All Youth Deserve To Dream
We create opportunities for justice-involved youth through an ever-expanding network of award-winning restaurants and training programs. Youth, ages 15–19, gain industry skills and a strong support system. Restaurants alone can’t transform the juvenile justice system, but they can reshape communities and futures—one meal, one person at a time.
Learn more about our model
Our Impact
Our justice system can be very messy, especially when it comes to the way it works (or doesn’t) for young people.
Despite reforms, youth incarceration remains a critical issue in the United States, which continues to have the highest youth confinement rates among developed nations. As of the most recent data, approximately 36,500 youth under age 18 are detained in juvenile facilities on any given day, a significant decrease from prior years. However, disparities and systemic challenges persist. Around 200 children under age 12 are confined annually, and some youth are still held in adult facilities, despite reforms aimed at reducing this practice.
Our Mission
Café Momentum's mission is to transform young lives by equipping our community’s justice-involved youth with life skills, education and employment opportunities to help them achieve their full potential.
Transforming Lives
A Decade of Hope, Growth and Impact
For 10 years, Café Momentum has empowered justice-involved youth to dream big, rewrite their stories and build brighter futures. With over 1,300 lives transformed, our work proves the power of community and opportunity.
Watch Tristyn and Chad’s story and see how your support fuels the next chapter.
10 Years of Momentum: A Bold New Vision
Today marks a momentous milestone for Café Momentum: 10 years of transforming lives, breaking down stigma and proving what’s possible when we invest in opportunity for our youth.
10 Years of Cafe Momentum
Events
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January 23, 2026 | Dallas
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February 12, 2026 | Dallas
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February 22, 2026 | Dallas
In the News
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January 5, 2026 | Pittsburgh
10 reasons to get out of the house and explore in January: Pittsburgh Restaurant Week
Welcome to our first monthly event guide of 2026! Whether you’re looking for ways to squash those postholiday blues, keep your resolution to try new things or escape winter’s gloom without depleting your travel budget, we have the recommendations. Pittsburgh Restaurant Week arrives just in time for all the exhausted home chefs who are so […]
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December 18, 2025 | Dallas
Café Momentum Founder Going to the Super Bowl
We’re all coming together today at the Tam Fam table for our annual holiday potluck! 2025 James Beard Humanitarian of the Year Chad Houser shares more about his restaurant that employs formerly incarcerated youth. Plus he makes us his gingerbread pot de creme and gets a SPECIAL surprise!
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December 17, 2025 | Dallas
Tamron Hall Show: Tamron’s Holiday Potluck
We’re all coming together today at the Tam Fam table for our annual holiday potluck! Plus, more giveaways! Cookbook author and chef PALAK PATEL, who won the Food Network’s Chopped and Beat Bobby Flay, shows how to make her mushroom shepherd’s pie. Then, chef MARK STRAUSMAN, owner of Mark’s Off Madison and a New York Times Top 100 NYC restaurant, makes his mother’s […]
Our manifesto
Dreams are the ink with which we write our stories
We learn to dream the moment we take our first steps: We’re told we can go anywhere, do anything, be anyone. That we’re limited only by what we dare to imagine, and how hard we’re willing to work for it. But for some of us, there are limits. Some of us don’t get to write our own stories.
Read full manifesto
