Maverick Kitchen Returns For the Fall Semester

The joy of cooking is returning to UTA Libraries as Maverick Kitchen gears up for another year to feed and educate students about healthy meal options. The Kitchen will host its first two cooking demonstrations at 12:30 p.m. and 5:30 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 31.   

Maverick Kitchen is a series of cooking workshops designed to provide students with an engaging learning experience around food. As a part of the workshop, students learn about the cultural significance of different dishes and basic food and kitchen safety skills.   

Milaun Murry, Experiential Learning librarian, stated the program started around six years ago to help combat food insecurities on campus. She noted students have trouble accessing healthy and affordable food options due to their low income.   

“Maverick Kitchen was designed to show students a way that they could cook affordable and healthy with the resources they have around them,” Milaun said.  

Milaun stated it is important to show students how to cook healthily and to reward them for their time with a meal. She noted that if students who attend the cooking demonstration are going to be fed as well.  

Maverick Kitchen is on the first floor of the Central Library inside one of the classrooms. Space is limited to 25 people due to the classroom size. No registration is required, but space availability is on a first-come, first-served basis. It is free to attend. During the cooking demonstration, students will learn how to make the recipe and be given the food afterward.   

The university’s annual homecoming celebration is a chili cook-off competition. As a part of that celebration, Maverick Kitchen teaches students how to make chili through its ChiliEats cooking demonstration.   

“Chili is a cheap filling meal to do in the colder weather and can feed a lot of people. It is an easy one that we can teach students,” Milaun said. “We teach them a vegetarian option, and then we talk to them about adding a meat option to it. More of our students tend to be vegetarian rather than meat eaters.”  

 Milaun stated that if they can, Maverick Kitchen uses vegetables grown in a garden plot here on campus over by the Maverick Activity Center. She hopes the cherry tomatoes growing in the plot will be ready by the time they do the chili cooking demonstration in November.   

 As Maverick Kitchen continues to grow, Milaum is looking toward the future in how to expand the program to reach even more students.   

 “We are hoping to get to the point where we can do a cookbook every year that we put out and have available to students,” Milaun said. “This is the first year we are partnering with Maverick Dining. We have a good relationship with them, and their chef works with us.”  

For more information about Maverick Kitchen, go online to https://libraries.uta.edu.