{"id":24313,"date":"2019-07-25T11:20:09","date_gmt":"2019-07-25T15:20:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=24313"},"modified":"2019-08-02T12:19:40","modified_gmt":"2019-08-02T16:19:40","slug":"newcomer-kitchen-unites-community-through-food","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/newcomer-kitchen-unites-community-through-food\/","title":{"rendered":"Newcomer Kitchen unites community through food"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wherever we come from, we all know the taste of home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We take it with us wherever we go and delight in finding\nthe familiar. But we also delight in trying something new, experiencing new\nflavours, and seeing if we can replicate and reinterpret those new flavours in\nour own unique ways.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Chef Maxine Knight has seen this happen close to home at\nthe York Region Food Network (YRFN) as instructor of the Newcomer Kitchen\nProgram. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Newcomer Kitchen Program is designed to help people\nmaking a new start and plant roots in a new community build bridges through the\ncommunal power of food.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAt York Region Food Network, we believe magic begins in\nthe kitchen and around the dinner table,\u201d says Ms. Knight. \u201cCooking classes\nprovide wonderful opportunities to build community, create networks, practice\nEnglish and build support systems. Through our cooking programs, we have seen\nstrangers become friends, people share in each other\u2019s ups and downs, and\nparticipants become actively involved in their local community.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This phenomenon is only set to grow. On Monday, following\na cooking demonstration on savoury garlic scapes \u2013 in this case, garlic scape\ntempura \u2013 the Newcomer Kitchen Program received a welcome boost from the\nProvince of Ontario, receiving a grant of $320,000 over three years through the\nOntario Trillium Foundation (OTF). The YRFN estimates that this grant will have\na positive impact on the lives of more than 1,500 individuals across York\nRegion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Joining in the cooking demonstration to help celebrate\nthe grant was Aurora-Oak Ridges-Richmond Hill MPP Michael Parsa, who said the\nwork of the YRFN was \u201ctruly amazing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cEducational workshops such as this allows growth,\npartnership and community engagement within our Region,\u201d he said. \u201cA Regional\nhub that supports healthy eating and access to healthy foods, the York Region\nFood Network has many wonderful programs available to our community members. A\nhuge congratulations on receiving the Ontario Trillium Foundation grant for the\nNewcomer Kitchen Program and one that will allow seamless transition for\nnewcomers in our community. Your endless support has helped many people within\nour Region, this initiative has helped many lives within our community.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Noting their mission of \u201cFood for Health, Food for All\u201d,\nYRFN Executive Director Joan Stonehocker said the Newcomer Kitchen program is\n\u201cdesigned to connect people together and connect people to the community\u201d and\nthis was a sentiment shared by Ms. Knight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt is amazing because everyone has to eat and when\nyou\u2019re displaced and you don\u2019t have all the comforts of home, it\u2019s like your\ncuisine is the most familiar,\u201d said Ms. Knight on the power of food to bring\npeople together. What we find is with our workshops, by sharing those foods and\nsharing how we cook together, amazing things start happening in our kitchens.\nWe have people who started businesses together, we have people where barriers\nmay have existed between different cultures, they don\u2019t exist anymore \u2013 at\nleast while we\u2019re here. It is just an opportunity for people to connect and to\ntalk. They often talk about what is happening in their Region or their local areas,\nthey talk about the struggles of being a newcomer and having the opportunity\nfor everyone to share those stories with each other gives an opportunity to\nuplift each other\u2019s experience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe other thing is just that power that food has in\norder to just connect with each other. Even if we look at our group here today,\nthere are multiple ethnicities here, multiple age groups, and everyone is\nsitting down and enjoying and experiencing something new together. It shows\nfood has the ability to do that, it breaks down barriers, walls and allows for\na certain amount of inclusivity without any other things in the way. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFrom my perspective, it is always amazing to see the\ndifferent cultures. It is amazing to see the different ways people prepare\nthings of the same ingredient and it is always fun to hear the debates. There\nare always debates. We see their confidence grow, even people who sometimes are\nemotionally going through rough times, they just start feeling more\ncomfortable, confident and able to do these things.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For more information on the York Region Food Network and\ntheir programs, visit yrfn.ca or call 905-841-3101.<\/p>\n\r\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir Wherever we come from, we all know the taste of home. We take it with us wherever we go and delight in finding the familiar. But we also delight in trying something new, experiencing new flavours, and seeing if we can replicate and reinterpret those new flavours in our own unique ways. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":24307,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[27,4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24313","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arts-and-culture","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2019-07-25-02.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-6k9","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-17 09:12:26","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24313","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24313"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24313\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24307"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24313"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24313"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24313"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}