Get Behind a Trainee

The House of Welcome Catering Social Enterprise (HW Catering) emerged from humble beginnings. What started as cooking demonstration classes at schools has grown into a thriving business, complete with an onsite commercial kitchen that opened in 2021.

This fantastic new kitchen allows us to offer more formalised training opportunities to people seeking asylum and refugees participating in our program. We are grateful for the assistance we received to help build this dedicated space for our enterprise, including major support from Cumberland Council and City of Parramatta.

HW Catering’s model gives trainees access to professional guidance, recognised industry courses and English language classes, so that they graduate from the program with the foundational knowledge they need to work in a commercial kitchen.

Trainees are offered the opportunity to enrol in a Certificate III in Hospitality at TAFE and complete a practical work placement with HW Catering. Supervised by our Head Chef, our TAFE trainees spend a minimum of 108 paid hours in our commercial kitchen, where they receive ongoing mentoring while gaining the practical skills required to graduate.

Other trainees are offered the opportunity to complete a Food Handling Certificate Course (Level 1) and work with our Head Chef to gain basic kitchen hand skills, while they evaluate which career pathway to pursue. These trainees spend 390 paid hours in our commercial kitchen.

In conjunction with the other services provided by House of Welcome, HW Catering tailors its support to the individual, so that each client can determine their future while benefiting paid work experience and ongoing professional mentoring.

We invite you to get involved in this program and open more opportunities for more trainees to join our program.