The Enslaved Woman Who Started A Thriving Catering Business To Get Free

food service personnel at work
Briona Lamback
March 8, 2022

As an enslaved servant, Duchess "Charity" Quamino cooked for the Channing family of Rhode Island. But she wasn't just going through the motions – she was honing her culinary skills and strategizing for a new world.

With regular access to a kitchen, Quamino started a catering business – right under her enslavers’ noses!

Her specialty was a frosted plum cake that patrons could NOT get enough of. But she was plotting on something much bigger than baking cakes.

Her freedom! Quamino saved as much profit as she could from every order, and baked herself to liberation! Eventually known as the “Pastry Queen,” she made enough to buy her and her children's freedom – a truly sweet victory!

Quamino used creative survival techniques to free herself and her family from enslavement. Today, many of us are still working and living under the thumb of white supremacy. The more we can determine what our futures look like, the better off we are. We just have to figure out what we an do do with what we have!

Like Quamino, we have to lean into our talents and find ways to create our own realities. Whether it's entrepreneurship or a community passion project, anything that helps us sever ties with white supremacy is worth pursuing to help us get closer to true Black liberation!

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