Coexist The venue uniting community through food
ON a side street off St Marks Road in Easton, a social enterprise is providing a place for people to get together through food.
Joey Callender-Wood said Coexist – a non-profit cookery school – was started 11 years ago by Ari Cantwell at Hamilton House in Stokes Croft, adding that when everyone got evicted in 2018 they realised the kitchen could not stop so they started a crowdfunder to find a new venue.
Ms Callender-Wood said they found the venue on Mivart Street in 2019 but, requiring a lot of work, it was not ready to open until January 2020 just before the lockdown. They managed to continue during the pandemic as their work is classed as having therapeutic value, she continued, but had to run smaller groups and socially distanced.
However, she said a lot of people could not come anyway as they were vulnerable so they were running online cookery classes. They have now been able to go back to normal, she added, and run various types of workshops from the space.
The kitchen coordinator and workshop facilitator said: “We run community-based workshops which are free to access for the people that use them. These are with various charities and, for example, we work with young carers, refugees and asylum seekers and also people accessing drug alcohol recovery services.
“We will work with a group for six weeks and at the end of a session we ask them what they would like to cook or learn to cook in the next one. We have a cuppa at the beginning to see how everyone is doing, then we do up to two and a half hours of cooking and we then all sit down together to eat.
“It is really important that we sit together.”
Ms Callender-Wood – a chef by training – said that participants have a recipe folder by the end of the sessions, adding these recipes are easy to follow and are based on what they want to learn. Their aim is to teach how to prepare nutritional but affordable meals that they can replicate at home and won’t require many tools.
Among others, they also run ‘Speak & Eat’ which is aimed at people that are looking to improve their English while preparing and sharing food from around the world. She described the group as very informal, but said it is supported by an English language teacher and that – after they cook but before eating – there is an English class.
She said a lot of their food comes from FareShare – the region’s largest food redistribution charity – and that they get a 30kg delivery from them every Monday.
We visit on a Wednesday, when they run their food provision. This started at the beginning of the pandemic, at which point they were delivering up to 400 meals a week because the need was there, continued Ms Callender-Wood.
At the moment, they are cooking between 80 and 150 meals a week and today they are cooking 80 meals which will be a roasted root vegetable dhal with rice and curried greens as well as creamy polenta with slow cooked leeks, purple sprouting broccoli, garlic and roasted seeds. If they have time, they will also make upsidedown mango cake.
“Some of them [the people who the meals are for] are referred through some of our partner charities, while others refer themselves,” she continued. “Quite a lot of people we provide for are families, often single parents.
“We also run during the summer holidays. Today we have three volunteers, but we normally have around five.
“There is a rota and this groups comes every other week, the others are more ad hoc and some people come more frequently than others.”
Ms Callender-Wood said that the social enterprise tries to generate as much income as it can and, for example, they also provide catering for weddings, adding that they recently catered for a wedding of more than a hundred people. They also run public workshops a couple of times a month, she explained, and for instance she recently ran one on pickling and fermenting.
Other public workshops include Caribbean cooking classes and pasta workshops. However, she said that they also get some funding.
She said: “We have quite a lot going on. The key aim is to use food as a means to bring people together and getting people from different walks of life and backgrounds together and interacting. It also improves their cooking skills while building confidence.
“Some of the people that come can be reserved and over the weeks it is very nice to see how they soften and start interacting with others.”
Volunteer Philippa Parish, from Keynsham, said she has been volunteering at Coexist for about nine months. The food scientist and nutritionist said that she was introduced to it by her friend.
She now comes every other week and described the space as amazing.
She said: “It is lovely to be doing something for people that need it. We are quite autonomous as well so it is fun. We all work well as a team and I enjoy not knowing what we are going to cook that week, it is a challenge and it is rewarding.
“My own cooking has changed since I come here and I am now doing more vegan food while experimenting with different flavours. It is really good fun and I always look forward to coming here. I think it has made me a better person.”
Anneke Bull, from St Andrew’s, said her daughter told her about
Coexist after she saw an Instagram post. The food scientist has now been volunteering at the social enterprise for more than a year, starting as the country was coming out of lockdown.
Ms Bull said she volunteers with the food provision service every other week, but has also joined their public workshops including in Lebanese cooking.
“I enjoy all the different cultures and all the different flavours,” she continued. “It is a great bunch of people that you would not meet unless you came here. I also enjoy sitting down and eating the food together, it is really sociable.”
Bearnie DeMonick, from Whitehall, is another workshop facilitator at Coexist. Among others, she works with young carers, young people and also delivers workshops to mental health groups.
She said: “Spaces like this are vital because they enable people from all backgrounds to get together around one thing – food. And everyone loves food.
“Friendships are made, links are built that continue outside this space. For a lot of the people we work with, eating together isn’t something that necessarily happens. They maybe living in a hostel, for example, so the whole thing of sitting together to share some food and relax isn’t the norm.”
The 62-year-old said she learns so much from the groups she works with, which she described as wonderful. She also enjoys creating a warm, loving environment, particularly for some of the younger children going through stressful situations.
“I love having the opportunity to learn from various people with such amazing skills, I like being around all sorts of people,” she continued. “I was born in South America so, despite having been here since I was eight, I know what it is like to feel like a stranger so I can empathise with them.
“I think this is a very special place. I absolutely love it here.”
It is a great bunch of people that you would not meet unless you came here. I also enjoy sitting down and eating the food together, it is really sociable.
Philippa Parish