20 Years of Changing Lives, One Recipe at a Time

For 20 years, Second Harvest Food Bank of Northwest NC’s Providence department has proven that food can do more than nourish—it can open doors, restore dignity, and create opportunity. What began as a small culinary training program has grown into one of Second Harvest Food Bank’s most dynamic strategies for strengthening communities, developing talent, and delivering fresh, nourishing meals where they are needed most.

Watch through the windows of the gleaming stainless-steel kitchen at Second Harvest Food Bank of Northwest North Carolina, and students in Providence Culinary Training finely chop onions and peppers to season meals for seniors. They learn about leavening and laminated dough, canapes and carving stations.

The state-of-the-art teaching kitchen offers culinary students training for new career paths and stands as a visible symbol of the value of second chances. What began in 2006 as Triad Community Kitchen, Second Harvest’s first-ever mission-aligned workforce development program, has evolved into the Providence Culinary Training program. Over two decades, Providence has graduated more than 1,000 students. Building on this initiative, Jeff’s visionary leadership led Second Harvest’s efforts to leverage the culinary training work and its meal preparation capabilities to impact hunger in our region through innovation and creativity.

During Jeff’s tenure, he built social enterprises to enhance training experiences, developed a renowned catering program, and created a large-scale fresh meal production operation serving children, seniors, and community partners across northwest North Carolina.

“The core mission was to help people reintegrate into the workforce and overcome whatever barriers they were facing in keeping them from being successful, whether it was homelessness, justice involvement, or a skills gap,” said program founder Jeff Bacon, Vice President and Executive Director of Providence Programs.

As Bacon reflects on the past two decades of his journey leading Second Harvest's Providence, he said it’s important “to always remember why we do what we do: it’s about the people and the food, and when you put those two together with the right intent, miracles happen.”

The roots of Providence

In 1998, Bacon had recently graduated from UNC Greensboro and started his first culinary job as corporate chef at J&S Cafeteria. He wanted to give back to his community, and his employer put him in charge of outreach, preparing turkey dinners for Thanksgiving. He attended a gathering of non-profits in Raleigh and met Linda Vogler, who was running a community culinary school in an under-utilized Meals on Wheels kitchen in Charlotte. The idea intrigued Bacon, who thought, “That is the greatest idea ever; why can’t we do that in Triad?”

He prepared a grant request for the Greensboro Community Foundation and gained momentum with interest from Mike Aiken of Greensboro Urban Ministries. He met Nan Griswold, then-Executive Director of Second Harvest Food Bank of Northwest North Carolina. She liked the concept, but the timing wasn’t right for a new venture for the Food Bank. Bacon received the grant to explore the feasibility of the project; however, the terrorist attack occurred on 9/11 and paused the project.

Bacon moved to Winston-Salem, determined to pursue the plan for the culinary training program. Eight years after Griswold first heard Bacon’s pitch, she said, “I think we’re ready to do it.” Triad Community Kitchen (TCK) held its first class in November 2006 in a kitchen in a portion of the Food Bank warehouse on Reed Street.

“It just made sense, that old saying, give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime,” Griswold said. “Jeff is so charismatic and convincing. Too many people in this world go to work or go to school hungry. We’re trying to help people and alleviate poverty, and you’re not going to alleviate it if you can’t eat. A lot of people thought this was a good program. It was a win-win-win.”

Attending graduation ceremonies shows the power of the program, as graduates share how the training transforms their lives, she said.

Bacon’s understanding of the power of second chances fuels the success of Providence. In 1993, he had resisted arrest for drug-related offenses and served two years in prison.

“The police that arrested me that night had every right to put me six feet under, and I’m eternally grateful that they chose not to,” he said. “I got a chance to turn my life around because I wasn’t dead. I firmly heard from God, ‘This is not what you’re supposed to be doing with your life. You need to do something more, and you need to give back the second chance that you got.’”

Griswold calls Bacon a trailblazer and says his example inspires students.

“A lot of students have been through hard times—addiction, prison, etc.,” Griswold said. “He turned his life around. He wants others to break that cycle. A lot of times, that’s what it takes, is to walk in those shoes. He’s such a role model. They look up to him so much.”

“It doesn’t matter what the circumstances are, as far as Jeff is concerned, he wants to help people, and the way he does it is through the food industry,” Griswold said.

Flourishing through food

In 2008, Second Harvest hired its first TCK employee, other than Bacon, and the extra help opened a floodgate of opportunities for the culinary students.

“Success moves you places you don’t necessarily know you’re going to go,” he said.

For years, Second Harvest had partnered with the Betty and Jim Holmes Food Bank Garden, which grows fresh produce for the Food Bank and its partner food assistance programs. Bacon met with garden volunteers, who asked for recommendations for vegetables that would best benefit the culinary training program.

“We would consult every year with Jeff Bacon and Lisa Richardson (VP of Operations for Second Harvest) about what the crops would be that they needed,” said long-time volunteer garden leader Ellen Kirby. Garden volunteers increased watermelon production because it was one of the Food Bank’s most popular items. “We grew garlic specifically for Providence. Jeff also told me that our fresh garden produce provided the opportunity for students to practice cutting skills.”

Second Harvest’s VP of Operations paved the way for garden volunteers to partner with Lowe’s Foods to refrigerate produce picked in the evenings that couldn’t be delivered to the Food Bank until the next morning, Kirby said.  Now, produce is stored in cooling rooms at Crossnore Communities for Children-WS. Additionally, Bacon and a fellow chef managed a beehive near the garden, which boosted pollination and production.

In 2009, Second Harvest started Providence Catering, which became so successful that it outgrew the kitchen space, which was still used for training classes. Catering operated out of the Food Bank’s Reed Street location until 2015, when Triad Community Kitchen was renamed Providence to better connect the training and catering efforts. Additionally, Second Harvest opened Providence Restaurant at the DoubleTree Inn in 2015 and moved the catering operation there. In 2018, a second eatery, Providence Kitchen, opened in the former Truist building.

During the COVID pandemic (2020–21), Second Harvest closed both restaurants to focus on mission work serving neighbors affected by the shutdown. The Providence department briefly moved catering operations to Tanglewood Park in 2020, where they ran the grill and manor house while preparing for their move to Second Harvest’s new headquarters.

Providence chefs prepare food for and oversee the Community Meals program that distributes after-school meals to school children, meals to community-shelter residents, and Meals on Wheels for seniors in five counties—Yadkin, Surry, Stokes, Rockingham, and Randolph. 

During COVID, Providence chefs prepared thousands of meals for students who relied on school meals for nutrition but were unable to obtain them since schools were closed. Their efforts stretched into the hallways to meet the high demand for student meals.

In 2022, space for Second Harvest’s Providence programs tripled with the move into the new headquarters warehouse on Shorefair Drive.

“It gave us space to do properly a lot of the things we were already doing with not enough space,” Bacon said.

The expansion vastly upgraded school facilities, training capacity, technology, and equipment for students and staff who prepare community meals. Community Meals now has nine vehicles to deliver prepared meals, heated or frozen.

In 2023, Second Harvest opened its Clyde W. Fitzgerald Teaching Garden Nourished by Food Lion Feeds, an accessible teaching garden where Providence students and community members learn about growing food at home; the health benefits of eating fresh, organically grown, whole foods; native plants; and harvest times. In 2024, Providence contributed meals to victims of Hurricane Helene.

Beyond the impact of the meals prepared and careers created, graduates have used their knowledge from Providence Culinary Training to pursue their dreams:

• Chef William Fulton founded Hugo Juice Bar, producing all-natural juices and smoothies that he sells in six locations, including Dilworth in Charlotte. He employs 10 graduates from Second Harvest’s Providence Culinary Training.

• Graduate Shereen Gomaa launched Delicious , a catering company that hires local refugees to prepare their traditional foods and enables them to gain financial independence as they adjust to life in the Triad area. 

• Chef Daryl Myers Jr. completed a prison sentence and found Providence. During class, he developed a passion for making cheesecakes. He opened DJ’s Cheesecakes, which offers a uniquely wide range of delicious cheesecakes, and he returns regularly to Providence to share his story and inspire other students.  

• Graduate Manuel Martinez had struggled to find employment and is now a chef at one of the best restaurants in Winston-Salem.

• ·      Father-son duo Steve and Steven Jones, who is on the autism spectrum, completed the culinary training program, with Steve shadowing his son. Seeing Steven’s success inspired Steve to start a program to share cooking skills with other individuals with differing abilities. Second Harvest’s GRACE by Providence.
  

• Vanessa Lanier had two small children and recalled “thinking I cannot make it in this country. I was buying a plane ticket to go back home. I told Chef Bacon, ‘I know you don’t know me, but if you give me a chance, and you open this door, I will prove to you I will go to the top.’  She graduated from TCK and worked as executive chef at High Point Country Club before Bacon hired her to lead Second Harvest’s Providence social enterprise programs, including Providence Catering.

“It changes everything once you get not just a job, but you get a career you can believe in,” Bacon said, noting that they’ve taught children and grandchildren of individuals who participated in the early years of TCK.

“It’s changed whole neighborhoods in some cases,” he added, due to the ripple effect of graduates hiring family members and neighbors to support businesses that result from Providence training and support.                

Looking forward

As Second Harvest’s Providence looks to the future, Bacon does so with a sense of completion and confidence. After two decades of building, refining, and expanding the program, he says Providence has reached a place of strength—shaped not by any one individual, but by a team prepared to carry the work forward.

“We’ve achieved much of what we set out to do when this program began,” Bacon said. “Second Harvest’s Providence department is no longer just leading a culinary school. It’s a full ecosystem—training, social enterprises, catering and fresh meal production—that supports students, graduates, children, seniors and the broader community.”

Bacon points to the depth and readiness of the Providence team as the foundation for what comes next.

“I’m leaving Providence in a much improved state,” he said. “We’ve been through a lot, and the good news is the team here has been preparing for this day for a long time—not because I’m stepping away, but because they hold the keys to the future. With the support of the entire Second Harvest team, my team is equipped to see what’s needed, shape the vision, and make it their own.”

Looking ahead, Bacon expressed confidence in the continued impact of Second Harvest’s Providence programs.

“I know the work I’m stepping away from is going to become even more important than it is now,” he said. “It’s going to reach further, serve more people, and lead to an even stronger community.”