When Comal Heritage Food Incubator closed this past February, not only did the Denver culinary community lose a great restaurant, but an important institution as well. The eatery’s mission was to build up and support immigrant women who wanted to work in or own a restaurant.
Luckily, Comal isn’t the only place building up underserved communities. Where one great spot falls, more pop up. Now the Denver metro area has a handful of service-forward restaurants where immigrants can eat food remnant of their homeland, and thrive in the service industry. In this three-part series we dive into the groups making waves.
First we covered Mango House in Aurora. Then Sawa Mediterranean Restaurant & Buffet. Now the series ends as we look at two groups working to uplift those in need of job skills and those new to the United States. Enter Cocina Libre Collective and Work Options, two organizations that aim to uplift those who need it most, through the culinary arts.
Cocina Libre Collective
“It’s hard for you to not listen to someone who’s feeding you,” said Julia Roncoroni, co-founder of the Cocina Libre community outreach initiative that uses food to bring the immigrant experience to life through activism, storytelling, and cooking events.
Cocina Libre started off as a cookbook, Cocina Libre: Immigrant Resistance Recipes, which Roncoroni and her husband Delio Figueroa wrote to tell the stories of the many immigrants and refugees they’ve worked with over the years.
The book eventually became a documentary, and has since expanded to an organization that hosts and caters community dinners, private events, and cooking classes and demos, all staffed by the immigrant chefs they’ve worked with. This includes the 30-some cooks who contributed to the cookbook (hailing from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Columbia, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Guatemala, Mexico, Peru, Ukraine, and Venezuela).
Neither Roncoroni or Figueroa are chefs themselves. She is an associate professor of psychology at University of Denver and he is a music teacher and adjunct music instructor at DU. But as immigrants hailing from Argentina and Puerto Rico, respectively, they have seen first hand the power food has to overcome barriers to understanding and empathy.
“The mission of Cocina Libre is to partner with immigrant communities to uplift their food traditions and their stories or lived experiences,” Roncoroni says. “It’s about the immigrant stories in the room, and food being the language that we used to share that.”
Cocina Libre serves as the hub through which participating immigrants can book catering jobs, or one-off private dinners and cooking classes. Events have taken place at local libraries, bookstores, even the Colorado History Museum, but also in homes for private dinner parties, birthday parties, and so on.
All profits go to training the chefs and helping them obtain the necessary licenses to run their business. In under a year since the effort started, two of the cooks involved have gotten full time employment in the food industry, with “a bunch” more earning meaningful income from the events they facilitate. The organization is also working on a second book and documentary.
Work Options
Unlike the others on this list, Work Options does not cater solely to immigrants and refugees. The nearly 30-year-old organization is designed to help anyone facing barriers to employment find and maintain long-term work. This includes not only immigrants, but also those navigating the justice system, housing insecurity, and other challenges.
However, students must be eligible to work in the U.S., as much of their role is to provide the work training requirements necessary for certain government assistance programs, and the school is completely free.
“One-hundred percent of our students would qualify as low income individuals from a low income household, and are typically required to enroll in SNAP or some other benefit,” said Work Options director of communications, Tessa Houston. “Every single one of our students are facing some kind of barriers. That’s the whole point of our program. We help people overcome those barriers and then build the self esteem that they need to become permanently and long term employed.”
After more than 25 years operating out of the Denver Human Services Building, it has since taken over the old Johnston & Wales culinary school facility in what is now the Mosaic Community Campus, where it utilizes several kitchens.
The first is dedicated to the entry-level, five-week core program, where they learn foundational culinary skills like knifework, food safety, and basic preparation, as well as readiness training for things like job interviews, resume development, and other “soft” skills needed to turn that training into actual work.
Another kitchen serves the Hungry Hen Cafe, open for breakfast and lunch mostly for the students attending St. Elizabeth’s School and Denver School of the Arts, which share space on the campus. Work Options also delivers emergency meals to multiple food-assistance programs at Micro-Communities sites throughout the city seven days a week.
Past the core program, students have the option to enroll in a 9 to 12 month line cook apprenticeship certification program. This includes eight additional weeks training at Work Options and 7 to 10 months paid work at a participating restaurant facilitated by the National Restaurant Association Educational Foundation’s apprenticeship program.
In all, some 6,000 cooks have passed through the program, some of whom have gone on to such roles as Chef de Cuisine or even restaurant owners themselves.
“Almost every restaurant in town at some point has hired somebody who’s been through the work Options program,” said Houston. “We’re looking for more food service contracts. But also, we’re looking for employer partners, for our students, so for restaurant tours, or folks who work in the food service industry who are in need of staff, which most of them are.”
