The two-year-old Queer Food Foundation aims to support queer folks in the food space.
SFA News Daily recently spoke to QFF co-founder Gabrielle Lenart (pictured above in the fore) about how the foundation came to be, what it endeavors to accomplish, and where it’s headed in the future.
What is the Queer Food Foundation and how did it get started?
The Queer Food Foundation is a growing resource and platform for queer folks in food. We create and facilitate dedicated spaces and opportunities for queer folks in food to amplify their voices through the following channels:
• Resource Provision: Through the creation of our queer food database, toolkits, educational workshops, and mentorship connections to queer folks in food, we build connections and increase visibility.
• Events: We work with brands on events, dining experiences, and classes to showcase the diversity of queer food ideas and voices.
• Community Support: We support our queer community through mutual aid, fundraising and advocacy, and awareness-raising campaigns.
We are a collective of queer individuals who work at all intersections of the food system — from food justice and culinary to community organizing, media, hospitality, and more. We are passionate about holding space for queer community in food. We aim to share our skills, knowledge, and experiences to create a thriving, represented, and intersectional food system.
I had a project idea after working in a queer food community organization and reached out to colleagues, mentors, and impactful folks to join. I didn't really know how to do it or what to do and alongside about seven or eight other folks with experience, we started something greater than we ever imagined.
Tell me about the Queer Food Fund and how it feeds those impacted by food insecurity in the Black Queer and Trans community?
Queer Food Foundation was established in 2020 by myself, Vanessa Parish, Jona Beliu, and Mavis-Jay Sanders during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic to address the needs of queer folks in food.
In 2021, our inaugural year of the Queer Food Fund, we wanted to be able to meet people and support folks where they were at -- oftentimes, queer and trans homeless folks don't have access to bank accounts or are in transitional housing and can't receive checks or money orders. We redistribute the money on a rolling basis through accessible sources such as Venmo and CashApp. Additionally, queer and trans folks of color, specifically those who are Black, are disproportionally affected by homelessness and food insecurity. In our first year, we raised a little under $10,000 and in 2022, we doubled our goal and raised $20,000 for Black, queer people experiencing food insecurity.
Please tell me about the Queer All Year campaign.
This campaign stemmed from the rainbow-washing and usage of "pride" as a marketing ploy for corporations. Most of our coverage or partnerships are during Pride Month, and then once June is over, corporations and businesses somehow "lose their budget" to work with queer culinary folks. Starting with Pride 2021, we vowed to only collaborate with corporations who showcase dedicated support throughout the entire year. We also have guidelines about who we partner with, as sometimes businesses or organizations like to make what we do more "palatable" for their audience. But, we're queer 365 days out of the year and we're proud. With that being said, we've featured over 100 organizations and queer leaders in food across our platforms and have partnered/continue to partner with organizations such as the James Beard Foundation, Museum of Food and Drink, Resy, Spruce Eats, and Hot Bread Kitchen to host queer food programming. We have quickly grown as a go-to resource for queer people in the food industry, which is very humbling.
I understand that you’re working on a directory. Please tell me about it.
Yes, we are! We beta-tested it last year and received a handful of responses, but to make sure we were asking the right questions, we just released an R&D survey, which will help us gauge how people would like to use it and why it's needed. Our original goal was to have it be used for community building and job opportunities and we'll see if that aligns with what the community envisions after a representative count. This database will contain literature/cookbooks, businesses, CPG, and other food operations (think pop-ups), freelance chefs, farmers, and more. It's super exciting to be able to create an accessible resource for the queer food community.
What’s next for the Queer Food Foundation?
Right now we have about 15 active Board Members and as we grow we're looking to expand to cover all expertise in food. Visibility is important to the nature of our work. I think back to being a kid and how it would have been awesome to find a queer chef or queer farmer to follow or keep tabs on. Additionally, one of our big goals for this year and next is to secure funding to bring on paid staff so we can implement more free resources and programming. We also are always looking for strategic partnerships so we can continue to uplift the queer food community. For example, we have bimonthly panels in partnership with the James Beard Foundation covering topics all across the food industry for queer folks from queer entrepreneurship to the beverage community (sommeliers, seltzer makers, and more) which thankfully, is sponsored by BentoBox.
Is there anything more you’d like to share?
First, thank you for including us! Queer folks are everywhere, especially in CPG. You can follow us at @queerfoodfoundation on Instagram or Facebook, as well as check us out on our website at queerfoodfoundation.org. As always donations are greatly appreciated: as we are a volunteer-based organization, all funds go directly into our community programs. You can donate here. We're a super friendly group so, please reach out, we'd love to hear from you.
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