Authentic Cuisine Supporting Female Entrepreneurs
Do you love authentic, home-style Middle Eastern food? How about Mexican and Latin American food, created from recipes handed down through generations? Comal Heritage Food Incubator offers visitors the opportunity to eat delicious food, learn about other cultures, and support women and families in our Denver Community.
Comal is part of a community outreach program partnered with the non-profit Focus Points Family Resource Center. Their mission is to offer home style cooking, while providing career-oriented job training for women in the Globeville and Elyria-Swansea areas of Denver. Comal is located at 3455 Ringsby Court in the Taxi development. The restaurant is open five days a week for lunch. Mondays through Thursdays, Latin-American food is served, and Fridays are reserved for Middle Eastern cuisine.
On the Friday that we visited, we had the opportunity to speak with Slavica Park, the director of economic and workforce development at Focus Points. She told us that the program is an eight months training program for female entrepreneurs who already have some cooking skills. The training offers advanced technical culinary skills as well as business education and includes menu pricing, food sourcing and recipe development. The goal is that after women complete this training, they will be able to launch their own food related businesses. Classes in financial literacy, management and marketing, developing business plans and market analysis will also be provided, as well as continued support for the women who have completed their training.
Our Friday lunch was a delicious Middle Eastern sampler plate of hummus, baba ghanoush, tabouli and yalangi (stuffed grape leaves) cooked by four Syrian women who are recent arrivals in Denver and part of Comal’s second entrepreneurial class. We appreciated the opportunity to enjoy a great lunch, learn more about Middle Eastern food and culture, and support women in our community.