Edwins’ Chrostowski’s latest travels? A little-known hot spot in Africa – cleveland.com

Brandon Chrostowski’s latest trip is to the tiny nation of Djibouti in eastern Africa. This photo shows a 12-year-old Yemeni girl outside her family’s tent in Obock, Djibouti. It was taken in 2015, but the region continues to be a transient haven for refugees. Chrostowski plans to travel to Obock next month to feed refugees.Associated Press
CLEVELAND, Ohio – Brandon Chrostowski cannot sit still. He has to be cooking, or helping. The workers at Edwins Leadership & Restaurant Institute carry that dual mission every day, and next week the Cleveland restaurateur will cook for refugees – overseas, in a tiny, little-known area ravaged with the problems of nearby nations.
Chrostowski is set to leave Friday, Feb. 2, for a nine-day trip to the eastern African nation of Djibouti, which has become a bridge for fleeing refugees seeking survival.
“I wanted to do something bigger than here in Cleveland,” he said.
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“It’s messed up. When I got back from Israel, the Middle East started to unravel. It may have already been unraveled, but the things that were coming to light were unique. The conflict with Yemen, which has been going on for years, has been amped up. It’s distressed.
“The crossroads is Djibouti.”
The nation is a path between Yemen and Africa, and the area is filled with thousands of homeless people because of civil-war fighting.
“And now it’s really gotten crazy with the cargo, the vessels coming through the Red Sea,” he said. “And you have people fleeing Ethiopia to get away from their problems.”
Djibouti’s roots go back hundreds of years, but its independence was not established until 1977. It’s slightly smaller than New Jersey, but the country of about 976,000 is on the front line to the problems of neighboring nations. The Red Sea and Gulf of Aden meet on the shores of Djibouti, which sits between Eritrea and Somalia. Its ports, which handle 95% of Ethiopia’s trade, offer strategic points for shipments between Europe, the Middle East and Asia. Complicating factors include the recent attacks on American-flagged ships from Yemen’s Houthi rebels.
When Chrostowski wants to go abroad, he kicks things in motion as quickly and efficiently as he can. He reached out to an Al Jazeera staffer, who connected him with someone in the region. He plans to meet with a government official and someone who helps coordinates refugees. After spending one day in the capital city of Djibouti, Chrostowski will head about four hours up the coastline to the small port city of Obock.
“There’s nothing up there, so whatever we bring, we have,” he said. “That’s where I’ll begin to cook, serve Yemeni refugees and the like.”
Some people have warned him about the trip, saying: “What are you thinking?”
“I’ll be honest, it kind of drives me to do it more,” said Chrostowski, who said he has been following the conflicts in the region for a while. “Humanity has no color or race or gender. Humanity’s humanity. This has got to be ground zero for humanity. It’s war-torn. And people need to hear about it, because you don’t just hear about this.”
It’s far from his first foray into problem areas where marginalized people are going hungry. He has fed people in Ukraine, Poland and Israel. But this trek, into what he calls “a glorified village,” feels different. Unlike his other trips, this is more or less a solo venture. One guide who knows the area will be with him, but there won’t be a big entourage. The visa process has been a bit bureaucratic, and in addition to the dangers he has to be wary of Yellow Fever.
For his trips abroad, Chrostowski will reach out to both sides of the political aisle for guidance. In the past, former Sen. Rob Portman has been a huge help, he has said, and for this one, both U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown and U.S. Rep. Marcy Kaptur paved the way.
Chrostowski is squeezing in the trip between restaurant deadlines for dinners, special events, paczki preparation, a fish fry, Valentine’s Day, Easter planning and more. But he feels this is a priority.
“This is the right time and it is the right place,” he said.
Chrostowski has always said any attention or honors he or his restaurant receive are not important to him but imperative to further the mission of Edwins, which hires and trains recently incarcerated individuals to work in the fine-dining French restaurant in Shaker Square. That’s a mission he has expanded over the 11 years the restaurant has been in business, from his training program in prisons to expanding food options in Cleveland’s Buckeye neighborhood and more.
“There’s impact that could be made,” he said, “and we’ll use our visibility to do it.”
I am on cleveland.com’s life and culture team and cover food, beer, wine and sports-related topics. For my recent stories, here’s a directory on cleveland.com. Bill Wills of WTAM-1100 and I talk food and drink usually at 8:20 a.m. Thursdays. Twitter: @mbona30. My latest book, co-authored with Dan Murphy, is “Joe Thomas: Not Your Average Joe” by Gray & Co.
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