From left: Bryan Bennett, Xavier, Trey’Anna, Sterling Wright
On a Saturday night in mid-December, Nashville families gathered at Glasshaüs on Craighead Street for an unusual dinner — one with 10- to 18-year-old residents of J.C. Napier Homes cooking, hosting and serving the food.
“Everybody’s always telling kids how to be successful, but who shows them what it looks like?” That was the question posed to guests by chef Sterling Wright — also known as “Mr. 100” — after he playfully berated a customer for eating fried chicken with a fork.
Trey’Anna, a 17-year-old, made that fried chicken all on her own. She’s part of Joy Kitchen, the nonprofit hosting these pop-up dinners throughout the city.
“I really appreciated when [Wright] taught me how to make the chicken and the sauce for the chicken, because people started telling me they like the chicken, and it really made me feel good about myself,” says Trey’Anna.
CEO Bryan Bennett says Joy Kitchen wants to embrace difference in the culinary scene.
“One thing that I think is different here is the ability to authentically introduce a community that has the same humanity, but also these beautiful differences, to Nashville,” Bennett says of Joy Kitchen’s mission.
Wright and Bennett are working to raise enough money to open a brick-and-mortar restaurant — to be called Joy — this year. For now, Wright runs Cooking the Wright Way, a nine-month training program in which he teaches kids how to become chefs, line cooks, servers and hosts.
“One time in cooking class, we had a whole oxtail,” says 16-year-old Xavier, who enjoys learning new skills through CWW. “We had to learn to trim the fat off of it and cut it down. It was really hard.”
Xavier was one of the first students to join CWW. He met Wright five years ago and enrolled with his cousins, who later dropped out. But he stayed, and he’s now Joy Kitchen’s executive chef.
“You get connections [that] will lead to a lot of opportunities,” Xavier says. “You can network and build relationships with the right type of people.”
“[People who] want you to do good for yourself,” Trey’Anna adds.
Wright himself also grew up in the J.C. Napier Homes, and says he was told he’d never make these kinds of connections.
Wright in the kitchen
“Imagine growing up [and hearing], ‘You ain’t gonna be nothing,’” says Wright. “‘You’re gonna be dead by 25. You ain’t gonna graduate.’ All that sticks in your head, and I refuse to be a [product] of my environment.”
Wright is the first and only person from J.C. Napier to appear on Hell’s Kitchen, where he was a Season 13 contestant. He was later offered a job with Hell’s Kitchen host and head chef Gordon Ramsay, but he turned it down to come back and serve the community he came from. “We gotta show our children a better life,” says Wright. “And who’s better to show them than somebody who’s lived that life?” Wherever Wright goes near J.C. Napier, people stop to talk to him. Walking across the street, a car honks, and someone inside greets him.
In the early 1940s, the Nashville Housing Authority (now the Metropolitan Development and Housing Agency) built the Napier homes in an area often referred to as Black Bottom. There was a good outcome: People who never had four walls were provided with a housing option. But it was segregated, and poor Black Nashvillians were concentrated in an area with access to fewer opportunities. Now, Napier exists in a food desert — an area with few options for affordable, quality food.
“The formal structures don’t really support or service,” Bennett says of infrastructure in the area.
But Joy Kitchen is working against this narrative, and Wright is their original success story.
“We already knew Sterling,” says Trey’Anna. “We look at Sterling as our hero, basically. He leads a good example for us. We take that home with us and show others.”
“Learn more about different communities that you’re not used to,” Xavier suggests. “Get out there and experience stuff that you wouldn’t see yourself experiencing. … It’ll open your eyes more.”
Joy Kitchen served more than 1,200 plates to the Napier-area community on Thanksgiving. Xavier’s parents came to the Glasshaüs pop-up last month, and he got to show them how successful he’s been in the program. Kolton, another Joy student, connected with his parents as they ate the food he helped prepare.
“That word ‘impossible’ is spelled right, but pronounced wrong,” says Wright. “It’s actually ‘I’m possible.’ And thanks to Joy Kitchen and Cooking the Wright Way, look what we made possible from the impossible.”
