The end result of food bank efforts

[jibz]

Hey HWC!

As some of you know I'm working my way though college by working part time at a men's shelter and rehabilitation center in the kitchen. Given that it's the season that food drives are running and one of HWC's sponsors is accepting forum points for donations I though I'd share a little about it.

At my work which is an independent not for profit organization we get the food we serve from several sources. Our main source is the budget from money donated to the organization and campaigns like scan away hunger at grocery stores. We also receive boxes upon boxes of canned goods, non perishables, juices and seasonal donations of things like turkey's for Christmas. For the people who hate wasting food, we receive many dented cans and past date products from food service distributors as well as the day old breads, buns, cakes and sweets from local groceries.

As an example of what food drives this time of year contribute, I bring you this picture:

:shok:
Today we got a pallet from the food bank of 90 turkey's which will be distributed to our various shelter's for Christmas dinner and probably every Sunday dinner for a few weeks after that.

A little about what we serve:
My kitchen serves 3 meals a day and 2 coffee/snack breaks 7 days a week every single day of the year for an average of 120 people. Believe it or not some shelters have holidays off and don't serve meals which means we get extremely busy on stat holidays(up to 280 people).

Breakfast consists usually consists of toast and eggs or pancakes with cereal every other day, milk, juice and coffee.

Lunch has a full salad bar with tossed salad, potato salad, pasta salad, pickles, beans and various creations. Buns and butter. A main plate which varies from a sandwich to macaroni and cheese. A bowl soup. A dessert(donated imperfect cakes or day olds) and a coffee or tea.

Dinner consists of the same stuff as lunch but the main plate has a starch a meat and vegetables.

What do I do?
As a part time college student I do the easy stuff like, preping the salad bar, cutting cakes and pies for dessert. General Prep for the meals. AANNNDDDDD the fun part... Dishes. Nothing beats doing 280 people worth of dishes Christmas evening. :bleh:

If you guys want to know anything about life in a soup kitchen just ask. :thumb:

 

[b1lk1]

Nice. I spend my Thursday afternoons running a program at my church called Food For Life. We get extra/leftover foods, mostly breads and vegetables, from grocery stores and distribute it to needy families. It's a small program, we only take care of 20-25 families, but I am also in a very small town.

 

[jibz]

Nice. I spend my Thursday afternoons running a program at my church called Food For Life. We get extra/leftover foods, mostly breads and vegetables, from grocery stores and distribute it to needy families. It's a small program, we only take care of 20-25 families, but I am also in a very small town.

:thumb: good stuff. We get a ton of "day old" bread(more than we can use) so we have a pig farmer pick up our extras on sunday.

 

[chrisk]

Me and my family relied on food banks. Very thankless work but I than you guys for doing this.

 

[Soullessone21]

Jibz keep it up your doing a damn good job be proud of yourself now soul needs to find some volunteering in Calgary once he gets settled

 

[Shadowmeph]

Hey HWC!

As some of you know I'm working my way though college by working part time at a men's shelter and rehabilitation center in the kitchen. Given that it's the season that food drives are running and one of HWC's sponsors is accepting forum points for donations I though I'd share a little about it.

At my work which is an independent not for profit organization we get the food we serve from several sources. Our main source is the budget from money donated to the organization and campaigns like scan away hunger at grocery stores. We also receive boxes upon boxes of canned goods, non perishables, juices and seasonal donations of things like turkey's for Christmas. For the people who hate wasting food, we receive many dented cans and past date products from food service distributors as well as the day old breads, buns, cakes and sweets from local groceries.

As an example of what food drives this time of year contribute, I bring you this picture:

:shok:
Today we got a pallet from the food bank of 90 turkey's which will be distributed to our various shelter's for Christmas dinner and probably every Sunday dinner for a few weeks after that.

A little about what we serve:
My kitchen serves 3 meals a day and 2 coffee/snack breaks 7 days a week every single day of the year for an average of 120 people. Believe it or not some shelters have holidays off and don't serve meals which means we get extremely busy on stat holidays(up to 280 people).

Breakfast consists usually consists of toast and eggs or pancakes with cereal every other day, milk, juice and coffee.

Lunch has a full salad bar with tossed salad, potato salad, pasta salad, pickles, beans and various creations. Buns and butter. A main plate which varies from a sandwich to macaroni and cheese. A bowl soup. A dessert(donated imperfect cakes or day olds) and a coffee or tea.

Dinner consists of the same stuff as lunch but the main plate has a starch a meat and vegetables.

What do I do?
As a part time college student I do the easy stuff like, preping the salad bar, cutting cakes and pies for dessert. General Prep for the meals. AANNNDDDDD the fun part... Dishes. Nothing beats doing 280 people worth of dishes Christmas evening. :bleh:

If you guys want to know anything about life in a soup kitchen just ask. :thumb:

I volunteered ( ok was volunteered by my ex's mother) to do the xmas breakfast lunch dinner thing. man was it hard I was help prepping food 2 days before and 12hrs the day before then from 3 am in the morning until late xmas night cleaning and clearing off tables doing dishes and of course my hands are fairly big so the rubber gloves caused cramps in my hands lol. but at the end of the day I have to say that it was well worth it just to see the od smile on some of the homeless peoples faces I was sore for a long time after that from all of the bending and standing . I don't think that I would last 1 day of that now days.