Catering with a Cause

An immigrant-founded Dallas organization empowers refugee women through food

- NATHAN LINDSTROM

WHEN JIN-YA HUANG was 13 years old, she and her family immigrated to Oklahoma from Taiwan to help their relatives launch W a franchise of Chinese restaurants across the Southwest. Eventually, Huang's parents opened their own in Dallas, where she watched her mother, Margaret Mei-Ying, run the kitchen. "She wanted all people to have access to success," recalls Huang. "She was hiring refugees and immigrants, training them, and then sending them on to bigger and better opportunities."