Food is good for the soul, and great for business too. Just ask Baxters Healthcare. It sent 12 of its regulatory affairs employees to a team-building exercise at Venturi's Table. Set up by two Italian food lovers in London, the firm provides kitchen space and a quality cooking masterclass to companies wishing to send their staff away to bond over bolognaise. And if Italian does not appeal, visitors can make Indian or Japanese cuisine instead. Companies such as Cadbury's, Google and Merrill Lynch have all attended the workshops.Debbie Yates, regulatory affairs assistant for Baxters Healthcare, was a recent attendee. "Everyone had a great time," she says. "No matter what your ability, everybody can take part." She says her department works across two sites. As a result some people did not know each other well at all. But the cookery classes changed all this. "It improved relations back in the office. We still discuss it," she says. "The chefs talk so passionately about food that it's hard not to get caught up in it all. We were smiling the whole day."

Novotel West London has an interesting approach to food too. It uses it as a training tool, with employees put through the Five Senses Experience at the hotel. It not only encourages a discussion between staff, but also makes them more aware of their senses, so they can carry out their jobs more efficiently. The training entails employees touching, smelling, seeing and eventually tasting different foods. "It helps if they are aware of their senses to judge how good a stay customers are having," says assistant HR manager, Emma Hickie. The sense of smell is particularly important in a busy kitchen, to detect burning, or even the smell of stagnant water in a guest's room, according to Hickie. And Novotel employees should of course count themselves lucky that their in-house training courses are catered for by their own head chef, who has worked at the likes of Claridge's. The rest of us have to put up with milky tea and stale sandwiches at ours.