Crowdfunding saves kitchen run by Syrian refugees

By Nicholas Keung — Immigration Reporter — Sat., Dec. 23, 2017

“It is so nice to see the flood of goodwill, generosity and support.”

Support and donations are pouring in to help a fledgling social enterprise for Syrian refugee women that was at risk of shuttering because of a lack of funding. The Newcomer Kitchen was in jeopardy of closing in January after it failed to secure funding from governments and charitable foundations to take the operation to the next level and make it sustainable. Staffed by Syrian refugee women and begun as a social program, the kitchen, housed weekly at the Depanneur restaurant on College St., offers catering and ready-to-go meals to the public with revenue split among the participants after deductions for ingredients and supplies.

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Toronto kitchen staffed by Syrian refugee women at risk of closing

By NICHOLAS KEUNG — Immigration Reporter — Mon., Dec. 18, 2017

“There is so much potential to grow. Catering and cooking and workshop requests pour in. However, without core funding to support the administrative and management and logistical support, the program can’t survive,”

Mariam Alaurm gingerly slices the cucumbers on a mandoline for a salad as other Syrian women cut eggplants and roll meatballs for the ready-to-go meals their young enterprise is selling.

Between stirring sauces in pans and mixing the Sfouf — a light semolina cake with anise, vanilla, coconut, black sesame seeds and pistachio — they catch up with one another about their new lives, English classes, kids in school and news from back home.

For almost two years, the Newcomer Kitchen, housed in the Depanneur, a culinary incubator on College St., has been the weekly gathering place for Syrian newcomer women, where they share stories and experiences, as well as joy and tears — all while using their cooking skills to make food for catering and meals for the public.

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Newcomer Kitchen: How Syrian refugee women are cooking their way to success

Leah Rosenthal, Advancement Officer | Hamilton | February 21, 2017 | DeGroote School of Business, McMaster University

Imagine packing up only what you can carry. Imagine fleeing a war-torn country and landing as a refugee in Canada.

Now picture a kitchen. The different smells, the cacophony of sounds. There is laughter, there is sharing, there community in this kitchen. There is healing.

Newcomer Kitchen invites Syrian refugee women to cook a weekly meal and socialize. The meals are then sold, and the proceeds shared among the cooks. Currently there are 59 women enrolled in the program.

The initiative, which began at The Depannuer in Toronto, is working to create a model that can be replicated with any newcomer group, in any restaurant, in any city in the world. What began as a safe space for women to cook and prepare meals for their families – many of whom were living in hotel rooms without access to a full kitchen – has now transitioned into a way for those women to make money.

Newcomer Kitchen has already been covered by Time and the Huffington Post, and the relatively new start-up had the pleasure of hosting Prime Minister Justin Trudeau when he broke bread with several Syrian newcomers on the first anniversary of their arrival in Canada. With a second Toronto location opening in May 2017, Newcomer Kitchen has big hopes for what it can accomplish in the near future.

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A Taste of Home

by Alex Mlynek | January 2017 | Investors Group

Newcomer Kitchen gives Syrian refugee women an opportunity to share their food culture with Canada.

Len Senater heard that many Syrian refugees who came to Canada were living in hotels and had no kitchens to make their own food. He did have a kitchen and wanted to provide a space where Syrian refugee women could cook.

Between sips of tea in glasses, some enhanced by fresh mint leaves, roughly a dozen Syrian refugee women prepare malfouf: cabbage rolls stuffed with halal ground beef, rice, spices and a few dashes of pomegranate molasses. These refugees, many of whom have been in Canada only a few months, spend the day cooking together in a Toronto storefront for 50 people who have preordered their meals. Between stirring steaming pots and searching for tender cabbage leaves, they show each other photos of family members on their smartphones, tell stories and debate the best way to make their dishes. It all takes place at the Newcomer Kitchen, a weekly event where up to a dozen Syrian women gather together to cook meals from home.

Last spring, Len Senater, owner of the Depanneur, a space that hosts pop-up food events in Toronto’s West End, heard that many Syrian refugees who came to Canada were living in hotels and had no kitchens to make their own food. He did have a kitchen and wanted to provide a space where Syrian refugee women could cook. Although he didn’t speak Arabic or have any connections with the community, he did have a group of volunteers who wanted to help. One of them connected him with Rahaf Alakbani, 25, and her husband Esmaeel Abofakher, 29, who had come to Canada as refugees from Syria in February. The couple then found a group of women who wanted to cook, and brought them to the Depanneur.

“There was a language barrier and a culture barrier,” says Senater, “but Cara [Benjamin-Pace, the Newcomer Kitchen’s executive director] and I bought a bunch of random ingredients, and when the women arrived, we said: ‘Why don’t you just cook something?’ They were like, ‘Really? You want us to do the cooking?’” After he answered “yes,” they took over the kitchen.

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