Equator Coffees Partners with Award-Winning Chef Tanya Holland to Launch California Soul Blend

MILL VALLEY, CA (JUNE 19, 2023) – Equator Coffees, the Marin-based B Corp coffee roaster known for making an impact in communities locally and at origin, has partnered with award-winning Chef, Author, and Restaurateur Tanya Holland to release Tanya Holland’s California Soul Blend. This new addition to Equator’s impact-focused Chefs Collection benefits the West Oakland based non-profit Mandela Partners, which builds community power through food, a cause near to the hearts of Chef Tanya and Equator’s Founders Helen Russell and Brooke McDonnell, alike.

“Partnering with Equator is an opportunity to work with a like-minded women-led company with integrity that represents excellence in the industry; these things have always been important to me,” said Chef Tanya Holland. “Supporting the work of Mandela Partners with this coffee is an exciting chance to support the community where my first restaurant (Brown Sugar Kitchen) got its start.”

Chef Tanya Holland joins the ranks of award-winning chefs that Equator has worked with to craft coffees in support of communities that the chefs are passionate about. The Marin-based coffee roaster has partnered with Thomas Keller, Dominique Crenn, Tyler Florence, Brandon Jew, and Susan Feniger and Mary Sue Milliken, and their chosen nonprofit organizations, such as Regarding Her (RE:Her), Cut Fruit Collective, Lyric, and Los Angeles LGBT Center. In 2022 alone, sales of the Chef Collection generated a total of $29,438 in donations for these various beneficiaries.

“We are thrilled to be partnering with Tanya in support of Mandela Partners; as female entrepreneurs in the Bay Area, uplifting, celebrating, and engaging with our community is deeply rooted in who and why we are,” said Helen Russell, Co-Founder and Executive Chair of Equator Coffees.

Mandela Partners, a non-profit organization founded in West Oakland, works in partnership with local residents, family farmers, and community-based businesses to improve health, create wealth, and build assets through local food enterprises in limited-resource communities. In 2022, as part of their impactful community programs, the organization distributed 178,000 lbs of sustainably grown produce, donated produce to 8,420 families, generated $262,000 in local economic returns through their food business incubator, E14th Eatery + Kitchen, and much more.

Tanya Holland’s California Soul Blend is built around a pair of coffees from the Kayon Mountain Estate in Southern Guji, Ethiopia, and a coffee from the Ketiara Cooperative in the Gayo Mountain region of Sumatra’s Aceh Province. This blend is fruit-forward and sweet with flavors of blackberry, pecan, and bittersweet chocolate. For more information, visit www.equatorcoffees.com and follow along on Instagram at @equatorcoffees.

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About Equator
In 1995, Equator Founders Helen Russell and Brooke McDonnell began their values-driven path, roasting coffee in a Marin County, CA garage. Possessing an obsessive commitment to green coffee sourcing and unparalleled roasting expertise, Helen and Brooke have committed over 28 years to sustainable and fair trade coffee practices all in the name of creating a remarkable coffee experience for consumers. Today, Equator Coffees is a retail and wholesale coffee roaster and coffee farm owner with ten retail cafes throughout California—from Marin County to San Francisco to Oakland and beyond. Throughout the years, Equator Coffees has spearheaded industry-leading sourcing and roasting practices, and has forged progressive partnerships with Michelin-starred chefs, specialty grocers, tech campuses, and more. Women-owned, LGBTQ-founded and an early adopter of Fair Trade certification, Equator Coffees is the first California coffee roaster to achieve B Corp Certification. equatorcoffees.com

About Tanya Holland
Tanya Holland is an award-winning Chef, Author, and Restaurateur. Acclaimed for her inventive take on modern soul food, as well as comfort classics, she is the Executive Chef/Owner of the internationally renowned and beloved Brown Sugar Kitchen restaurant, in Oakland, California. Holland is the host of “Tanya’s Kitchen Table” on OWN: Oprah Winfrey Network, served as the president of the prestigious Les Dames d’Escoffier San Francisco chapter, and authored three award-winning cookbooks, most recently Tanya Holland’s California Soul: Recipes from a Culinary Journey West. tanyaholland.com

About Mandela Partners
Founded in West Oakland in 2004, Mandela Partners is a non-profit organization established to fill a gap that was created by deeply rooted inequities – a challenging local food environment, a legacy of redlining and economic disinvestment, and barriers to good jobs and economic opportunities. Today Mandela Partners approaches these challenges with creativity, joy, and innovation, and uses food as a tool for Black communities and communities of color to build their own wealth, well-being, and opportunities. Their programs include: distributing sustainably grown fruits and vegetables for families facing food insecurity; culinary training for community members facing barriers to employment – with a focus on those returning home after incarceration; wellness education rooted in empowering individuals to redefine their health and celebrate food; and support for small farms and small food businesses owned by people of color. mandelapartners.org

For futher information visit https://www.equatorcoffees.com/products/tanya-hollands-california-soul-blend?variant=40453580423250