José Andrés is as famous for his high-profile D.C. restaurants as for his efforts to serve meals to communities affected by disasters. With hundreds of thousands of people going without a paycheck in the D.C. region, those two worlds are colliding.

At 10:08 p.m. on December 21, even before the government officially shuttered at the stroke of midnight, Andrés was ready to serve, tweeting an offer of a free lunchtime meal at any of his restaurants to furloughed feds. With the closure stretching into the longest shutdown in U.S. history, the celebrity chef and humanitarian is significantly expanding his effort. Andrés announced Monday that he plans to open a kitchen to serve hot dishes and give out to-go meals through his non-profit.

“As you know, World Central Kitchen is always there to respond to any disaster, to make sure that Americans and people around the world will not go one day without a plate of food. And today we face another type of disaster emergency in the United States,” he said in a video posted to Twitter. “More than 800,000 federal workers are without a job. Many millions of Americans are going to go through hard times.” 

https://twitter.com/chefjoseandres/status/1084834780246654976

Indeed, hundreds of people attended pop-up food banks held over the weekend, in which the Capital Area Food Bank distributed fresh produce and canned items. “They’re just worried about where to get their food,” the food bank’s president and CEO, Radha Muthiah, told NPR. “We’ve had someone say ‘I’ll pay you back after I get my paycheck, but I just need [food] now.’”

Other restaurants around the city have also offered free or discounted meals. As of last week, &pizza had given out $86,000 worth of free pies.

Andrés has plenty of experience with setting up rapid-fire kitchens, though they have been in response to natural disasters rather than political stalemates. After providing meals to Haitians in the wake of the 2010 earthquake, the chef founded World Central Kitchen. The non-profit has served Americans affected by Hurricane Harvey in Houston, Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico, Camp Fire in California, along with more projects around the world. Those efforts earned Andrés a nomination for the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize.

The emergency kitchen will open on January 16 at 701 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, in a space normally used for Think Food Lab’s events and pop-ups and a location that is deliberately blocks from both the White House and the U.S. Capitol. The plan is to serve a rotating menu of hot meals, sandwiches, and salads, according to a spokesperson. They will also add take home meal kits, though they aren’t likely to be available on opening day.

“We’re going to be open for any federal family that needs food. We will have food for you to eat or food for you to take home,” he says in the video. “But also I hope it will be a call to action to our senators and congressmen and especially President Trump to make sure we end this moment in the history of America where families are about to go hungry.” 

The #ChefsForFeds cafe will be open every day from 11 a.m.-6 p.m. starting Wednesday, January 16. If you’re interested in volunteering, email chefsforfeds@wck.org.