Dawn Brooks-Rapp

Jack Foley|Herald News

TIVERTON, MA – Aspiring food business owners now have a new commercial kitchen to rent in Tiverton at the Sandywoods complex.

Dawn Brooks-Rapp, a food business owner herself, and the manager of the kitchen that recently became available for rent, said she’s had inquiries about renting the kitchen space from a variety of aspiring and current food business owners including caterers, bakers, a candy maker, and one person who is interested in starting a boxed lunch program for an area marina.

Brooks-Rapp said the commercial kitchen in the Meeting House at Sandywoods was built with idea of using it as an incubator kitchen for food business start-ups. The roomy kitchen has amenities to suit most food business needs including a commercial mixer, a grill, a six-burner gas stove, a double convection oven, a flat-top griddle and a commercial dishwasher.

Rental of the kitchen costs $20 an hour with additional fees for a cleaning deposit and a security deposit. Commercial kitchen users can also rent shelf space in an adjacent storage room and refrigerator space.

“The kitchen is perfect. It’s great for a small business,” said Brooks-Rapp, who uses the kitchen to do the prep work for her food truck — Acacia Cafe. “Our hope is that people will be interested in starting a business and they’ll join the farmers’ market here (to sell their products.) It’s a great place to try out a new product, and it’s not expensive — you don’t have to rent a brick and mortar facility. And it’s a great community event.”

Find the entire article by Linda Murphy at Herald News Life <here>