Passage Excerpt from “The Food Business Incubator”
Excerpt from “The Food Business Incubator”
by Mandalit Del Barco
“La Cocina” means “the kitchen” in Spanish. It’s also the name of a business incubator1 based in San Francisco’s Mission District. Since it began in 2005, it’s been helping local food entrepreneurs, many of whom are low-income immigrant women, develop their small businesses.
Over the years, many of its alumni have found success: more than 50 chefs in its program have become self-sufficient business owners, and many of them have opened their own brick-and-mortar restaurants. Two alumnae of its culinary program . . . were even recognized as semi-finalists for prestigious James Beard awards.2
A new cookbook, We Are La Cocina: Recipes in Pursuit of the American Dream, tells some of their stories.
Executive director Caleb Zigas says the nonprofit La Cocina grew out of two grassroots economic development organizations3 who found many people cooking at their homes and selling food on the streets. The vendors needed an affordable commercial kitchen space and technical assistance in order for their businesses to be legally viable. La Cocina provided just such a space, in addition to helping them develop business plans, pull city permits and more.
Zigas says as many as eight businesses can work in the kitchen space at La Cocina at any one time. Some can prep for a farmers’ market sale, corporate catering gigs or weddings, while others might be making and packaging their food products.
“It’s just an incredible and exciting range of techniques, flavors, perspectives, age, language. And that’s a really beautiful thing,” he says. . . .
Twice a year, La Cocina hosts “F&B: Voices from the Kitchen,” a storytelling project where their chefs can tell their own stories, as they do in the new cookbook. Some of the chefs will be on tour to promote the book, whose proceeds will go to support La Cocina entrepreneurs.
NPR4 caught up with . . . La Cocina chefs, who shared their stories:
Mariko Grady, Aedan Fermented Foods
At La Cocina, you can often hear Mariko Grady singing or humming as she prepares miso, koji, and amasake. Her fermented products come in four different flavors, including mushroom and chicken, to be used in soups and sauces. She originally brought the fermenting rice and barley koji seeds from Japan, where she had a 30-year career as a singer and dancer with the prestigious modern theatrical dance group she founded, Pappa Tarahumara. They performed around the world, and 16 years ago, had a one-night show in San Francisco. The man who would become her husband was in the audience. She soon joined him in San Francisco, often returning to Tokyo to rehearse. But after the earthquake and tsunami hit Japan in 2011, her company disbanded. . . . Grady focused on nourishing her family and creating a line of fermented products that she sells online, at local Bay Area stores and at the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market. She began at La Cocina in 2012 and named her business after her son, Aedan. (Written in Kanji characters, the name means “wisdom” and “handed down from generation to generation.”) . . . Her fermented products are “also full of wisdom about how to relate to nature and how to create a healthy life,” she says. . . .
Shani Jones, Peaches Patties
Shani Jones is a native San Franciscan. Her father was born in New Orleans, her mother, in Jamaica. She says their home was always filled with a variety of spices and dishes like jerk chicken and Jamaican patties—savory pastries filled with beef or chicken. Jones says she learned to cook from her mother, whose nickname was Peaches. After returning from college in Atlanta, Jones worked on her doctorate in organizational leadership and management while driving a Lyft5 car. She often told passengers about her idea of opening a catering company with her mom’s recipes. They steered her to La Cocina, where she developed her own business, named after her mother. Five years later, she caters and runs a kiosk6 at a small food cooperative in Bernal Heights, where some of her handmade patties have an Ethiopian twist, “because my husband is Ethiopian.” Jones has big aspirations for Peaches Patties: “The ultimate goal,” she says, “is to be the patty kingpin7 of the West Coast.”
From “The Food Business Incubator That Helps Immigrant Women Pursue The American Dream” by Mandalit Del Barco from WEEKEND EDITION SUNDAY, June 19, 2019. Copyright © 2019 NPR.
QUALIFICATIONS FOR LA COCINA APPLICANTS
| Level of Income | La Cocina considers assets and access to opportunity when screening applicants. La Cocina’s mission is to support entrepreneurs who face barriers to becoming successful in the food industry. Applicants must be classified as low- or very-low-income earners according to the Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Guidelines for San Francisco. |
|---|---|
| Business Plan | Applicants must have a business plan that is ready to be put into action. La Cocina will help applicants refine an existing business plan. Applicants without a business plan should contact one of La Cocina’s partner organizations for guidance in developing one. |
| Viable Product | The applicant’s food must not only be delicious but also stand out. For a business to make a profit, there also has to be a market for the food. |
| Entrepreneurial Work Ethic | La Cocina is excited to work with entrepreneurs who are motivated and passionate about growing their business. Succeeding in the food industry requires a lot of heart and hard work. |
| Community Spirit | The 30+ entrepreneurs who share La Cocina’s kitchen are from many different backgrounds. La Cocina values the community it has created and expects each entrepreneur to be active in bringing the spirit of La Cocina to the wider world. In order to succeed in the La Cocina kitchen, accepted applicants must be flexible and willing to work closely with others. |
Source: La Cocina
1business incubator: company that helps new and startup companies develop by providing services such as management training and office space
2James Beard awards: an award named after American cook and author James Beard, considered one of the highest honors in the culinary industry
3economic development organizations: organizations whose mission is to promote economic improvement within a specific geographical area
4NPR: National Public Radio, a nonprofit media organization that produces and distributes news and cultural programming
5Lyft: ride-sharing company where people use their own cars to provide rides to customers
6kiosk: cart or small structure with one or more open sides that is used to vend merchandise or services
7kingpin: the leader in a group or undertaking
Question
The description of Mariko Grady’s background in paragraph 9 contributes to a central idea in the excerpt by
- Ademonstrating what people are looking for when they come to La Cocina.
- Bexplaining why La Cocina is the best option for people starting out in the food business.
- Cshowing how La Cocina can help people find success in the food business even though they have a background in something different.
- Dconfirming that La Cocina was originally established for small business owners who are looking to expand their services.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks how the description of Mariko Grady’s background in paragraph 9 contributes to a central idea in the excerpt.
A. Incorrect. The paragraph about Mariko Grady describes her earlier success in the field of theatrical dance and how she later started her own small cooking business. It does not describe what she was looking for when she came to La Cocina.
B. Incorrect. The excerpt does not argue that La Cocina is the best option for people starting out in the food business, and the description in paragraph 9 does not support that idea.
C. CORRECT. The detailed background story of Mariko Grady describes that Grady started a small food business after working as “a singer and dancer with the prestigious modern theatrical dance group she founded” and then, after that ended, created a fermented food product line. This information contributes to a central idea in the excerpt that many of the people working with La Cocina, like Grady, “needed an affordable commercial kitchen space and technical assistance in order for their businesses to be legally viable. La Cocina provided just such a space, in addition to helping them develop business plans, pull city permits and more” (paragraph 4).
D. Incorrect. While Mariko Grady is now a food business owner that La Cocina has helped since 2012, Grady’s story does more to illustrate how people from non-business backgrounds can receive special support from La Cocina in order to do more with their business.
Question analysis
This central-idea question turns to paragraph 9 of the La Cocina article, the profile of Mariko Grady, who makes miso, koji and other fermented foods for her company, Aedan Fermented Foods. It asks how the description of her background contributes to a central idea of the excerpt, so students must sum up a long life story and decide what it illustrates about the incubator.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Connecting one person’s story to a central idea is regular grade 7 reading work. Paragraph 9 is long and packed with names, places and Japanese food words, but the four choices differ clearly once the story is summed up.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- A lot to read moderate
- Reading between the lines minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 10, 1057 words; question and choices: about grade 11, 85 words.
- Students, last 30 days
- Not enough answers yet to show (it takes 10).
Why it is hard, traps and wrong answers (shows the answer)
Why it is hard
Grady’s profile is a life story, and the question asks what it shows about La Cocina, which the paragraph mentions only at its start and in one dated sentence. Students who sum it up as a dancer turned food maker find the answer quickly. Those who skim may pick a choice that sounds like a fair lesson about the program, such as what newcomers seek or why it was founded, without checking that the paragraph shows it.
A lot to read moderate Understanding the question
Paragraph 9 runs about 215 words and packs in miso, koji and amasake, a 30-year stage career, a husband met at a show, the 2011 tsunami and the meaning of “Aedan,” so its point must be sifted from many facts. (Kintsch, 1998; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Reading between the lines minor Working it out
The paragraph never says that La Cocina helped someone from another field succeed; students must set Grady’s career as “a singer and dancer” beside the business she built after joining in 2012 and draw that conclusion. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Sum up paragraph 9 in a sentence of your own, then test each choice twice: does Grady’s story actually show it, and does the rest of the excerpt treat it as a central idea?
Traps
- Too broad or too strong: A choice overstates, generalizes, or uses absolute words the text does not support.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
The wrong answers, classified
A Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Assumes that a profile of one member reveals what everyone hopes to find at La Cocina, but paragraph 9 tells Grady’s past and her products, never what she was seeking when she joined.
B Too broad or too strong (King et al., 2004)
Inflates one success story into a ranking, though the excerpt never compares La Cocina with any other path into the food business, so “the best option” goes beyond it.
D Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Echoes paragraph 1’s help for small businesses but makes Grady’s story proof of La Cocina’s founding purpose, though paragraph 4 traces it to home cooks and street vendors who needed kitchen space.
Working it out, step by step
Decide what to look for
Paragraph 9 tells the life story of Mariko Grady. You need to decide what her story adds to a central idea, a big idea of the whole excerpt. First, sum up her story in one sentence. Then see what it shows about La Cocina.
Pick out the key facts
Paragraph 9 is long, so look for the main facts. In Japan, Grady had “a 30-year career as a singer and dancer.” After the 2011 earthquake and tsunami, her dance company broke up. Then she began making fermented foods, like miso. These foods are left to change slowly, with help from tiny living things. “She began at La Cocina in 2012.” Now she sells her products “online, at local Bay Area stores and at the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market.”
Sum up her story
Here is her story in one sentence: Grady was a singer and dancer for 30 years, then built a food business with La Cocina’s help. Food was not her first career. Yet she now sells a whole line of products. Her story is one example of a central idea: La Cocina helps people grow food businesses.
Check each choice
- A is wrong. The paragraph never says what Grady hoped to find when she joined.
- B is wrong. The excerpt never compares La Cocina with other programs, so it can’t call it “the best option.”
- C is right. Grady came from dance, a very different field, and she found success in food.
- D is wrong. Paragraph 4 explains how La Cocina began: groups found home cooks and street sellers who needed a kitchen. Grady’s story says nothing about that start.
Watch out: A sounds like a fair lesson. But check that the paragraph actually shows it, and this one does not.
Choose the answer
Grady’s story shows someone from a whole different career succeeding in food with La Cocina behind her. So the answer is C.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the closest wrong answer, because one member’s story can seem to show what all members want. But paragraph 9 tells Grady’s past and her products, not her hopes. C matches what the paragraph does show: a dancer who built a food business.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from “The Food Business Incubator”” as printed (pages 158–160)
