The smell of pan-seared salmon topped with a creamy garlic sauce that Chef Niomi Jones placed on a bed of wild rice filled the halls of Greater Piney Grove Baptist Church in Atlanta one morning in March.
“Cooking is a way that people connect,” Jones said while chopping vegetables. “From every walk of life, every religion, we break bread and we connect with one another over food.”
Jones is the culinary director at the church, but she also owns and operates Grand Empire — a catering business she started after getting a degree in culinary arts and graduating from the Gwinnett County Public Library’s New Start Entrepreneurship Incubator program in 2022.
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