SEATTLE — A renowned local chef is teaming up with the Salvation Army to teach a cooking class with lessons that go far beyond the kitchen.
This week, chef John Howie surrounded himself with eager pupils and ingredients in a kitchen quite unlike his award-winning restaurants.
This kitchen was at the Salvation Army’s Adult Rehabilitation Program (ARP) in North Seattle, and those cooking alongside him were recovering from addiction.
“The last five years of my life, I’ve been either homeless, incarcerated or strung out on methamphetamines and fentanyl,” Woodford Woodruff, one of the participants, said. “I’m just trying to get through today, really.”
The people at the ARP are going through a long, painful process to overcome their addictions. That process got a little tastier this week.
“Today, we are going to make a rigatoni bolognese,” Howie said. “We are going to have a nice, chopped salad with salami, chicken, garbanzo beans and roasted peppers. It’s going to be a really nice meal.”
Howie swapped out his high-end restaurants for a chance to teach and heal others.
His decades of success in the culinary world have given him the resources to give back and he told KIRO 7 he intends to do just that.
“Maybe they’ll come back and cook dinner for a family of their own one day,” Howie said. “That would be awesome.”
The Salvation Army’s ARP takes dedication. For many of the participants, it’s not their first attempt and getting clean and understanding what makes them use.
“The only way I’ve ever known how to cope with it is to numb it,” Woodruff said. “Now, I am learning how to feel my emotions.”
Woodruff told KIRO 7 he has tried and failed before. This time, though, he is starting to think about what’s next and what life after addiction looks like.
“I want to help other people,” he said. “I know that’s part of recovery, getting outside ourselves, helping other people and finding a purpose in life. I am trying to figure that out completely, what that looks like for me.”
The rigorous program involves therapy, drug testing and more, aimed at creating a structure that enables people to eventually live on their own.
“That is what I needed when I was broken,” ARP participant Tito Garcia said. “I’m not broken today, though.”
Along the way, they learn skills like cooking.
It’s practical, but as Howie pointed out, a lot of the lessons you learn in the kitchen are even more useful in life.
“The biggest thing is, you are going to make mistakes,” he said. “But as long as you own your mistakes, then figure out how not to make them again, it all works out.”
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