*Please note, our project activities evolved slightly between phase 1 and phase 2 with feedback. Phase 2 includes an updated description of proposed activities, deliverables, and staffing. Phase 1’s original submission is preserved below for transparency.

Project Significance and updated Statement of Project Feasibility and Anticipated Impact, including the Osher Community: Poor diet poses a significant barrier to integrative health equity. Culinary medicine is the evidence-based application of food and cooking to medicine such that patients are empowered to make healthful dietary decisions for disease treatment and prevention. From years of patient care experience, providers including our project leads have observed that a substantial proportion of Osher patients, particularly those eligible for our Community Care Fund, struggle to adhere to critical dietary recommendations. Interest in bringing culinary medicine to our UCSF Osher Center for patients and providers has been long-brewing and this opportunity will strengthen our internal capacity (e.g., in staff skills, resources, connections with relevant Osher Collaborative and UCSF partners like the Food Equity and Justice Program) to provide or restart a menu of culinary medicine programming at the Center. Previously, our project lead helped establish the Vouchers4Veggies program at Osher before funding sources changed. Our project co-lead helped launch the first culinary medicine program for patients in ambulatory care at UCSF. Our research lead is experienced in quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods data collection and analysis as well as public health nutrition. Successful completion of this project will instill valuable cooking skills to more under-resourced members of our Osher patient population, hopefully inspiring better health. 

*Updated* Project Description and Deliverables (d):This project will host a series of live, quarterly virtual patient “cook-along” workshops (d1) and also create a resource library of 5-6 short-form (1-2 minute) videos for patients on basic cooking skills and nutrition education (d2). These activities will be led by experienced Osher providers Danica Cowan and Linda Dulong. They will be informed by a short, targeted patient needs assessment to identify prominent barriers to dietary change in our Osher patient population to address. We will team up with UCSF Educational Technology Services to edit the videos, restart Vouchers4Veggies to support groceries/food and ingredient sourcing for patients, and collaborate and coordinate with UCSF and the Osher Collaborative's existing network of staff and programming already working in the areas of food equity and culinary medicine to augment our efforts. This grant will also kickstart other resources at Osher to support cooking amongst patients, including establishing a spice pharmacy (d3), cooking appliance/equipment library (d4), and cookbook library (d5). We will also assess program feasibility and acceptability as well as examine changes in cooking skills, culinary knowledge, and basic dietary intakes.

*Updated* Project Team Members/Roles: Danica Cowan, MS, RD; Integrative Dietitian - Culinary Medicine Lead;  Linda Dulong, MSN, ANP-C; Integrative Nurse Practitioner - Culinary Medicine Co-Lead;  Dorothy Chiu, PhD, MSPH; Postdoctoral Fellow - Research Lead;  Julia Burns, MA; Communications Specialist; Osher Administrative Staffperson TBD - Project Administrator. Kavita Mishra, Deborah Caldwell, and Maria Chao provide release time.

Project Innovation: Virtual culinary medicine workshops and videos are an innovative strategy to teach cooking and nutrition effectively and sustainably. They bypass logistical challenges of in-person activities and allow participants to cook and learn in their regular cooking spaces. Patients can ask questions as they figure out how to apply lessons in their individual contexts and even topics like taste, smell, and appearance can be interactively addressed as a group. People often struggle to translate what they learned during an appointment to home – the virtual format jumps that hurdle and brings the provider to their kitchen/cooking space. Additionally, this project will help solidify professional culinary medicine networks for Osher providers.  

Project Timeline:

Phase 1, Preparation (July-Sept 2025): Needs Assessment, Plan Cookalong Workshops and Videos, Set up Distribution for Veggie Vouchers, Spices, Cooking Equipment/Cookbook Library

Phase 2, Implementation (Oct-April 2026): Film Videos, Run Quarterly Workshops

Phase 3, Evaluation (May-June 2026): Analyze Data, Tweak Offerings per Feedback

Total Budget Requested: $20,000

Phase 1 Proposal Project Description: Poor diet poses a significant barrier to integrative health equity.  Dietary change is a critical  component of an effective integrative care plan, but many Osher patients lack foundational cooking skills and culinary knowledge to facilitate these changes via cooking tasty and healthful meals. Thus, it is often very challenging for Osher patients to fully adhere to their dietary recommendations. This is especially a concern for Osher patients eligible for the Community Care Fund. Here, additional barriers to eating healthfully often include a lack of equipment and ingredients. This project will address the barriers above by partnering with 18 Reasons to pilot 2 rounds of virtual cooking classes, as well as build up resources at Osher to support cooking such as a spice bank and cooking appliance library. We will also assess program feasibility and acceptability as well as examine changes in cooking skills, culinary knowledge, and basic dietary intakes.

Phase 1 Statement of Project Feasibility and Anticipated Impact:18 Reasons is a well-established SF based non-profit that provides in person and virtual nutrition-oriented cooking classes to many underserved individuals and families in the Bay Area. Since 2017, 18 Reasons has partnered with various UCSF groups and Linda Dulong, team member on this project, worked with them while she was a provider in WHPC. Successful completion of this project will instill valuable cooking skills to more under-resourced members of our Osher patient population, hopefully inspiring better health. Additionally, this project will kickstart the ability of Osher providers to provide culinary medicine programming to its patient population. Culinary medicine is the evidence-based application of food and cooking to medicine such that patients are empowered to make healthful dietary decisions for disease treatment and prevention.  Project outcomes such as the cooking appliance library, spice bank, and information collected from the evaluation component will also help inform and improve future iterations of this offering.