthy Eating Advisory Service Phoenix P-12 Community College National Nutrition Foundation Ballarat Community Health City of Ballarat Ballarat Neighbourhood Centre Our Kitchen Social Cafe

06/08/2026

Here's a stat that stops us in our tracks.

Research by Deakin University found that Victorian primary school children aged 8 to 12, right in the age range we serve lunch to across our classes, are getting almost half (47%) of their daily energy from ultra-processed food (UPF). Cakes, biscuits, packaged snacks, sugary drinks—the stuff on every shelf at children's height, marketed right at them.

Food companies spend big to make UPFs impossible to avoid, and families are up against a food system stacked in favour of convenience over nutrition every single time. It's a hard environment to navigate.

This is why we love what happens in our every week 🍅 Real vegetables, real chefs, real food made from scratch, served up at school where children spend most of their day. One more nourishing meal in the mix, made with care, served up at school, is our way of supporting families and community.

Have you seen this research? Read it here:
https://tinyurl.com/3ppjx6f7

Keen to hear what you think.



City of Ballarat Phoenix P-12 Community College Ballarat Community Health Ballarat Wholefoods Collective VicHealth Ballarat Foundation

03/08/2026

Exciting brand new Lead Chef/Cook role in the Healthy Lunch Kitchen social enterprise!

To help us grow we are recruiting for an amazing brand new position for a creative and motivated chef/cook with purpose across the Healthy Lunch Kitchen social enterprise – helping us to grow and be sustainable!
Please spread the word. Ballarat Foundation Ballarat Wholefoods Collective Ballarat Community Health Ballarat Neighbourhood Centre Our Kitchen Social Cafe

About the role here:

https://www.ethicaljobs.com.au/members/healthfutures/lead-chef-ballarat

03/08/2026

We're growing rapidly at the , and we are thrilled to pieces!!

Third week into Term 3 and we've hit a major milestone. We've grown from 370 to 530 meals every single week 🚀 That's almost 50% more nutritious lunches going out to Ballarat students - Phoenix P-12 Community College than we were serving just weeks ago!

More students sitting down for a nourishing meal. More classrooms fuelled and ready to learn. More of this program doing exactly what it was built to do. We started this with one class, two days a week, and now look where we are. 🥳

Mr Button, Grade 3/4 teacher at Phoenix P-12 Community College watched it happen in his own classroom. His students saw a few photos of what was coming and found out they'd be joining the program. Mr Button said they were “super pumped and excited” 😃 Watch Mr Button tell it himself below.

Huge thank you to everyone who has helped make this happen, the kitchen team, our volunteers, and every school trusting us to feed their students. This is just the beginning 💚

City of Ballarat VicHealth Ballarat Wholefoods Collective Ballarat Foundation Ballarat Community Health Ballarat Neighbourhood Centre

30/07/2026

Soup, glorious soup! 🍲 We think it glorious because it is one of the most nutrient-loaded foods we can provide and it warms us on these cold winter days in Central Victoria. The taste, texture and look of some of our foods in the Healthy Lunch Kitchen might be quite different. Not every student loves every dish that comes out of our kitchen first up, soup being one. Honestly? That's completely normal and fine🙂

One of our students summed it up better than we ever could: "If you don't like something you kind of have to give it a shot”. And another, "I thought I'd hate it but I tried it and actually, it tasted pretty good, I even asked for seconds!". One of the teachers commenting “the homemade focaccia fingers were perfect as students used them to scoop up the delicious soup”.

That right there is half the battle won. The willingness to try something new, even when it looks and maybe smells a bit different, is exactly how healthy eating habits get built for life.

We watch students push past that hesitation every single week, and we couldn’t be prouder of every one of them who gives something a go. And to the superstar teachers who constantly role model and encourage - what champions you all are ⭐⭐⭐ at Phoenix P-12 Community College

City of Ballarat VicHealth Ballarat Neighbourhood Centre Ballarat Wholefoods Collective Ballarat Foundation Ballarat Community Health

29/07/2026

A major focus for our organisation is healthy and ethical food for everyone, especially children and young people.
We know the battle we have with the food industry to do the right thing by we consumers, but they aren’t.

Watching Duped makes us even more determined to provide a market alternative to ultra-processed foods for our schools and families through our Healthy Lunch Kitchen and proudly be a member of the wonderful Ballarat Wholefoods Collective who work tirelessly and voluntarily to source local, real Australian and ethic foods for the Ballarat Community, thank you to Wholefoods and Four Corners VicHealth Ballarat Foundation Healthy Eating Advisory Service Food for Health Alliance National Nutrition Foundation

Watch Duped: Food Exposed here: https://bit.ly/4fwfKXm

23/07/2026

Lunch time used to just be lunch time. These days, it's something else entirely.

Children eating together, swapping stories, building the kind of everyday connection you genuinely can't fake or force into existence. Teachers have noticed it too, a real shift in how students relate to each other once they're taking time out together over a meal, instead of rushing through a quick bite alone.

Honestly, it's become one of the best parts of what we do here. And it's the kind of thing that's easy to overlook completely if you're not looking closely enough to catch it.

City of Ballarat VicHealth Ballarat Foundation Ballarat Wholefoods Collective Phoenix P-12 Community College

22/07/2026

Can we take a minute for our volunteers?

Since began, this crew has turned up week after week. They've served the food, washed the bowls, packed everything away, done the unglamorous bits nobody sees. They've done it because they genuinely believe children deserve nourishing meals at school. Not because anyone's paying them to care.

One of our students said it best: "The people who cook the food are really nice, and I appreciate how they basically get nothing from it cause it's all voluntary."

Out of the mouths of children, honestly. That's exactly it.

To every volunteer who's ever ladled out a bowl of pasta or wiped down a bench after the bell, thank you. You are the Healthy Lunch Kitchen 🩷

City of Ballarat VicHealth Ballarat Neighbourhood Centre Ballarat Wholefoods Collective Ballarat Foundation Phoenix P-12 Community College