Kris Ohleth

Kris began exploring her love of locally produced food over a decade ago. She has dabbled as a hands-on baker and prep cook in a half a dozen commercial kitchens and worked on several organic vegetable farms in the region. During these experiences, Kris discovered how common the struggle was for many new entrepreneurs to find adequate professional kitchen space and connect to essential business resources and education. Ever curious and service-oriented, Kris began to investigate how she could utilize her project management talents to solve this problem for the food community she had come to know and love. She began her journey to open Garden State Kitchen in 2015. GSK became the perfect amalgamation of all she ever wanted to do by combining her passion for producing, preparing, and sharing food and her love of community. Because of her professional career as a project manager, Kris already knew how to secure and manage funding, write a business plan, hire and manage a staff, and perform marketing and bookkeeping duties. With these skills and a ready-made network that had naturally evolved from her culinary and farm work in the community, Kris has been able to connect the dots between the logistics, people, and organizations needed to bring Garden State Kitchen to life.