Meet the Founders
Quandisha German- Ellis
Quandisha is a Culinary Curator and wellness advocate, focusing on food as healing. She is the Founder of Breathe Cafe, where she strives to bring healing back to community and relationship building through food as a praxis.
Quandisha was born in Harlem, NY and raised in Kinston, NC. While she has strong New York City roots, she’s a country girl at heart. She channels most of that love through her comfort dishes and savory sauces.
Quandisha graduated from North Carolina A&T State University with a BA in Sociology with a focus in Child Development. She received her Masters of Social Work at Hunter College. She completed her certification in Holistic Nutrition at AFPA (American Fitness Professionals Association).
Quandisha has always had a deep love and passion for food. She’s always found a way to express herself through cooking. She attributes her skills and creativity to her mother and grandmother. Her style of cooking is deeply rooted in her being a Black woman, interwoven with pieces of southern Caribbean culture which influenced her culinary technique infused with bold spices, rich sauces, fresh veggies +herbs, gourmet meals and hood classics.
Ashley Ellis
Born and raised on the West Side of Chicago, Ashley Ellis is a daughter, sister, lover, auntie, mentor, and sista friend to many! She has a mission to be a conduit of healing and transformation with young people. She is a restorative justice practitioner and trainer.Ashely Ellis is the co Founder of Breathe Cafe and the Founder and Co-Keeper for The Breathe Collective.
Ashley has attained her Master of Arts in Urban Youth Ministry at New York Theological Seminary in May 2017. Using a womanist integral spirit centered approach and pedagogy, along with circles, she strives to create holistic spaces that communicate a message of Love, Connectedness, Hope, Faith, Restoration and Transformation with the goal of bringing healing to not only our youth, but to our communities locally and globally in a profoundly dope way!
Ashley brings her West Side of Chicago flavor and charismatic energy to Breathe Cafe. She takes the lead in branding, marketing and coming up with delicious and decadent creations like our “Soulpanadas” Ashley makes sure systems are created so that operation is seamless and efficient. She ensures the quality and value of our products and service.
Our Story
The BREATHE Collective creates safe space for Black Girls and Women to Balance, Restore, Empower, Affirm, Transform, Heal, Embody love in a community that nourishes the whole self. Through restorative and healing justice practices peacemaking circles, as proactive relational strategy, and holistic nutrition as a pathway to self recovery. We transform and heal ourselves as we transform and heal the world around us.
Breathe Cafe was created due to a demand for fresh, nutritious, and delicious food options in the South Bronx. Breathe Cafe was founded in August 2017. While hosting The Breathe Collective circles, we would often have conversations about healing ourselves and it was important for us to be more mindful of what we were eating. Quandisha always had a love for both cooking and food, so naturally she began to cook for the Circles. We would often have colleagues from other programs join our circles and pretty soon the word began to spread. Breathe Cafe quickly morphed into a full catering business. We started to get requests from community/youth programs, schools, universities, etc to cater their events and meetings. Breathe Cafe was able to use some of the profits help fund programming at The Breathe Collective and created employment opportunities for youth in community.
“If I eat, you eat!
If I got cookies,
you got cookies!
-The Breathe Collective Proverb