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LakeForestLeaderDaily.com DINING OUT
the lake forest leader | December 12, 2019 | 23
Posted to LakeForestLeaderDaily.com 1 day ago
Curt’s Cafe provides opportunities for at-risk young adults
Michael Wojtychiw
Contributing Sports Editor
When Open Communities,
an organization that
promotes housing, economic
and social justice
in north suburban Chicago,
approached Susan
Trieschmann, executive
director of Curt’s Cafe,
about opening up a Highland
Park location, she
knew this was an opportunity
she couldn’t pass up.
Curt’s Cafe’s original
location is in Evanston,
where Trieschmann lives,
but she had always wanted
to open up a Lake County
location.
“We’re a mission-based
organization serving highly
at-risk young adults,”
she said. “We work with
15- to 24-year olds that
are underserved in our
communities. That’s kind
of our niche.
“We don’t want to run
restaurants. We want to
really teach young people
how to get jobs and stay in
those jobs.”
After starting in Evanston,
where a reported 95
percent of students graduate
from high school,
Treischmann wanted to
go into an area where that
number was much lower
and where Curt’s Cafe
could make a bigger impact.
Highland Park is close
to Waukegan, where she
says the graduation rate is
around 64 percent.
“That means that there’s
too many young people
walking around without
high school degrees, but
also without that structure
and without the benefits
and opportunity a
high school can bring,”
she said. “I know that if
we don’t help them find
the right path, then they
The Highland Park cafe offers avocado toast ($8) on toasted sourdough bread with
a fried egg topped with salt, pepper, micro greens and olive oil. Photos by Nick
Frazier/22nd Century Media
will find the wrong path,
because we have a lot of
gangs, or people that are
very schooled in bringing
people along a different
way. I wanted to get in
here to kind of start to turn
the corner a little bit.”
Students at Curt’s Cafe
are chosen through a rigorous
application process.
“They’re chosen or
they’re welcomed into the
program if we identify that
their needs are the highest
possible,” Treischmann
said. “If a youth is homeless,
they may not get into
our program. They’ve
dropped out of high
school, they may not get
out of our program. If they
have had high judicial contact,
they may not get into
our program. If they have
all three, they’re likely to
get into the program.”
She said there are other
organizations that deal
with homeless youth, the
judicial system and workforce
training individually,
but not one that deals
with all at once.
“We deal with all of
that.”
After not having any
students for the cafe’s first
three weeks, Curt’s Cafe
will have at least three
students. Ten is the highest
number they’ll have,
with five or six students in
the cafe at once.
When the students
graduate from the threeto-four
month program,
are all welcome to come
back to the cafe, especially
since it has social
services providers on site.
Trieschmann said students
can come back and have
three or more meals a day.
A primary reason Treischmann
started Curt’s
Cafe was the amount of
things that were unavailable
to teenagers who
needed a second chance.
“I couldn’t think about
having one more child in
jail. I just... I couldn’t do
it,” she said. “I started it
because I wanted to stop
that injustice and I wanted
to show people that if you
give these young people
what they’re looking
for, which is a job, then
CURT’S CAFE
1766 2nd Street,
Highland Park
(847) 748-8086
Curtscafe.org
8 a.m. - 4 p.m.
Monday-Friday
8 a.m. - 3 p.m.
Saturday
Closed Sundays
they’re not going to find
themselves back in the
prison system.
“We’re one of the industries
that take in a lot of
different kinds of people,
entry level. We’re an industry
that has growth potential
and it’s an industry
I know and I love, but also,
I tell the students, even if
they go into something
else, get a CDL license or
whatever, they can always
do a side hustle of a restaurant
so they can always
eat. It’s a good thing to
have in your background.”
Three of 22nd Century
Media’s editors stopped
by to try some of Curt’s
popular dishes made by
Curt’s Cafe has chicken salad stuffed tomatoes ($10) on
a bed of greens and vegetables.
The triple-decker cookie has Oreo crumbs sandwiched
between a brownie bottom layer and a cookie on top.
chef Byron Gonzalez.
The first dish was one
of the cafe’s most popular
dishes, the avocado toast
($8), which is toasted
sliced sourdough bread
with mashed avocado and
fried egg topped with salt,
pepper, micro greens and
drizzled with olive oil.
The dish, like all of the
breakfast dishes, is served
all day with a side of fruit.
You can also add bacon
for an additional $2.
Next, we tried a tomato
stuffed with either chicken
or tuna salad ($10). The
tuna salad (tuna, onions,
celery, capres and mayo)
or chicken salad (chicken,
onions, celery, grapes and
mayo) is stuffed in a tomato
on a bed of greens.
The tuna melt ($10) is on
the menu as one of the chef
signature sandwiches and
wraps and is served with
a pickle and your choice
of chips, fruit, small salad
or soup. The tuna melt
is served on a wheat roll
topped with avocado and
cheddar cheese. Gonzalez
says it gives a little bit of
everything to customers.
We also had a bevy of
delicious desserts, including
the cinnamon chocolate
chip scone, triple
decker cookie, which has
a bottom layer brownie,
oreo crumbs in middle
and topped with a cookie),
chocolate chip cookie and
brownie.