Liberator In Action: Ellisa Alvarez
During the October 2025 government shutdown, families dependent of food assistance in Long Beach, CA, began to panic. Ellisa Alvarez decided to do something to calm their fears: cook meals for anyone who needed one.
She put a message on Facebook telling people to reach out if they were struggling, promising a meal that was “guilt free. Stress free. Made with love.” She thought maybe a few people would respond. Instead, hundreds did.
What started in her tiny apartment kitchen a few months ago has now grown into the Long Beach Food Coalition, a nonprofit that feeds about 100 people each week and hopes to grow even larger.
Alvarez, a former chef and current acupuncturist, has learned to make meals out of whatever donations come through the door. “It’s like, ‘Okay, we have a can of sardines, six pounds of rice, 12 pounds of pinto beans and an egg. What are we gonna make this week?’” she said.
Even after burning out nearly every appliance she owned, she kept going. Now, more volunteers have stepped in to help cook and deliver meals, and a local church has opened up its kitchen so the group can feed even more people each week.
What makes Alvarez’s work so powerful is the way she refuses to judge people who need help. There’s no paperwork, no proving you’re poor enough, no shame attached to asking for food. “You could be driving a Mercedes and lost your job this morning,” she said. “I don’t care. If you need a meal, we’re gonna give you a meal.”
And she’s thinking beyond just the next meal, too. Alvarez hopes the kitchen can eventually become a place where young people learn how to cook while serving their community alongside neighbors who care. Her goal is simple: make sure people eat and remind them that somebody in their community cares that they do.
Ellisa Alvarez shows us what it means to liberate others. Instead of closing her heart and looking the other way, she empathized with her neighbors, understood their concerns, and took a leap of faith to resolve their needs by taking matters into her own hands.
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