“Almost all problems can be solved in the kitchen. And the others? Maybe with a smile.” This sentence, which she has placed at the top of her website, sets the tone. Justine Piluso is a luminous, bubbling chef who embodies the future of accessible, conscious and supportive cuisine. After opening “Le Cappiello” with her husband, they decided, in the midst of their success, to close the restaurant and embark on new adventures. Justine came to public attention on the TV show Top Chef. While she remains on TV as a host, she also becomes a consultant chef, helping restaurateurs create their new restaurant offerings. She is also a nomadic chef, putting down her suitcases and pans in new places, or for events. Above all, she’s a chef for everyone. Her credo: to get us cooking again, to promote inclusive cuisine open to everyone. This is why she works with theassociation Ernestassociation, which distributes fresh produce to people in precarious situations, or as a jury for the call for innovative projects under the Génération Equitable program , in partnership with the NGO Max Havelaar .
Association
Ernest
Ernest is named after Hemingway, the favorite writer of chef Eva Jaurena, who founded the association in 2015. Little Ernest has grown up a lot since then, and hasn’t stopped weaving a unique link between solidarity and gastronomy. Starting with the “pourmanger” initiative, a few centimes that round off the bill at over 200 partner restaurants in Paris and Bordeaux. The money raised finances local food aid programs, such as the weekly distribution of organic vegetable baskets to families in precarious situations. But the virtuous circle doesn’t stop there, since the contents of the baskets come from a solidarity garden in Sevran, which helps people with social and professional difficulties find employment. A kind of short-circuit food aid. “You don’t have to go very far to find people who are destitute and precarious. What better way to prove it than by imposing borders? “(Eva Jaurena)
During the Covid crisis in 2020/2021, the association and its partners prepared and distributed over 80,000 meals for the most destitute, and Ernest has since opened a third-place restaurant called “Le Sample” at Porte de Bagnolet. Operating on a chef-in-residence basis, the solidarity restaurant is designed as a place for meeting and sharing, based on the association’s values, and, like the events, helps to finance donations.
In addition to distributing the baskets, the Ernest association organizes cooking workshops in each social center, led by a chef from its network. The Restaurer program, meanwhile, brings together volunteer and professional cooks to prepare a tasty meal for a food distribution association.
