The Green Café: feeding hope with purpose
Serving fresh, healthy food to St. James Town residents every day.
Aravind Joseph standing out front of the St.James Town Community Corner
As soon as we entered the Green Café community space, the aroma of delicious food filled the air.
Aravind Joseph is the Lead for the Green Café and Catering Collective, a social enterprise based in the St. James Town Community Corner (240 Wellesley Street East). He invited us in where the cooks were busy preparing a vegetable biryani for the lunch service. Aravind was excited to show us around the community space that was filled with plants and natural light.
Started in 2018, The Green Café is part of a larger initiative called The Kitchen Collective. It is a non-profit organization with the purpose of providing income generation opportunities for members of the St. James Town community. Aravind explained that “The Green Café is more of the brand that faces the community,” where they sell daily meals from a take-out window. Catering is the other part of their operation. The idea for the Green Café began when The Kitchen Collective had food donations that they didn’t want to waste and wanted to help with food security within the community.
The Green Café has a colourful pick-up window for residents.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the demand for affordable, home-cooked meals soared for homebound tenants in the surrounding apartment buildings. “We realized there were many people left out in the community who wouldn’t come out for groceries, or they were disabled and couldn’t cook for themselves,” said Aravind. “The Green Café was able to deliver these meals during that time, and I can easily say 60 to 70 per cent of these customers came from the surrounding Toronto Community Housing buildings.”
The Green Café has been popular ever since, feeding up to as many as 100 individuals in a day. “Our samosas are very popular,” he said with a laugh.
Aravind told us they want the menu to appeal to everyone. Except for soup and wraps, the menu changes daily and includes foods from around the world like chicken curry, pasta, schnitzel, and chow mein. He also told us that, “we have people facing homelessness that come in, and they ask for food. We will never refuse them. We want to reach a point where we are making a profit, but we are also mindful of the fact that we are a community-based organization. Our responsibility is the community.”
Delivious, nutritious food is always the order of the day.
As for employment opportunities, Aravind said that many of the individuals who arrive in St. James Town face language barriers. “They don’t come with the best English skills or computer skills and it’s very difficult for them to find employment. The Green Café has helped them to overcome these barriers and bring them together.”
The Green Café is just one aspect of the St. James Town Community Corner. This is a space that also offers computer workshops, a bike repair service, a reuse program, small repair service, after school club, sewing and knitting classes, and a crafting circle. Many of the programs are tenant-led. “Some of the people that come to the café just want to socialize, and a few come from other neighbourhoods,” said Suhayla Kamarudheen, Coordinator of the Green Café.
She says that she finds fulfillment in the people she’s met at the Green Café. “It’s very fulfilling to work with the women in the kitchen, to hear their stories. For many of them, it’s their first job here.” Suhayla added, “I feel very fortunate to be able to make an impact.”
The Green Café is located at the St. James Town Community Corner, 240 Wellesley Street East, and is open for business from 7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., daily.
To learn more about the Green Café, how to get involved or to find out what’s on today’s menu, check out their Instagram.
