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Creative cooking helps put homeless on right track

HEADNOTE

CHARITIES

HEADNOTE

Food is integral to social program's strategy for recovery.

Two former executive chefs, Sierra James

and her husband, John Walston, of Rehabilitation Services and Veterans Program (RS&VP), Albuquerque, NM, are using food as an integral part of RS&VP's strategy for recovery and social integration for its small army of homeless veterans. And the menus they create are like nothing you would ever expect to find at a homeless shelter.

James and Walston believe the road to recovery should be paved with good nutrition provided by creative meals. Burned out from the demands of a commercial kitchen, James answered a newspaper ad in 2001 for a cook at RS&VP. Walston brought his experience at fine restaurants and together they are not only cooking for residents and staff, they are teaching culinary arts to 17 of the veterans.

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