THE FUTURE OF FOOD IS FRACTURING: LINDSAY OFCACEK STEPS UP TO THE PLATE

At the beginning of March, Kentucky to the World was finalizing plans for our upcoming collaborative program with another Louisville based non-profit, The LEE Initiative. At the time, we were all focused on creating a lively conversation about Kentucky food and the disparities experienced by female chefs in the industry before The LEE Initiative announced their new class of young female chefs accepted into the mentorship program onstage at the conclusion of our program.

(L) The LEE Initiative co-founder and managing director, Lindsey Ofcacek, prepares to announce their 2020 mentees. 
(R) L-R Chefs Damaris Phillips, Samantha Fore, Kristin Smith and Nikkia Rhodes in conversation in the Bomhard Theater. 
Photos by Kentucky to the World

Our program on March 2 at The Kentucky Center’s Bomhard Theater was centered around a panel anchored by Louisville based Food Network personality Damaris Phillips and featured women from different areas of the state and profession. There was Chef Nikkia Rhodes, who participated in the first season of The LEE Initiative and now leads a culinary program of her own design at Iroquois High School. Chef Samantha Fore, a Harvard graduate and first generation Sri Lankan American whose pop-up dinner series in Lexington, Tuk Tuk Sri Lankan Bites, has garnered national notoriety. And finally, Chef Kristin Smith who is simultaneously running her family’s sixth generation farm alongside a taphouse and restaurant in her hometown of Corbin in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains. 

There was a nearly full audience in attendance, who spent the duration of the onstage conversation being caught between laughing and tearing up, hearing the panel speak so warmly about their careers and favorite nostalgic Kentucky dishes. We all left The Kentucky Center that night feeling like we had really done something special. 

Two weeks to the day later, on Monday March 16, Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear joined a handful of other forward-thinking leaders and closed dining rooms and bars across the state to protect citizens from a growing pandemic sweeping the world. 

Serve the Servants

It’s late afternoon outside of 610 Magnolia, Chef Edward Lee’s nationally acclaimed restaurant, nestled discreetly among Victorian homes and oak trees still bare from winter. It’s been raining for days on end, but gloved and masked volunteers are running back and forth between the restaurant and its satellite event space, transferring supplies and prepared meals to organize for distribution. The line of cars will begin curling around the block in less than an hour. 

It has been three days since bars and restaurants had to suddenly close, lay off staff and figure out what to do next. In those 72 hours, The LEE Initiative alongside their partners at Maker’s Mark, laid the groundwork for The Restaurant Workers Relief Program. 

Their event space, once a sparsely decorated open room filled with warm wood tones and bathed in natural light, is stacked with every kind of household essential you could imagine, from diapers to dog food, dry goods and even Girl Scout cookies. The heart of the relief program is in this room: any employee affected by the closure can come here for a hot meal and any supplies they may need at home, free of charge. 

AuCo Lai of Season 1 of The LEE Initiative works at 610 Magnolia for the Restaurant Workers Relief Program. March 19, 2020.
Photos by Josh Meredith on behalf of Original Makers Club for The LEE Initiative

At the center of all this hustle and bustle stands Lindsey Ofcacek, co-founder and managing director of The LEE Initiative. Wearing a bright red rain jacket that echoes the pop-up Maker’s Mark tent behind her, she is simultaneously keeping the team of volunteers organized and navigating an influx of donations, all while responding to pleas for aid from cities with similarly affected restaurants. Undaunted, dampened with rain and glued to her phone, she looks up at me briefly with a smile and says, “A lot’s changed since we last saw each other, huh?”  

We’re All in This Together

As I write this on March 26, The LEE Initiative has expanded their Restaurant Workers Relief Program to 14 centers around the United States, with more in the works. It has been 10 days since the restaurant closure order in Kentucky, and Lindsey has her eyes on reaching the world. In her mind, this is exactly what she and Edward Lee had in mind when they started this initiative in response to the #MeToo Movement in 2018.   

Video courtesy of Neon Bites

Most people that end up turning hospitality into their career kind of fall into it without ever planning to. Lindsey is no exception. She’s worked on farms, in kitchens, behind bars, on restaurant floors and everything in between on her road to Magnolia St. At times, it can be an absolutely punishing industry to immerse yourself in; between pleasing guests and trying to stay above water on razor thin profit margins. Then, there’s your staff. Getting through a grueling, fast-paced dinner shift creates a family-like bond between co-workers. During the time of day when most people spend their downtime together, hospitality workers are readying a perfect space for them to do so at the expense of quality time with their own friends and families. If you ask any of them, it’s a choice they’d make a million times over. 

When you really think about it, the word ‘hospitality’ is inextricably linked with the South, and the South, to many people, starts in Kentucky. Lindsey speaks about working in hospitality and her community of hospitality employees nationwide with the same vital appreciation you’d expect to hear from one lauding an art museum. It’s a vital industry, a place where culture and experience are shared across a glass of wine or on a plate. 

The most recent estimates from the National Restaurant Association project that between 5 and 7 million restaurant employees in the United States could be out of work by June. Even more dire, 75% of independently owned restaurants may shutter for good in the midst of this crisis. These numbers are keeping Lindsey, like so many others, awake at night. 

HiCotton Hospitality Founder Ryan Rogers on the Restaurant Crisis. Video courtesy of Neon Bites

Family Meal
Many local restaurants have the same pre-shift ritual: the family meal. Something communal thrown together in the midst of pre-shift preparations in the kitchen to feed the whole staff in the brief moments before opening when the manager leads everyone through the night’s reservations and which beer kegs are tapped out and off the menu. 
I can’t help but think that this ritual, this coming together to feed each other before we take on the night before us, is at the heart of The LEE Initiative’s response. We have to feed the people who feed all of us. We have to care for the caretakers. In this moment of fracture, we need to serve the servants.

L-R Maker’s Mark Diplomat Thomas Bolton and Lindsey Ofcacek deliver essentials to affected industry workers outside of 610 Magnolia. March 19, 2020. Photos by Josh Meredith on behalf of Original Makers Club for The LEE Initiative

Disclosure: Taylor Cochran is a Kentucky to the World creative team member and the co-founder of Kentucky to the World’s media partner, Neon Bites. While writing this article, Taylor began helping The LEE Initiative manage their social media communications as their program expanded. For more resources, visit https://www.neonbites.com/service-worker-assistance-resources 

To support the Restaurant Workers Relief program directly, visit https://leeinitiative.org/