Food Empowerment Education Sustainability Team (FEEST)

FEEST's mission is to set the table for young people to transform the health and equity of their community by gathering around food & working towards systems change. FEEST began in 2008 as part of the King County Food and Fitness Initiative, seeking a community and policy driven approach to reversing health inequities in some of Seattle’s lowest-income and most diverse neighborhoods. We began with just 5 youth and two teaching artists in the bustling community kitchen of Youngstown Cultural Center in Delridge and quickly grew to be a staple of the Center. After a number of successful years, including national replication work, FEEST made the strategic decision to move into two local high school sites. We now operate of out schools in Southwest Seattle and South King County.

FEEST empowers low income youth and youth of color in White Center and Delridge to become leaders for healthy food access, food justice and health equity. We organize 40-45 high school youth once a week to cook an improvised dinner using a table full of fresh vegetables from local markets. These community dinners serve as a pipeline to recruit and develop emerging food justice leaders for our year-long internship program. Interns develop and implement campaigns that seek to increase access to healthy foods for students and their families.