COVER STORY

Twinkle VanWinkle on Food, Advocacy and Self-Love

By Bianca Mestiza

Make your life shine,” says Twinkle VanWinkle. “I really think it’s important and there’s so many ways to do that.”

Twinkle

(they/she) currently serves as the Executive Chef of The Patachou Foundation and Manager of Foundation Coffee Company, the proceeds of which fund the mission of the Foundation.

FOOD IS FOR EVERYONE With their love of food, Chef Twinkle has dedicated her work to providing assistance for those in need. “I had been working in non-profits for a while,” she says. “I always wanted to help people in some way.” The Patachou Foundation was a good fit for her, as it’s focused on educating and empowering youth by amplifying the value and power of food.

“Everybody deserves to eat good food, that’s really what it comes down to,” says Chef Twinkle. “Unfortunately, there’s many barriers for a lot of people, especially the ones who do not have access to or as many privileges… Being a food access advocate really means helping other people understand how food is a basic need that everybody deserves. You just have to keep fighting for it because it doesn’t end. There’s always some kind of hurdle.”

The Patachou Foundation combats hunger in several ways, one of them being the after-school program where 1,500-2,000 meals are made from scratch and served to kids. The program began with meeting immediate hunger needs and has since expanded into a multi-tiered way of fighting hunger from its source. In addition, The Foundation offers a paid, six-week food fellowship program that takes place in the summer. The program is centered around the food system and open for high school students, who learn transferable skills in farming, cooking, hospitality and customer service, along with career-readiness, finance and business basics, and communication techniques.

“They receive skills that give them a jumpstart. [From there,] they can support themselves and they can go right into a job that they want,” says Chef Twinkle. “It’s another way of trying to end hunger before it starts.”

Their newest project, PataSchool, is a school lunch program, providing breakfast and lunch meals made from scratch that follow USDA guidelines. Chef Twinkle mentions it’s a great way to build a community and bring educational programming into meals and cafeterias.

“There have been so many systemic hurdles in place for decades that make things difficult for marginalized groups. When fighting for food access, one has to dig in and fight against those systems built a long time ago,” states Twinkle. After all, the school food system is not the one they grew up in. Seeing the changes that have taken place shows her that children are not getting healthy food, especially those who depend on their two school meals every day. “My grandmother was in charge of our cafeteria, and she cooked everything from scratch. It was awesome,” says Twinkle. “[Now,] my son goes to school and if I don’t send him with lunch, he eats something that somebody microwaved in a little package.”

HUMBLE BEGINNINGS Born and raised in Mississippi, Chef Twinkle attended the University of Mississippi during the 90’s. Though influenced early on in her life by her grandmothers, it wasn’t until this time that she truly began to get into cooking, even though the only places to work in town were in a restaurant, on campus or at a gas station. “I lived like 20 minutes away from Oxford, Mississippi, so I didn’t go very far but it felt like I was going to a big city,” says Chef Twinkle. “I had a friend that hired me to be a dishwasher, after I delivered pizzas for a while and then I just moved up to prep from there.”

Chef Twinkle then worked in a vegetarian restaurant which she mentions was very unusual for Mississippi in the 90’s. Eventually, they landed a job at Bottletree Bakery, where she stayed for 10 years, gaining a lot of experience, ultimately moving up to pastry chef and manager. She was also met with incredible opportunities like being on “The Food Network” and “The Oprah Winfrey Show”.

Now, whenever Chef Twinkle is cooking and coming up with new recipes, she likes to think about the impact it’ll have on people. She credits her way of cooking and making food to her time at the bakery.

“One of my best influences was Felipe Flores. He taught me it wasn’t just technique, but more of a creative emotional way to think about food,” voices Chef Twinkle. “That’s how I think about everything when I cook now, too. I love technique, but I really am someone who is about flavor and how it makes somebody feel.”

THE FUTURE IS FEMALE Reflecting on her career as a chef, Twinkle says this is the first time the kitchen they’re working in is full of female-identified employees. The kitchen is an equal opportunity kitchen that has female-identified or non-binary staff. It’s a fun place where there is always music and dancing involved, and she says everyone is a real team.

“It’s really refreshing to work in an atmosphere where you have these supportive people with you in a kitchen,” says Chef Twinkle. She’s also involved with community groups that help support female presenting individuals. Currently, she is active in Indy Women and Food, a local organization that promotes female-identified people in the food industry, as well as Women in Hospitality United, described by Twinkle as “a group for femaleidentified hospitality and restaurant workers [that] helps promote a fair and equitable workplace where you’re not marginalized because of your sex, race or gender.”

As the year is coming to an end, Chef Twinkle shares she is looking forward to the upcoming projects The Patachou Foundation has in store for the next year, specifically for The

Foundation Coffee Company. Personally, she sees the new year as a way to reinvigorate the things she’s been doing.

Twinkle tries to make her life shine with what she has. She’s a positive person and wants to make things better for people.

“I want to be able to go out and make things good for others. To do that, I have to love myself and make my life shine so I can help other people too and make things at The Foundation work,” Chef Twinkle says. “I have to have that drive to be able to do those things.” Z

All information for The Patachou Foundation can be found online and anyone can get involved. Volunteer, donate, share the foundation on social media and follow them @thepatachoufoundation.

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