Cooking Up New Lives
A county jail might be one of the last places you’d expect to see a sense of community coming together over a freshly prepared, healthy meal.
Restaurateur Larry Bain sees it happening all the time. Bain’s cooking outreach program brings gourmet chefs to the San Francisco County Jail where they teach nutrition and cooking skills to female inmates, culminating in a sit-down dinner.
Beyond the hard skills, Bain sees these women coming away with something less tangible: control over one small aspect of their lives.
Join host Jerry Kay, as we hear all about Bain’s efforts to empower through cooking. We’ll also learn how one community kitchen is turning small time home chefs into thriving food business entrepreneurs.
This Week's Guests:
Larry Bain — Restaurateur & Executive Director of Nextcourse
Bain began his culinary career by studying for five years in New York before relocating to the West Coast. After managing a number of restaurants in San Francisco, Bain took a break from the restaurant industry tofor the Tides Center, a non-profit organization that supports social justice and environmental groups around the country. In September of 2000, Bain decided to combine his years of restaurant experience with his social and environmental passions as Director of Operations in the Jardiniere restaurant, with the aim of turning Jardinière into a socially responsible business. Together, Bain and Traci des Jardins opened Acme Chop house in 2002 and Mijita Cocina Mexicana in 2004, with the primary goal of bringing their commitment to seasonal, sustainably raised, local foods to the mass market. Bain continues to use his experience in the sustainable restaurant industry for educational purposes, speaking at several conferences and working with Nextcourse, the non-profit organization he founded in 2003, which offers nutrition and cooking classes to underserved communities and supports local family farmers and ranchers. Bain is a founding member of the San Francisco Food System Alliance, the Seafood Choices Alliance and Food Links. He is also a former board member of Chefs Collaborative, a convivium member of Slow Food, and a member of both Environmental Entrepreneurs and Eastern Neighborhoods Community and Health Impact Assessment.
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Valeria Perez Ferreiro — Executive Director, La Cocina Community Kitchen
Perez Ferreiro, had 13 years of experience in workforce development before she joined La Cocina. Previous to her hire, she had an independent practice as an evaluation and fundraising consultant and served as the Associate Director for OpNet, a nonprofit that prepares low-income young people of color for careers in Information Technology. She earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in English from Cornell University and a Masters Degree in public policy from Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government. She is a native of Argentina and is bilingual in English and Spanish.
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Guisell Osorio — Tenant Chef, La Cocina Community Kitchen
Osorio is a tenant chef at the La Cocina Community Kitchen. Originally from Chile, she makes and sells traditional Chilean empanadas and cookies at a local farmer’s market.
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