Purpose-DrivenSoulFood

restaurant, since I was a little kid,” Brown says. “I love people and I love interacting with them.”

In the 80s and into the early 90s, Brown helped-out at his father Cask Thomas Senior’s roadside food establishment in East Central, called Sam’s Barbecue Pit (which closed in 1993). There he learned the ins and outs of restaurant work, as well as honed his barbecue skills with recipes and techniques he learned from his father. He left Spokane briefly to go to school in Alabama, but then, he says, “God called me back to Spokane to be closer to my mother until she passed away.”

Brown’s major life influences include his stepmom, Eileen Thomas, who is a co-founder of the East Central Community Center (now the Carl Maxey

Center) and an active member of the local NAACP, as well as the Reverend Clifton E. Hamp, who created Hamp’s Camp, a church-based camp for young people from low-income families. Their inspiration led Brown to establish the faith-based Spokane Eastside Reunion Association, or SERA. SERA’s mission is to serve people (especially youth) in marginalized communities and give them a fighting chance at leading purposeful lives away from trouble.

Fresh Soul started in 2018 to provide teens, aged 14 to 18, with a 16-week paid internship in which they are able to learn basic hospitality and life skills. “I want them to learn kitchen etiquette, how to talk to customers, take their orders, fulfill orders, and keep track of payments,” Brown says, “but I also want them to learn basic life skills like budgeting, how to write a resume, interview skills, and how to connect with people.” At the end of the program, Brown hopes that the kids who graduate are equipped with ways of being productive members of society who also give back to their community. “We have a 98 percent graduation rate, and I’m really proud of the fact that these kids go on to become advocates for good in their places of work.”

While Brown is proudest of his work with the teens who go through his hospitality training program each year, he likes to remind people of the amazing soul food that comes out of Fresh Soul’s kitchen on Thursday through Saturday each week. “I don’t wanna brag about it –you will have to taste it for yourself – but people come from all over the place to get our ribs. Just the other day, someone drove all the way from Pullman to have them. They’re really something else,” he says with a smile. Come for the Southern foods, like fried catfish, collard greens, fried chicken and ribs, and leave with a warm heart from having met one of Spokane’s most inspiring restaurant owners.