December 2019 | SMITHSONIAN.COM 63have organizations led by cooks
the same way we had rebuilding
organizations led by architects
or health organizations led by
doctors,” Andrés said. That year,
using $50,000 in prize money
from the Vilcek Foundation,
which raises awareness of immi-
grant contributions in America,
Andrés founded World Central
Kitchen “for cooks like me who
want to join forces and feed peo-
ple in moments of chaos .”
It was Andrés’ intervention in
Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria in 2017 that made WCK fa-
mous. The island was without power and without fuel when
Andrés arrived on one of the fi rst fl ights following the storm;
immediately he connected with a network of chefs and purvey-
ors. “These things I had been thinking through and developing
in my brain, we knew we could do,” he said in an interview. “And
we did. We went all in.” In his book about the eff ort, We Fed an
Island, Andrés is matter-of-fact about how he bullied suppliers
to extend him credit for food and used the news media to pres-
sure the Federal Emergency Management Agency for support.
He and WCK mobilized chefs, schools, distributors, truck driv-
ers and more than 20,000 volunteers—and served 3.7 million
meals over nine months.BYLINESJane Black writes about food politics for the Washington
Post, the New York Times and Eating Well.
Argentina-born, Brooklyn-based Emiliano Granado
photographed José Andrés in Washington, D.C.ity project. Andrés’ goal is nothing short of a new model for
disaster relief that provides better, more nutritious food for
less money, all while investing in affl icted communities at the
time they need it most. “I get praise more than I deserve,” An-
drés told me. “Inside me is this feeling that we’ve not really
achieved anything major yet. That even where we are today, it
is only a platform for the things that may come ahead.”
Andrés has long been a student of the politics of hunger
and disaster relief. His lessons began shortly after he arrived
in Washington and volunteered at DC Central Kitchen, a non-
profi t dedicated to fi ghting hunger by training unemployed
adults to prepare meals for the homeless. Robert Egger,
founder of DC Central Kitchen, became a mentor to Andrés,
who went on to serve as the organization’s board chairman.
In 2010, Andrés was headlining a fancy food festival in the
Cayman Islands a few days after an earthquake fl attened Hai-
ti. He went there to help, and made a discovery. “We didn’t
SOCIAL
PROGRESS
José Andrés and
World Central
Kitchen
Aiding disaster
victims around
the globeCONTINUED ON PAGE 84