They say that generosity starts at home, and that’s certainly the case for Ravi Prasad and his wife, Della, who opened up their living room to create a 16-seat café that provides hospitality training to asylum seekers and refugees.
Prasad wants to give newly arrived Australians an idea of what it’s like to run a hospitality business, so at Parliament on King you may find them behind the coffee machine, in the kitchen behind the pans, or behind a calculator balancing the books.
The food is homely – toasties made with Bread and Butter Project bread, homemade cakes and slices. Settle in with a cup of tea and enjoy the eclectic, if tiny, space.
The café also hosts ‘local family’ dinners, where refugees are given the chance to showcase dishes from their home countries for the local community, and earn some money in the process. Prasad has extended this idea into a social enterprise catering initiative for private and corporate events.
This place might be small in stature, but it’s big in heart.