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| Massimo Bottura (Photo courtesy of Osteria Francescana) |
Massimo Bottura's non-profit organization, Food for Soul, has received a grant from the Rockefeller Foundation to support the Italian food-based charity's expansion in the USA. This support will enable Food for Soul, which was founded by Bottura in 2016, to bring its community kitchens, known as Refrettorios, to at least two U.S. cities by 2019, turning abandoned or underused spaces into inspiring dining rooms and transforming surplus ingredients into nutritious meals served to the poor and vulnerable. As part of this project, Food for Soul will spend the next years assessing the opportunities in potential U.S. cities - first cities being considered include New York, Miami, New Orleans and Detroit - before seeking local community partners to support individual Refrettorio projects.
Since 2015, over 130 chefs and 600 volunteers have been involved in Food for Soul's Refrettorio projects that have served almost 15,000 dishes across four locations worldwide. This included Bottura's hometown of Modena, the Italian cities of Milan, Bologna, and Rio de Janiero in Brazil during the 2016 Olympics. While future outposts are planned for Germany and Canada, its current focus is on launching a new Refrettorio in London in partnership with The Felix Project, a London food waste/food poverty charity organization.
On 5th June 2017, Refrettorio Felix will open in a soon-to-be-disclosed London venue in time for the London Food Month festival. The Refrettorio will provide lunch from Monday to Friday for the homeless and other vulnerable groups from surplus produce supplied by The Felix Project with the aim of serving more than 2,000 meals using five tonnes of recovered food. To-date, a cadre of British and international chefs - including Alain Ducasse, Ashley Palmer-Watts, Brett Graham, Clare Smyth, Claude Bosi, Jason Atherton, Michel Roux Jr., Sat Bains and Nuno Mendes - has accepted the call to action to cook on the roster. Following the month-long festival, Refrettorio Felix will continue to operate with meals prepared by two resident chefs and monthly assistance from a guest chef.