Just a few weeks after feeding hungry Houstonians pasta and red sauce, José Andrés has moved on to the hurricane-recovery efforts in a much more forgotten corner of America. He arrived in Puerto Rico midday yesterday, and according to his Twitter feed, he started sourcing ingredients for meals (like some free chicken he scored from Perdue) before his flight even took off.
Seven hours later, he was in the kitchen at Puerto Rico’s biggest indoor arena ready to cook:
A farmer in the southeast tells the New York Times that, in Maria’s wake, there is “no food” and “no more agriculture.” Between Andrés’s hurricane-relief efforts and aid in the Mexican earthquakes’ aftermath, acting as a first responder has essentially overtaken his restaurateur day job. He’s been in the U.S. territory scarcely a day, but has already used Twitter to secure one restaurant a bread delivery in 30 minutes, and to search for a missing 86-year-old man:
The work is nabbing him plenty of thank-yous online, too. By now, he’s got hundreds of tweets (“You’re a true humanitarian,” “While leaders aren’t leading, citizens can count on true leaders like you,” “You are one heck of an American!”) from people frustrated by President Trump’s (mis)handling of Hurricane Maria.
