Kitchen Coalition

The same kitchen that prepares your dinner feeds 1,200 neighbors every week.

Most people who work with Create know us through an event.

What they do not always know is what happens in our kitchen on Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday.

Those are our Kitchen Coalition days.

What it is

Kitchen Coalition is a program run through Second Harvest Heartland that partners with local restaurants and caterers to turn donated food bank ingredients into freshly prepared meals for neighbors who face barriers to cooking. Neighbors without consistent access to a kitchen. Neighbors managing illness, housing instability, or a time of transition. People for whom a bag of groceries is not the right solution.

Create joined in 2020, when the pandemic shut everything down and the team was looking for a way to stay together and do something that mattered. We started small. Five years on, we are at 1,200 meals a week, all delivered to partners across the metro.

In Philip's words

"Kitchen Coalition helped save this business. When everything stopped, this program kept our chefs working, kept our kitchen running, and kept us connected to the community in a way we had never been before. We had always donated meals to galas and fundraisers. But this put us on the ground level, feeding students at community colleges, families in rural counties, neighbors in transition. That felt different. It still does."

Philip Dorwart, Founder and Executive Chef

The same standard

The same team that prepares a private dinner for thirty or a corporate event for three hundred shows up for those 1,200 meals every week with the same care. Chefs Desiree and Jake lead the Kitchen Coalition kitchen. The ingredients are donated and change week to week depending on what is available, which keeps the menu design constantly in motion. But donated does not mean ordinary. Every meal is made to be delicious, comforting, and worth looking forward to.

The kitchen finds a way every time.

7 million meals served across Minnesota.

We are proud to be part of that number.

The current moment

Recent federal funding cuts have reduced the program's output and the future of Kitchen Coalition is uncertain. What happens next depends largely on community support.

This work is not separate from what we do at Create. It is part of the same commitment. Hospitality means showing up for the community that supports you, in whatever way you can. We cook for the people in our dining room and for the neighbors who need a meal most. That has always felt like the right way to run a kitchen.

Get Involved

If you want to support Kitchen Coalition, donations go directly to meals for neighbors who need them.

Donate at kitchencoalition.org

To learn more about the program or connect with us, reach out.

Get in touch