In an era when dining has become a pastime and restaurants compete on a vast matrix of ingenuity, sustainability, personality and decor, a cornerstone component of cuisine is often overlooked: Nourishment.
You can read that word literally. After all, the bacon-wrapped-whiskey-infused-pork-belly culinary zeitgeist doesn't exactly bow to recommended nutritional daily allowances of fiber, sodium, riboflavin and such.
Or you can read it metaphorically, with nourishment being about bringing people to the table to replenish and restore them.
If you're Brett Swayn at The Cookery restaurant and culinary training program for the homeless, it all runs together.
"It's a parable," he says, referring to his own journey from homelessness to food- and faith-based social enterprise. His restaurant near the corner of 12th Avenue South and Wedgewood serves customers a fresh and well-executed menu of pancakes, biscuits, salads, sandwiches, wraps and pastries, while serving indigent men by housing, feeding, clothing, teaching and employing them.
Metaphorically speaking, Swayn's own road to Damascus wound from Dallas to Nashville more than a decade ago. He arrived here penniless on a Greyhound bus and spent four months living at the Nashville Rescue Mission, until he got a job as prep cook at Fleming's restaurant. He worked his way up through the kitchen, ultimately traveling the country to open new Fleming's stores. With a corporate restaurant résumé under his belt and newfound humility and compassion in his heart, Swayn founded Lambscroft Ministries and Upper Room, to provide food and shelter to the poor.
When inspiration for The Cookery struck, he and co-founder Terry Kemper thought they could transform a burned-out building near the corner of 12th and Wedgewood in a matter of months. It took more money, time and frustration than they budgeted, and three years in, Swayn almost lost hope. But Kemper reminded him how far they had come. Looking around the nearly completed building and its tidy decor, Kemper, who died soon after the opening, reminded Swayn what naysayers once told them: The structure was too far gone, would cost too much and would take too long.
To Swayn, a devout Christian and student of the Bible, it was another parable: The building was like so many souls who would ultimately come to him for help. Souls like Wiley Walker, who arrived at The Cookery a year ago, destitute and drugged out. Walker had heard about a fledgling program to prepare homeless men for culinary jobs, and he wanted in. Swayn gave Walker an unusual test. He made him sit all day in the dining room, where copies of The Purpose Driven Life fill the bookshelves and a sculptural portrait of Jesus hangs on the wall. Walker persevered, so Swayn invited him back the next morning, then showed him the dishwasher.
Since that time, Swayn has helped Walker get clean and sober, found him lodging in a Lambscroft discipleship house, and paid for him to take the ServSafe certification program for culinary workers.
On my recent visit to The Cookery, Walker showed me the new digital meat thermometer in the breast pocket of his immaculate kitchen uniform and explained how to check food temperature to prevent contamination. He shared the recipe for pulled pork shoulder and arranged to bake a frangipane tart for me to pick up the next day. It's hard to imagine Walker as the same downtrodden character Swayn recalled from a year ago. I will remember him as a confident culinarian who made an exquisite pastry layered with caramel and pears and accented with bright sparks of sea salt.
Walker is one of seven formerly homeless employees and apprentices manning the large stainless-steel kitchen. Swayn calls them "brothers."
"They're never going to be super-chefs," Swayn says, but they will graduate from The Cookery's five-month program with basic knife skills, recipe-math literacy and anchoring relationships to rebuild integrity. Some graduates, like Walker, will be hired as staff.
Nor will The Cookery's comfortable repertoire of burgers, lettuce wraps, stuffed potatoes and fish tacos ever be called super-cuisine, but under Swayn's tutelage, the team produces bountiful plates that stand out for fresh ingredients, house-made sauces and spice blends, and presentation that conveys care and attention.
We devoured a large bowl of decadent spinach-cheese dip with flour tortilla chips made in-house — a thoughtful detail in lieu of standard-issue corn chips. We also applauded coffee-rubbed fries that were baked, not deep-fried, and we are always grateful for that all-too-rare detail of rich, dark-brewed iced tea.
Several wraps, tacos and salads were based on tea-smoked chicken, which in all cases arrived juicy, glistening and tinted with a balanced blend of warm red spices. (We have prepared enough dried-out chicken at home to know that it takes some know-how to achieve this consistent result.) Another highlight was a pulled pork lettuce wrap with hints of candied fruit and bourbon.
In addition to comfortable American fare, The Cookery offers a few intriguing items from Swayn's native Australia, including meat pies and lamingtons — sponge cakes rolled in chocolate sauce and dried coconut. There's even toast with Vegemite.
When one of the brothers arrived for work looking a little tired, Swayn asked if he slept well last night.
"Nope. First time I'd slept in a soft bed."
When the brother rounded the corner to the kitchen, Swayn explained that he just got out of jail and now lives in a Lambscroft discipleship house in Woodbine, which Swayn describes as a mini-monastery, with mandatory group prayer. Then Swayn grasps the sides of the handsome wooden two-top where we are drinking strong-brewed coffee from Murfreesboro-based Just Love roasters. "He made this table," he says.
There is gratitude in his words that infuses the dining room at The Cookery, as if Swayn is truly grateful for the carpentry, and the brothers are truly grateful for the opportunity. Meanwhile, the noontime crowd suggests that more than a few business people are grateful for a healthy, affordable dining option in this onetime food desert.
There might be no one at The Cookery more grateful than server Rita Skemp. Like so many of the souls who have come here, Skemp arrived at a time of crisis and grief in her life. Now she volunteers in the dining room three days a week, delivering meals to the table and singing praises of the plates and of the program that nourished her back to strength.
"They think I'm helping them out," Skemp said, pointing toward the kitchen, where the brothers are peeling carrots and mixing pancake batter. "But they saved my life."
The Cookery is open 10:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. Tuesday through Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. Saturday, and noon to 2 p.m. Sunday.
Email arts@nashvillescene.com.
