Providing nourishment is at the center of what chefs do. However, some are called not just to nourish the bodies of their diners but the spirit, soul and wellbeing of their community. These civic-minded culinary creators don’t just make giving back something they do in addition to their day jobs. They fully integrate that concept into every aspect of the work they do. In their own ways, these three San Antonio culinary stalwarts have found ways to enhance the community with their love of food and tireless commitment to improving the world.
Lorris Gibson, Executive Chef, St. Vinny’s Bistro at Haven for Hope
Anyone who spends time around Lorris Gibson has likely heard him utter a phrase that identifies the decision that changed his life: “I just had to eat a slice of humble pie and go to Haven for Hope.”
Gibson is now the executive chef of St. Vinny’s Bistro at Haven for Hope, a San Antonio campus devoted to ending homelessness, where he doles out some 40,000 meals monthly. But before he became the culinary shot-caller at the facility, he lived there.
Gibson traces his love for cooking back to his days at John Jay High School. After spending time in the semiconductor industry, he ended up attending Le Cordon Bleu culinary school in Arizona, and returned to the Alamo City with accolades under his belt.
However, an addiction to alcohol almost snuffed out those ambitions. In 2012, homeless and fresh out of state-mandated detox, he entered Haven for Hope. His first experience with the campus ended with Gibson landing a job with restaurant chain that put him in charge of opening a San Antonio franchise location.
During his training in Florida, he picked up the bottle again.
“I made it back to San Antonio, and had 80-something employees under me, four or five managers. All of corporate was here, and we were ahead of schedule by four days of opening. So I was doing my job,” Gibson said. “I ended up drinking, and I had my first blackout and ended up in Bexar County Jail the day of my soft opening.”
Gibson was offered jobs in other cities, but his father implored him to get help. By this time, he ended up sleeping behind a Home Depot, drinking hard and hustling as well as he could.
“I ran into an engineer from when I used to be in semiconductors, and I asked him for some money,” Gibson said. “He gave me $20, and he goes, ‘Man, Lorris, you’re better than this.’ So you have to deal with people knowing you, seeing you. I did not know I was suffering from mental illness. So until I understood that I was self medicating, and admitted that I needed help, I was going to keep going through that cycle.”
Haven for Hope partnered with St. Vincent de Paul Catholic Church to provide meals for the people it serves, and when Gibson returned to the facility in 2013, he quickly went to work in the kitchen. Now, Gibson — who’s in recovery and no longer homeless — and his crew of Haven residents and volunteers offer reliable breakfast, lunch and dinner to up to 580 daily, all year long.
“The hardest thing to deal with is going to bed hungry. That’s one of the longest nights, not knowing where your next meal is coming from,” Gibson said. “Sometimes it ain’t as easy just to pull yourself up by your bootstraps, because it’s not just that. You’ve got to correct the problem. Feeding people, providing at least that much stability, it’s a miracle.”
Greg Williams, Culinary Program Chef Educator, San Antonio Food Bank
Chef Greg Williams began his culinary career at the tender age of 31.
Growing up, he played “restaurant” with his friends instead of cops and robbers, but he avoided work in the culinary industry for decades due to his brother’s bad experience with the business.
“When I was a teenager, my brother went to work for McDonald’s. And he would come home and just be like, ‘Never work in food.’ So I dodged it for years,” Williams said. “I went into business first and didn’t start in the culinary field until I was like, 30.”
The impetus for Williams’ career change was simple — and terrifying.
“I almost had a heart attack when I was 30 years old,” he said. “So that was my eye-opening moment. You know, maybe I should stop chasing the dollar and do something I truly enjoy doing. So I quit my job … got into a culinary school, and just kind of hit the reset button.”
Since then, Williams’ culinary journey has been varied. He’s gone from part-time culinary arts instructor to golf club food and beverage director to owner of a catering service. However, his current post as culinary program chef educator at the San Antonio Food Bank is where he feels he belongs.
In his current job, Williams operates a 10-week, boot camp-style course that aims not just to fight hunger but also the root cause of food insecurity: unemployment. In 2022, the Food Bank and job-placement agency Workforce Solutions Alamo banded together to form the Workforce Solutions Alamo Career Center. The first-of-its-kind, federally funded program focuses on retraining workers whose jobs were lost during or due to the pandemic.
The program begins with the basics, according to Williams.
“Day one starts off with ‘This is a knife, and this is the pointy end,'” he said, joking. “And then we move into all of the techniques, and the science behind those techniques. I want them to understand why we sauté, or blanch and shock. Giving them the vocabulary, so they can get those entry jobs in the field.”
At the end of the 10 weeks, Williams’ students will understand the fundamentals of not only interpreting and executing recipes but also creating and costing them out. All graduate with both a ServSafe managers’ certification and a Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission server certification.
At the end of the program, graduates strive to obtain jobs that pay at least $15 an hour and offer benefits. However, beyond long-term employment at a living wage, the program arms its students with an invaluable skillset, Williams said.
“The classes I run here are for people who are changing careers or are unemployed, or just don’t have the means to go to a culinary school,” he added. “It really is about getting people back on their feet and getting them employed gainfully with a career path that they love as well.”
Ernie Bradley, Co-Owner, The Cherrity Bar and Kuriya at Cherrity Bar
Chef Ernie Bradley’s career in the foodservice industry began more than 20 years ago, when he was the only male in his high school home economics class.
“That ratio was a large part of why I picked the class. I’ll be honest with you,” Bradley said, laughing.
Bradley’s priorities and motivations have changed a lot over the past 20 years, but his love of food is unchanged. These days, he’s the culinary mind behind Kuriya, the Japanese restaurant and ramen shop at The Cherrity Bar, San Antonio’s first philanthropic watering hole.
“At some point, it stopped becoming about putting money in my pocket, and maybe that’s backwards, because I like money. Who doesn’t?” he said. “But I’m doing what I truly love, and that’s really a blessing. That’s what it’s about.”
When they opened in 2018, both the bar and Bradley’s ramen shop aimed to combine cocktails and charitable giving via voting system put entirely into the hands of guests.
At that time, the bar distributed tokens to visitors who purchased a cocktail or more than $10 in food or merchandise. Customers could then use the tokens to vote for one of three charities featured that month. The charity with the most tokens at month’s end would receive 60% of the month’s profits, and while the next two vote getters would receive 20% and 10% percent, respectively.
The COVID-19 pandemic changed the way the businesses operate, resulting in the end of the token system.
Even so, The Cherrity Bar and Kuriya still support local charities, one sip at a time. To date, they funneled some $100,000 into the coffers of organizations including the El Paso Community Foundation’s Shooting Victims’ Fund, Vision Guide Dogs, student career-focused Building a Purpose and creative-support project Hearts Need Art.
Aside from donating monthly to a single charity, the spot regularly hosts events to connect the community to creatives of all kinds. Bradley hopes gatherings such as art-collecting mixers, outdoor pop-up markets, twilight yoga and live music foster meaningful relationships between artists and patrons. <
Similarly, Bradley has built relationships with local food producers and farmers, working diligently to use locally sourced ingredients in Kuriya’s dishes whenever possible.
“I really want to showcase these local producers, because we’ve been so fortunate. COVID really did a number on so many small businesses, we have to lift each other up,” Bradley said. “It doesn’t hurt that San Antonio has some really amazing producers to choose from.”
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This article appears in Oct 31-31, 2023 and Flavor Issue (2023).
