Food, Food, and More Food!

Second Harvest Community Kitchen: 3.5 hours

Broadmoor Food Pantry: 2.5 hours

Service Hours This Post: 6

Total Service Hours: 12.5

Anyone who knows me knows that I LOVE food. 

I love eating it. I love cooking it. I love sharing it with others. Cooking during the pandemic has really been a way for me to relax and get in touch with my Caribbean roots. I haven't been home in almost a year, and although I'm an adult - I get homesick. Cooking meals from my childhood always centers me and helps me miss home just a little bit less. I wanted to find a service opportunity here in New Orleans that would allow me to do what I'm passionate about - working with people and working with food. Second Harvest was my answer!

    Second Harvest is an organization that fights against hunger by providing food and support to over 700 community partners through their community kitchen, food distribution programs, and education. Their goal is to help families struggling with hunger in South Louisiana. This organization truly combines two things that I truly love: cooking/prep work and giving back to the community. 

Packing pasta, meatballs, and veggies for the lunch containers!
(I am the second closest to the camera)

    On Monday I volunteered at Second Harvest's Community Kitchen in Elmwood where I worked alongside others to prep thanksgiving meals and pack hundreds of daily meals to be distributed in the community. When I first arrived, I donned gloves and an apron and joined the train of people packing pasta, meatballs, vegetables, and desserts into containers to be sealed. After we had finished that task I lined baking sheets on baking sheets with chicken breasts and seasoned them with salt and pepper (see picture below) and helped the head chef load 4 ovens. While that was in the oven, the next prep task was to cut up peeled sweet potatoes. I have never seen so many sweet potatoes in my life! I think I spent the majority of the time I volunteered there dicing sweet potatoes. The kitchen was super organized and with all of the help, we were able to finish all of the prep work for the next day's meals. So many different kinds of people, from high school students to those in the reserve, all came together to make sure that this organization's vision and goals were getting accomplished. It was truly a feeling of community.

A local news station, WWL, was there capturing all of the action for the pre-holiday preparations:

               

Check out the full video that aired here.

Only some of the food donated from Winn Dixie!
So much more was in storage!

    Today I volunteered at a Second Harvest Partner site, the Broadmoor Food Pantry. This food pantry is about 5 minutes from my house, located at the Broadmoor community church. I got there and was quickly acquainted with the other volunteers and then tasked with packing bags of food that was donated by Winn Dixie for the holiday season to go along with the normal food boxes that get distributed. I was moved to a post outside, lifting all of the food boxes and bags for families out to their cars, making sure those waiting had water, and answered any questions people may have had. We made and handed out hundreds of boxes and bags of food to the community. Especially with COVID, it's more important than ever to make sure that people can get what they need. Many families rely on organizations and places like the Broadmoor Food Pantry to make ends meet. I am glad that I was able to help out today and made connections with the people here. I will definitely be returning to volunteer in the upcoming months.