Food indulgence with a social conscience

In Vienna, good food tastes even better when there is more behind the plate than culinary skill alone. Some Viennese venues pair cuisine with a clear social mission: they create jobs for people who face barriers in the labor market, bring generations together at one table, or offer people with a refugee background a new professional home.

Living and working under one roof

On Währinger Straße in the ninth district, the VinziRast restaurant “mittendrin” shows how closely living, cooking, and (re)entering the workforce can be connected. The building has been home to formerly homeless people and refugees living together with students since 2013 – on the ground floor, they run the restaurant together with volunteers and staff members. The menu features mostly vegetarian and vegan dishes shaped by the team members’ cultural roots, plus a lunch menu that changes daily. The project has already received multiple awards for its architectural and social concept, including the Urban Living Award and the ÖGUT-Umweltpreis. Architecturally, the idea of community living is reflected throughout the entire building. Green-planted arcades connect the residential units, and shared kitchens and living rooms invite people to exchange ideas and spend time together. A rooftop garden, a studio, and workshops create additional places where residents come together, work, and shape everyday life as a community.

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Team of the restaurant Vinzirast mittendrin — VinziRast mittendrin – © Vinzirast/Martin Steiger

Restaurant from inside — VinziRast mittendrin – © Katharina Kaiser

Caritas Wien takes a very similar approach with its social business division, Magdas: at the magdas Hotel on Ungargasse, people from many different nations work as hosts. In the building itself, the magdas restaurant serves breakfast, brunch, and lunch, using regional, organic, and fairly traded ingredients. The magdas restaurant is also a training site for apprentices – this is where young people with a refugee background can complete an apprenticeship in hospitality. And magdas is still growing: at the original site near Vienna’s Prater, the former hotel is currently undergoing extensive renovation. Instead of building from scratch, Caritas is focusing on reusing the existing structure, renewable energy, and upcycled materials. The magdas HotelVienna Prater is set to reopen with 103 rooms in 2027.

A new home at the stove

The social business Habibi & Hawara employs around 20 team members, most of them with a refugee or migration background, and trains them as cooks and restaurant service professionals. At lunchtime, guests can expect a buffet; in the evening, family dinner sets featuring Austrian-oriental fusion cuisine are served. In the long term, the goal is to support employees on their path to entrepreneurship and empower them to take on responsibility for running a business themselves.

Interior Shot Habibi & Hawara Restaurant

At Yppenplatz in the 16th district, the organization “Food Without Borders” (Speisen ohne Grenzen) is pursuing a similar mission. Here, people who have had to leave their home countries (such as Afghanistan, Somalia, Syria, Ethiopia, or Uganda) cook traditional dishes from their countries of origin while gaining professional and language skills. A second culinary venue is located on the Danube Canal: Food Without Borderes also has a presence on board the Badeschiff, bringing the diverse cuisines of its team members out onto the water. With its 27-meter-long pool and several decks, the Badeschiff itself is one of the city’s more unusual places to eat and meet in summer.

Multiple generations at the same table

For the past 14 years, Vollpension has been proving that even those aged 60 and older can still be in the prime of their careers. At Vollpension, “Grandmas” and “Grandpas” bake Buchteln, apple strudel, and cakes based on family recipes. The idea is to provide seniors with a source of supplemental income and, above all, to facilitate social integration, thereby helping to combat poverty and loneliness in old age. Its success has long attracted the attention of international media outlets such as CNN, BBC, and The New York Times.

Three elderly ladies behind the coffee house counter

A very different audience is at the heart of Mamas Café: in the Zwettlerhof at Stephansplatz, single mothers serve coffee and homemade pastries. The café offers them permanent employment along with hospitality training. Directly across the street, Mamas Werkstatt creates additional prospects. Here, the women make textile and upcycled products and are prepared for entering the labor market through training and individual support.

Second chance and inclusion

In the fourth district, the Kuchenamt shows what inclusion in hospitality can look like. Since March 2025, people with and without disabilities have been working here as equals in the kitchen and in service, while young people with learning difficulties are trained as restaurant service professionals. The pastries, from Esterhazy torte to vegan apple strudel, come fresh from the training restaurant “Speiseamt” in Seestadt, another inclusive operation run by wienwork.

The Inigo on Bäckerstraße takes its own approach to helping people return to the workforce. Since the early 1990s, Caritas Wien’s socio-economic enterprise has offered temporary jobs to long-term unemployed people in service, the kitchen, and cleaning. Classic Austrian cuisine meets a large vegan and vegetarian offering here, and around half of participants go on to make the leap into the mainstream labor market.