Pride Month spotlight: Creating queer-affirming community food spaces across the country
June 26, 2026
Hilda Nouri-Sabzikar gestures as she speaks at a Queer Food Project session at our Food Summit 2026 conference in April.
2SLGBTQI+ people are often overlooked in conversations and policies about food insecurity in Canada. Yet research suggests 2SLGBTQI+ people in Canada disproportionately experience food insecurity. This makes it vital for community food organizations and programs to welcome 2SLGBTQI+ staff, volunteers, and program participants.
Enter Queer Food Project (QFP), a Right To Food initiative that brings together 2SLGBTQI+ staff from community food organizations in our partner network. QFP is a unique national initiative in Canada that is centred on the experiences of 2SLGBTQI+ people in the community food sector. Among its activities, QFP hosts regular virtual meetups where participants find solidarity, learn about queer-focused community food programs, and discuss the needs and sensitivities involved in working with 2SLGBTQI+ people. “At the end of every meeting, people are so joyful,” says Hilda Nouri-Sabzikar, who runs QFP. “They appreciate having time together with other queer people in the sector.”
Hilda also manages Mind Your Food, Right To Food’s hands-on program that promotes positive mental health in young people through food-based learning. Through Mind Your Food, Hilda sees how important it is for queer participants to find welcoming spaces in community food programs. “I often hear about queer youth showing up to Mind Your Food. Several facilitators from across the country have told me it’s a really safe space for queer youth to come to.”
QFP is mapping queer food programs around the country. By putting queer food on the map, we can share this information with others for learning, support, and inspiration. The mapping is uncovering exciting work.
This includes the work of Feed Nova Scotia. In 2025, they brought together community food organizations and 2SLGBTQI+ community members to co-create principles for designing queer-inclusive community food programs. The principles included moving beyond symbolic inclusion, and shifting from charitable models to mutual aid approaches that view people as proactive participants rather than passive recipients.
Lavender Kitchen Coordinator Amber Zaza in The Loaded Ladle’s kitchen.
“Folks who were part of that process said, ‘Maybe we can demonstrate these principles in practice through something new and collaborative together,’” recalls Sue Kelleher, Director of Community Partnerships, Innovation, and Advocacy. “That’s why Lavender Kitchen emerged.”
Lavender Kitchen is a 2SLGBTQIA+ community food program in Halifax. Funded by Feed Nova Scotia, it’s run by community organizations The Loaded Ladle and Youth Project.
Lavender Kitchen offers a wide range of activities, including drop-in community meals, and cooking sessions where participants prepare food together and distribute it to community pantries.
Amber Zaza is the Lavender Kitchen Coordinator. Their favourite Lavender Kitchen program activity so far is a recipe-sharing night. “It was to celebrate not only your own food traditions, but the food traditions you’d like to pass on as a queer person,” Amber explains.
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There’s a lot of history and culture that hasn’t been passed down to queer folks. If you’ve left your family situation due to a lack of acceptance or you left young, you wouldn’t necessarily have received those physical recipes and the skills from watching someone.
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Amber Zaza, Lavender Kitchen Coordinator
Amber is passionate about passing on food skills to her 2SLGBTQIA+ peers. “I have 10+ years working in commercial kitchens, and they aren’t traditionally safe spaces for queer folks to learn.”
Running Lavender Kitchen is Amber’s first community food role—and they’re keen to stay in the sector. “I learned plenty of skills in the for-profit sector. Now it’s time to apply them to things easier on the heart and more supportive to my community.”
To learn more about food insecurity among 2SLGBTQI+ people, read our policy primer.
