Heaven’s Kitchen, a charity of Dudley Counselling Centre, have been successful in securing funding from Dudley’s Innovation Fund to develop their work with young people and the elderly in isolation. Heaven’s Kitchen will be opening a community café facility known as “The Lighthouse Café” later this year which will provide low level support with physical and emotional wellbeing, a space for community togetherness, and opportunities for a positive future.
This new facility aims to bring people together from all backgrounds and ages by providing a drop in café around focused supportive events. Heaven’s Kitchen will work together with young offenders and young people not in employment or education who volunteer or are offered a placement to learn new skills in catering and café service, food handling, heath & hygiene, customer service, work experience, money handling and following recipes. Young people will be supported to obtain a hygiene certificate and encouraged to pursue further opportunities where they have excelled.
The Lighthouse Café will provide healthy cooking classes and cooking on a budget for the wider community, taking referrals from GPs and other health providers. The cafe will be open to the general public and third sector groups to host drop in services, run by other service providers and third sector groups that cannot afford the hire fees of other venues. Young people and user groups will play key roles in the delivery and design of the community café, its menus and its income generating ideas.
