2025 DINNERS WILL BE ANNOUNCED SOON!
Approximately 1.8 million New Yorkers experience food insecurity, including 1 in 4 children. For many, basic nutrition competes with needs such as rent, medical bills, childcare, and transportation. Food is the foundation of our health and intersects with every aspect of our lives, so let's come together to make a difference.
Since 2023 we have gathered for joyous, cooking classes and dinner, led by a Black Chef and focused on culturally-celebrated foods. ALL proceeds from ticket sales go to support One Love's work in the Brooklyn community to provide fresh meals.
The “Nourish Me. Nourish My Community.” dinner series presented by The Infatuation is only the latest of The Lay Out’s collaborations with One Love Community Fridge. Launched in June of 2020, this Brooklyn-born non-profit empowers and engages the community through education and access to fresh, healthy produce and prepared foods 24/7.
One Love supports dozens of NYC fridges, with a volunteer team 100+ strong and support spanning the globe. Through corporate and community support, they stock 25+ free community fridges across Brooklyn and Manhattan, serving some of New York City’s most vulnerable populations, delivering thousands of pounds of free food each month.
We gather for a joyous, cooking class and dinner, led by a Black Chef and focused on culturally-celebrated foods, before sitting down for an intimate family style meal. ALL proceeds from ticket sales will go to support One Love's work in the Brooklyn community to provide fresh Community Fridge meals.
The Lay Out x One Love Community Fridge
5,000+
Meals supported by One Love from 2021 - 2024 through our partnership.
Chef Rasheeda of Ramen By Ra
SLURP! Chef Rasheeda of NYC’s hottest ramen counter, Ramen By Ra (the first Black-woman owned ramen shop in New York City), joined us for our first edition of our Nourish Me. Nourish My Community. dinner series in 2024. Given that Ramen by Ra seatings are sold out within the first day of each month for the entire month, to say we were honored to steal her away would be an understatement.
Chef Ra took us through the inspiration for her famous Potlikker Ramen (Collard greens and smoked turkey based ramen? Sign us up!) before we each got a chance to put together our bowls and sit down for a family-style dinner. We finished the amazing evening with cookies from the fam at EatGoodNYC and Chef Ra’s hot toddies made with Toki whisky. Each of the dinners is magical and Chef Ra did not disappoint.
Rahim and Chef Sidik of Ginjan Cafe
From bustling African markets to hurried North American crosswalks, the teenage arrival of brothers Mohammed and Rahim Diallo in the 2000’s was rife with challenge but filled with opportunity. In 2018, the brothers started working on a lifelong dream of a retail location for their growing brand, Ginjan, and in 2019 they opened The Ginjan Café in the historic Corn Exchange Building in Harlem.
After weathering the COVID storm — and as café sales have started rebounding — the brothers opened their second location in Brooklyn, NY in January 2023. Also in 2023, Howard Schultz — founder of Starbucks — invested in the brand and made a commitment of support to the Ginjan brothers.
We were so honored to have Rahim and Chef Sidik of Ginjan Cafe take guests through the history of the cafe and their philosophies on food of the diaspora as they showed attendees how they make their delicious cassava fries. Everyone then sat down for a family style dinner of all the yummy things, including vegan and chicken jollof bowls.
Nicole and Michael of Aunts et Uncles
Buss up, buss up! We were so honored to have Nicole and Michael of Aunts et Uncles as guest chefs for the Nourish Me. Nourish My Community. dinner series. As one of the most well-known vegan restaurants in Brooklyn, owned by one of the flyest couples in Brooklyn, the night did not disappoint.
Whether attendees were vegan, baby vegan, dietarily fluid and don't like to be labeled, vegan curious, flexitarian or a vegan that only eats meat on days that end in "day", Nicole and Michael had us covered.
Chef Eden of Makina Cafe
As one of The Lay Out’s Day 1’s, there was no better person to kick off our Nourish Me. Nourish My Community on April 13, 2023. dinner series than Makina Cafe founder Eden G. Egziabher. Born in Ethiopia from parents of Eritrean descent, Eden was raised amidst a vibrant mix of Ethiopian, Eritrean and Italian cultures. It’s no coincidence that “Makina” translates to “truck” in all three of these countries’ languages, whose cultures combine to create the mosaic of flavors found on the mobile cafe’s menu.
Eden prides herself on being the first Eritrean-American female entrepreneur in NYC with a food truck serving “Habesha” food. Used as a term of pride, the word “Habesha” is used to eliminate the distinction between different tribes of Eritrea and Ethiopia and celebrates the unity of people of the same region.
