This new cafe is a training ground for future chefs and restaurateurs

""We train our students. They're in the kitchen, they're learning all things within a very short amount of time. It's an intensive program and then we work to place them afterward," said Sherri Francois, the executive director of the SoLa Foundation, a nonprofit that works to empower underprivileged residents of Los Angeles with workforce development training. The foundation opened the cafe and culinary training program at its campus dubbed The Beehive at 1000 E. 60th St."

""On our campus we had a full commercial kitchen and cafe retail space that was sitting idle for a long time. So we collected a lot of data and what we learned from our community was that there was huge appetite for culinary arts and culinary training," Francois said. The cafe trains students in every aspect of the food industry, from running a restaurant to waiting on customers to cooking in the kitchen and coming up with new menu items."

The 60th Street Cafe is a student-run cafe and culinary training program in South Los Angeles that opened in early November. The program operates on the SoLa Foundation campus called The Beehive and repurposed an idle commercial kitchen and retail space after community interest. Students train intensively in kitchen techniques, menu development, front-of-house service, presentation, cost analysis and customer service with the goal of workforce placement or starting their own restaurants. The cafe offers affordable comfort-food items like a breakfast burrito, burgers, avocado egg rolls, sandwiches, wings and bowls while providing real-world restaurant experience to underprivileged youth.

Read at Daily News