CityView Magazine

CityViewNC.com | 25 Culinary Incubator Coming to downtown Fayetteville By sara COOKE T hey've been popping up around the country and now Fayetteville is pre- paring to welcome one of its own. e Center for Economic Empowerment and Development (CEED) has plans to turn a 14,000 square foot warehouse on Russell Street into a 24-hour facility with six kitchens, to be rented with time-shared access to anyone in the community with an interest in cooking. Suzy Hrabovsky, CEED Chief Operating Officer, is confident that the "pop-up" restaurants, (the term denotes the variety of chefs and cuisines that will make their way through the space), will contribute a much-needed flavor and culture that comes along with locally owned, non-chain restau- rants. Residents will be welcome to enjoy the assortment of chefs and bakers who will bring their own styles of cooking to the downtown kitchen. Planners are calling the forthcoming culinary incubator the "Training Station," because of its location across from the railroad tracks. It will offer four cooking kitchens. One of which will be gluten free and two baking kitchens, avail- able for rent at $25 an hour and at a discounted rate for "an- food CeeD is serving up new dishes chor" or longer-term clients. e adjacent 250-person ca- pacity event space to be used for parties and even business meetings, complete with audio-visual equipment, will be something unique to Fayetteville's facility. While the com- munity kitchen will be the first of its kind in Cumberland County, it will also be a great option for caterers working events in downtown locales even if those gatherings them- selves are held elsewhere, caterers can take advantage of the space and equipment on-site, saving money they would typically spend on shipping either food or supplies. Retail space will also be open to two clients and the close proxim- ity to the farmers market means that fresh food will always be readily available. Hrabovsky said her organization found inspiration for the concept in Durham's "e Cookery" (though the Train- ing Station will be significantly larger) and DC's "StartUp Kitchen" project, among other similar ventures. Hrabovsky and her team traveled across the state and further to check out these spaces and learn from their successes as well as their mistakes. While Hrabovsky is spearheading the pro- ject, CEED's Executive Director, Sylvia Ray, isn't shy about

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