L.A. Kitchen had a motto: “Neither Food Nor People Should Ever Go To Waste.” That belief led to their three clearly defined goals:
1. Reclaim healthy, local food that would otherwise go to waste.
2. Provide culinary job training to unemployed men and women.
3. Distribute fresh, nutritious meals to fellow Angelenos.
Unfortunately, L.A. Kitchen closed on November 1st because it could not continue to fund its programs. You can read founder Robert Egger’s farewell email here and watch the video about L.A. Kitchen’s journey. EngAGE CEO/Founder Tim Carpenter commented, “I am greatly saddened by the loss of L.A. Kitchen. Such a great place, great idea, and run by a great man, my friend Robert Egger. A big loss for our city.”
L.A. Kitchen’s Empower L.A. culinary school admitted 22 new students every 14 weeks. All of the participants had either been incarcerated, homeless, or had aged out of foster care. The school provided not only valuable job training, but also personal counseling and a nurturing place in which the students could grow. Learn more here.
L.A. Kitchen took cosmetically imperfect fruits and veggies that were donated by farms, wholesale businesses, and local gardens and used them not only to train their new chefs, but to provide healthy meals to the community. Many of our EngAGE community residents benefited from this program which included not only a sample healthy meal, but also instruction in how to cook it and a bag of groceries to make that possible. Here’s an example of one of their visits to the Metro at Compton Senior Apartments in Compton, CA.
We wish Robert Egger the best and know that we’ll see him again somewhere, engaged in continuing, determined efforts to make sure that neither food nor people go to waste.
