Ginger Cason Creates a New ‘Yum!’ in her Career
By Meg Hale Brunton
Owner and operator of Flour Power Cooking Studios in Fort Mill, South Carolina, Ginger Cason always loved to cook, but spent the first twenty years of her professional career as a geriatric physical therapist. “I did this whole thing, stepping out on faith,” she says of her career shift. “In the beginning the decision was more about Flour Power, but became more about taking a risk, and trusting myself.”
Ginger grew up in Whiteville, North Carolina. With a family made up of farmers, gardeners, and butchers, she always put a great deal of importance on the food she ate. “I always knew where my food came from,” she explains. “I realized as I got older that a lot of people did not all grow up that way — growing their own food.”
When her grandfather suffered a stroke in his 80s, Ginger was able to see the help his physical therapist provided to him. This inspired her to go into the physical therapy field and earn her degree from East Carolina University. Since she loved children, Ginger considered going into pediatric physical therapy, and got a job working at the Shriners Hospital for Children. “I found it was more than I could handle emotionally,” she recalls. “I’ve always loved working with kids, but realized early on that healthcare with kids was not my calling.” So, she went into geriatric therapy instead where she remained for two decades.
After throwing a birthday party for her oldest daughter at a Flour Power Cooking Studio in Quail Corners, Ginger saw the delight the kids at the party took in cooking their own food. Feeling burned out in the healthcare industry, she could not help but feel a strong desire to generate that passion for cooking in kids. In October 2016, Ginger took over the Quail Corners location from the previous owner. While she had done some teaching at the hospital, Ginger felt a bit of trepidation about leading the cooking classes. “Even though I love to cook, you don’t know that you can teach other people,” she explains. “It took a bit of confidence-building on my part.” Ginger enjoyed running the business and loved the location where they remained for six years. Unfortunately, the building’s landlord did not renew their lease after that. So, they moved the studio to Fort Mill and re-opened on June 20, 2022.
Flour Power Cooking Studios began as a kids’ cooking studio, but broadened over time to offer cooking classes of all kinds to all ages. They currently have over 200 recipes to choose from, and 40 themes for the type of cooking class a group can schedule. They host birthday parties, team-building parties, after school/homeschool programs, and competitions based on television cooking programs like Iron Chef, Cupcake Wars, Nailed It!, and Chopped Challenge. “I work with everybody to customize based on the things that they tell me they’re interested in,” Ginger explains. She says that her groups most often make a lot of pizza, pasta and Hibachi dishes, but that her favorite dish to make is the lava cake.
Ginger adds that the cooking classes are for ages 2 ½ and up. “A lot of people don’t give kids enough credit for what they can do,” she says, attributing a lot of that to parents’ fearing that the child will make a mess. Ginger says that messes are okay at her studio since so much of their program is based on discovery. It is her goal to make her studio a fun and comfortable environment (rather than a culinary school) where her students can learn skills that they can reproduce at home. “It really is about the process, not the outcome.”
Ginger loves seeing the kids get excited about preparing a new recipe, or trying something that they don’t usually like very much. “The best part of the day is talking through the recipes with the kids,” she says. “I always tell them to taste it with the thought of how they would change it. You get some really good ideas from kids when you think that way.” Ginger reminds the kids that taste buds change over time, and always makes it a point to impart the rule on her students that, ‘You don’t Yuck someone else’s Yum.’
Currently, Ginger is the studio’s only full-time employee. She teaches the classes, creates some of the lesson plans, purchases the supplies, handles the programming and marketing, and does all the cleaning and dishwashing. “When you are a small business owner and a mother, there is not much free time,” she explains. “So, you just have to organize and maximize the things that have to be accomplished the best you can.” In the future, Ginger hopes to create more partnerships and bring more inspiration to her community through Flour Power. Furthermore, she aspires to bring more programs to her studio to educate kids on the connection between eating quality foods and one’s overall health, as well as the relationship between food and exercise.
While Ginger says she is pleased that Flour Power has expanded to offer more adult classes, she appreciates that she will always get to develop relationships with kids and pass on to them her love of food and fellowship around food. “The focus will never deviate from kids, but we’re adding other things,” she explains. “Flour Power, at this point, is more of a lifestyle movement. I like to think of my own studio as a community. Food is my love language.”
Flour Power Cooking Studios in Fort Mill offers classes throughout the week for all ages and all levels of cooking experience. They also offer a summer camp from June through August, as well as a Flour emPower Leadership Development program for teens.
For more information on the studio, or to schedule your class today, visit their website: https://www.flourpowerstudios.com/fortmill/aboutus