The consortium wanted to make sustainability education in cooking practical, attractive, and easy to adopt in VET and secondary school contexts. Our main objective was to develop and test a gamified learning package (board/card game and supporting digital materials) that helps learners understand the environmental impacts of food choices and motivates them to practise more climate-friendly, healthy, and resource-efficient cooking habits. We also aimed to strengthen educators’ capacity to teach these topics through ready-to-use lesson guidance and “game master” training materials, so teachers and trainers can confidently run engaging learning sessions. A further objective was to pilot the approach with learners in partner countries, collect feedback, and improve the tools based on real classroom experience. Finally, we wanted to ensure long-term uptake by disseminating the results through partner networks, creating openly accessible outputs, and building a foundation for future use and adaptation of the GreenChef methodology beyond the project period.
We applied for GreenChef because we identified a clear gap in vocational and secondary culinary education: sustainability, food systems, low-carbon cooking, and plant-based recipes are often missing from official curricula, while teachers frequently lack practical tools and ready-to-use methods to teach these topics in an engaging way. At the same time, young people need relevant, hands-on learning that links everyday food choices to climate impact and encourages healthier, more sustainable habits. The project addressed these needs by developing a gamified learning approach (a card game plus trainer guidance and a digital repository) that supports experiential learning, strengthens educator competences, and motivates students through teamwork, challenges, and real cooking practice. The transnational partnership (Hungary–Bulgaria–Greece) was formed to combine expertise in climate education, culinary training, and game design, ensuring the results are pedagogically sound, culturally adaptable, and scalable across different educational and VET contexts.