Success Stories

Jarie realizes dream with own restaurant

After graduating from Fresh Starts Culinary Academy, Jarie S. hoped to open a restaurant within five years. He never dreamed that he’d achieve that goal in the middle of a pandemic.

“It’s hard. But when you have a chance, you do it,” he says. La Esperanza Pupuseria y Comedor opened in 2020 in San Rafael, offering authentic Guatamalan and Salvadoran food. A second location opened recently in Vallejo.

The restaurant shares the name of his wife, Esperanza, who had been selling her homemade pupusas — traditional stuffed tortillas — for years. The menu also includes Salvadoran breakfast, savory soups and tamales.

Jarie enrolled at Fresh Starts Culinary Academy in 2017, after legal issues led him to lose a longtime position as a cook and he lost his housing. “After that, with my certification, I started getting better jobs,” he says.

The longtime Novato resident learned in many kitchens, including Sol Food in San Rafael and Toast in Novato. He’s worked as a dishwasher, busser, barista and line cook.

He still keeps his Fresh Starts Culinary Academy certificate on the restaurant wall, though he spends less time in the kitchen now. “I say thank you, thank you, a thousand times, to everyone there,” he adds.

Janin learns to nourish the community

Growing up in a family with lean resources, Janin Harmon. learned to make the most of everything and count her blessings. “My mom worked three jobs and we often counted on food banks,” Janin says.

That experience came full circle after she graduated in 2018 from Fresh Starts Culinary Academy. Now she nourishes others as executive chef at C.O.T.S., the Committee on the Shelterless, which offers free meals, shelter, and housing services in Petaluma.

“This job – it really gives me what I need to stay whole,” she says. “To see people engage with the food and relax for a minute, it’s wonderful to make that gift for them.”

Her kitchen at C.O.T.S. relies mainly on food banks and donations from local grocers, posing a menu challenge that she finds exhilarating. She often rolls the cart outside herself to greet walk-up customers coming for a boxed lunch to go.

Janin worked in fast-food spots as a teenager and returned to her culinary skills periodically as an adult.

When the wildfires left her unemployed, she enrolled in the Fresh Starts program. “I had a lot of experience, but there was so much that I gained,” Janin says. “It all came together there. It was life-changing for me,” she says.

Denna Harvey serves health and smiles

Meals play a central role in daily life for residents at Piner’s Nursing Home in Napa, a fact that provides daily motivation for Dietary Services Manager Denna Harvey. “It’s a time when they get to talk to people and enjoy something they picked out, even when they may have lost so much,” she says.

This 2013 graduate of Fresh Starts Culinary Academy applied her skills first in restaurants, then set her sights on finishing a two-year program to become a Certified Dietary Manager.

Her position at Piner’s includes managing food inventory and a staff of seven, interviews with residents to keep current on their dietary needs, and compliance reports for state and federal agencies. Denna also cooks one or two days a week.

Despite the strict guidelines, she tries to keep taste and a home-cooked feel at the forefront. 

“If there’s one dish or one soup that I can make from someone’s childhood or culture, it’s a way to make them feel at home,” Denna says.

When she enrolled at Fresh Starts, Denna says, she felt “broken” after experiencing the trauma of homelessness but drew strength from the supportive training staff. “One of them told me that I’d be managing a kitchen one day,” Denna says. “They totally believed in me when I didn’t.”