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Community Connections opens shared commercial kitchen space

The Neighborhood Kitchen is located in the Community Connections Outreach Building
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Community Connections has opened the Neighbourhood Kitchen, a shared kitchen space to make ready-to-eat meals for those in need and to be rented out to food entrepreneurs in the community.

The space is located at the Community Connections Outreach Building at 416 2nd St. West.

Community Connections’ Food Recovery program takes food which would otherwise go to waste, like mis-shapen vegetables, from local vendors. In their brand new facility, Austin Luciow, a Red Seal Chef and the Kitchen Manager, will take that excess food and turn it into ready-made meals for those in the community who don’t have access to a kitchen of their own. This program will also divert more produce from the compost pile.

Luciow joked that his job will be like an episode of Chopped, coming up with meal ideas from the mixed bag of donated food.

The Neighbourhood Kitchen will also be working with local businesses to provide a space for food entrepreneurs to create added value products. The space is perfect for small businesses or start-ups who need a restaurant-quality kitchen but wouldn’t otherwise have access.

“The 2014 Revelstoke Food Security Strategy identified that value-added products are an un-tapped area of our food system, so we are very pleased to be able to partner with business development organizations to help build local food processing businesses,” said Melissa Hemphill, Co-Director of the Community Connections Outreach Building.

The space is also equipped with storage for the products made on site.

“This kitchen space rental model keeps as much money and business in the community as possible,” said Community Connections in a press release.

According to Hemphill the incubator kitchen can also provide food literacy workshops, kids cooking classes, the chance to learn from diverse cultures, Indigenous food workshops, school lunch and breakfast programs and the opportunity to create foods that are sustainable and nutritious.

The space was designed by a professional kitchen designer and incorporates an area for prep as well as a hot line, a shared dish pit and cold storage, and is available 24/7 with renters given a way to enter autonomously.

To learn how to rent the kitchen space for your business needs, run classes or programs, or volunteer in the kitchen, contact Luciow at kitchen@community- connections.ca.

READ MORE: ‘Building the local food system’–Community Connections building incubator kitchen

READ MORE: ‘The right veggie for the end of the world’: Hot pepper farmers weather a challenging summer


@josh_piercey
josh.piercey@revelstokereview.com

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