February 2012
Volume 51, Issue No. 1
Inside Sean Mandel plants a seed on Colfax
We’ve Got To Get Ourselves Back To The Garden How a woman named Raw changed her diet, became a chef and moved in at 35th and Albion
pg. 6
By Erin Vanderberg Editor
GPHN Photo/Erin Vanderberg
GPHN remembers Linda Elliott pg. 15
Contributed Photo/denvergreenstreets.com
Aleece Raw started her journey toward owning a restaurant three years ago. Before her sister Shelly was diagnosed with stage III ovarian cancer, Aleece, an internet marketer, ate whatever was easy – namely, food from a box – and never thought twice about it. After Shelly was diagnosed, Aleece realized that she was the only woman in three generations of her family to be cancer-free, and she started researching what she could do immediately to decrease her risks. Now Aleece, three years a vegan, a graduate from Bauman College’s Natural Chef program and former intern
at Kate’s on 35th, and her family are poised to open The Garden this month for weekend brunch service. The Garden’s menu, vegetablebased as it is, will reflect what’s fresh and locally available. These days, it features items like pureed sweet potato soup and spinach, navy bean salad. Currently, Aleece and her nephew Jake Courington, Shelly’s son, are the only full-time employees at the restaurant. But they have a lot of help. Aleece’s sister Debbi Stephens, a fiveyear breast cancer survivor, is The Garden’s COO. Their mother Carol Carleton, a Hodgkin’s lymphoma survivor, is the CFO. Owen, Aleece’s step-dad, and
See The Garden pg. 7
The Education of Ami Desai An entrepreneurial educator becomes an entrepreneur redefining work By Erin Vanderberg Editor Contributed Photo/Family of Linda Elliott
Robbie Bean receives Trailblazer Award pg.15
Contributed Photo/Joanne Davidson, Denver Post
At home in her beautiful Park Hill bungalow, meditation deck out back, it’s clear that Ami Desai has it together. A known powerhouse in the Denver education community and now author, Ami sat down to talk with me about her new book, her recent world travels and how she became exactly what she wanted to be since she was four-years-old. Until mid-2010, Ami was the Head of the Denver Venture School in Five Points. When her school merged with Envision Leadership Prep and became Venture Prep on the Smiley campus here in Park Hill, Ami – the entrepreneurial educator – became an entrepreneur herself by opening her own educational consulting business, Ami Desai and Associates, LLC. As a result, the woman who used to wake up at 4 a.m., go to the gym before school, not come home
again until around 8 p.m., eat a litMalaysia, Sri Lanka, Bali, Lomtle dinner and work until bedtime, bok, Indonesia, Thailand and Brazil is now setting her own schedule. are the places she visited from 2010Because she can work 11. from anywhere, and Ami was born in because educational Vadodara, India. Her consulting work is doctor dad moved everywhere, she deher family to suburcided to use this new ban Detroit when freedom and flexibilshe was just a toddler. ity to tap back into When asked what she traveling. wanted to be when “I redefined what she grew up, almost work looked like for since she could talk GPHN Photo/E. Vanderberg myself,” said Desai. the answer was a Ami Desai at “I could be in these “first grade teacher.” home in Park Hill. beautiful and amazBecause the moding countries, workels in her family were ing here and there, and it didn’t all doctors, she nearly strayed off the feel like work – it was tons of fun educator course and went into psylearning about new cultures. I pur- chology, but for an educational psyposely went to no place I’d ever been chology class that just clicked. Her before, to expand my vision and first job out of college was doing exmindset about people and cultures actly what she had said she would: and happiness and life and what teaching first grade. defines us as who we are as human See She’s Going pg. 9 beings.”