Since 2015, Chefs Cycle has given chefs an outlet to fight hunger AND push their own physical limits. After a two-year break due to COVID, the Chefs Cycle event returned in 2022 – with an intentionally smaller footprint to keep things safe – with a two-day, 200 mile ride in the Santa Rosa region of California. With more than 90 riders, a mix of new and returning, the event exceeded its goal of $500k raising more than $800k for the No Kid Hungry campaign. Add Passion and Stir talks with some of this year's riders -- Thomas Pisha-Duffly of Gado Gado in Portland, OR; Baruch Laskin of The Laskin in Calgary; Jamie Carawan of Buffalo Wild Wings; Elaine Cizma who rode with her dad Ted Cizma of Stellar Pizza; and Damien Hanft of Inspire Brands -- about why they ride.

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Brandon Chrostowski discovered his career path in restaurants after an arrest nearly landed him in prison. Years later, he founded EDWINS Leadership & Restaurant Institute to provide training in culinary arts and hospitality for formerly incarcerated adults in Cleveland, OH.

“’Broken,’ ‘discounted,’ ‘damaged,’ ‘a threat’ - this is what the majority of people think about someone who's returning home from prison,” says Chrostowski. EDWINS helps change that perception. “It's not the scarlet letter, it is in fact a golden ticket to new places.” T

he institute also provides assistance with finding employment, free housing, basic medical care, clothing, job coaching, and literacy programs. Join us to hear about how people are overcoming their worst moments to find success and stability.

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In 2016, when she wasn’t busy as an attorney, Joanne Lee Molinaro started blogging about food, heartbreak, cooking vegan, love, insecurity, and everything in between as The Korean Vegan. As she explains, “I don’t share my stories simply to share my stories… I do it because I feel there is a kernel of truth in my stories that more people need to hear.”

Today, she shares her truth with more than 4 million followers on TikTok and beyond in videos that combine veganized Korean recipes like Miyeok Guk and Kimchi with stories about the immigrant experience in America. The central thread: showing love through food.

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Chopped celebrity chef Marc Murphy spoke with us right after he returned from seven weeks feeding Ukrainian refugees in Przemysl, Poland with Jose Andres’ World Central Kitchen (WCK).

Since the invasion of Ukraine, WCK’s Relief Team has been on the ground supporting families sheltering in the country as well as refugees in six countries with nearly 200,000 hot, nourishing meals every day. Murphy was both inspired and changed by his experience. “Humanity has just gone on display there in a beautiful way and people just show up and are like… ‘I'm here to help,’ and it was really amazing.”

He describes the difficulties of seeing the horrible situations of the Ukrainians, as well as the moments of hope when humans help humans. “In the midst of everything, you would have these moments and just sit in the kitchen and cry… I want people to understand people, and how humanity is connected through food, and how important food is.”

Join us for a first-hand account from a city on the border of the war.

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Frances Moore Lappé published the groundbreaking Diet for a Small Planet in 1971, changing the way Americans thought about food policy and world hunger. A 50th Anniversary edition of this seminal work was released in 2021, adding to Lappé’s list of 20 cookbooks with the underlying theme of living democracy. “We have to think of all of life as participating with one another in order to make big decisions that enhance life for all, because we're all connected and we're all affected,” she says. The Small Planet Institute - which she co-founded with her daughter Anna - channels resources to democratic social movements worldwide. “We have to feel deep indignation about what I call our taproot problem, and that is democracy... Democracy is about whose voices get heard.” 

Join us for a timely discussion with Frances Moore Lappé, author, activist, and past recipient of the James Beard Foundation Humanitarian of the Year Award for her lifelong impact on the way people all over the world think about food, nutrition, and agriculture.

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Born in Tijuana, Mexico, Reyna Montoya and her family were fleeing violence when they migrated to Arizona in 2003. She was in the 8th grade, did not speak English, was undocumented, and remembers feeling shame and anger at her parents for “bringing her to a place she didn’t like and didn’t belong.” It was traumatic.

Naming this traumatic experience and working towards healing is central to Montoya’s work. In 2016, she founded Aliento, an organization that supports undocumented, DACA, and mixed immigration status families to transform trauma into hope and action. “I see brilliance and talent in our immigrant community…we remind them that they have a voice, that they are powerful, and that they belong in this community.”

Using art as a pathway to community healing and connection, Aliento champions the immigrant experience and works to promote policy and human-centered immigration reform: “We’re people-centered. We imagine a world where we see immigrants, not only as the storytellers but the strategists of their own lives. We have so many solutions we can provide.” Join us for a moving discussion with Reyna Montoya, founder of Aliento, about her vision for a future where “human potential is nurtured and not defined by immigration status.”  

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“You can change people’s moods really fast with food.” This sentiment is at the heart of all that Greg and Subrina Collier believe. A husband and wife team behind six successful restaurants including Charlotte, NC’s-acclaimed Leah & Louise and the founders of the Bayhaven Food & Wine Festival, a three-day celebration of Black foodways, Subrina and Greg are at the forefront of the movement to increase the number of Black-owned business, Black chefs, and Black leaders in the hospitality industry. For them, this movement is about more than representation, as Greg Collier noted, “Representation is important. Being seen is important. But if there is a thing, funding is the most important thing. If we had half the opportunities other chefs had you would see different types of restaurants.” In this episode, part of Add Passion & Stir’s ongoing Rebuilding series, we connect with two inspiring leaders in hospitality who are creating pathways to economic empowerment for Black culinarians.

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In his more than 30 years in the industry, Chip Wade, President of Union Square Hospitality Group, has seen all sides of hospitality – from the kitchen to HR and real estate development. Throughout his career, he’s been a champion for expanding leadership diversity in the hospitality industry.

“In our industry we are woefully underrepresented with women in key leadership positions and that is the same for people of color,” noted Wade when we connected with him as part of Add Passion and Stir’s ongoing Rebuilding series.

This work requires looking at how the hospitality industry has been designed and who it was designed for. For Wade, this means fostering a culture that is diverse, equitable, and inclusive, not only for employees, but also for partners and guests: “We want our workforce to look like the city of New York. And last time I looked, New York was the second or first most diverse city in America.”

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On today’s very special episode of Add Passion and Stir, we speak with DC chef and restaurateur Erik Bruner-Yang, who was on the ground in Medyka, Poland with Jose Andres’ World Central Kitchen. World Central Kitchen is feeding hot, nourishing meals to tens of thousands of Ukrainian refugees coming across the border.

 When we spoke with Erik on the night of Monday, March 7th, continuous Russian attacks on a number of Ukrainian cities were sending an estimated 2 million people to neighboring countries in search of safety. World Central Kitchen activated restaurants in Ukraine and 4 surrounding countries, serving hundreds of thousands of meals to families. Chef Bruner-Yang provided his eyewitness account of serving over 100,000 refugees in the span of one week.

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Stephen Satterfield is the founder and CEO of Whetstone media and host of the critically-acclaimed Netflix docuseries High on the Hog. Satterfield is using education about the relationships of Black people with food and agriculture to inspire and galvanize. “Not seeing yourself as a part of a cultural narrative is deeply, deeply damaging,” he says. “I'm advocating for the language of food as a means of accessing difficult conversations, and generally waking people up about all of the connections that we have with environment, culture, society, that are right in plain sight.” He also wants his work to play a part in national healing. “I hope my work can be a small part of bringing back this ancestral knowledge, this deep knowledge that is in our bones that has also given us life and opportunity, and even in 2022 has the capacity to radically undermine the systems that continue to harm us and keep us down.”

This episode is part of Add Passion and Stir’s ongoing series Rebuilding which connects with leaders from across media, restaurants, education, government, and beyond to learn how they’re reimagining and redesigning their industries to make sure everyone feels a sense of belonging.

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