Feeding a Need

COVID-19 KEPT CUSTOMERS OUT OF TRI-C’S ALERE RESTAURANT THIS FALL, SO CULINARY STUDENTS COOKED FOR THE COMMUNITY INSTEAD

Cuyahoga Community College’s student-run restaurant found new clientele at the St. Malachi Parish hunger center after the COVID-19 outbreak closed its reservation book.

Delicious dishes cooked in the Alere kitchen as part of an advanced culinary class were boxed and taken to St. Malachi’s Back Door Ministry during fall semester. Twenty to 25 meals were dropped off every Wednesday and Thursday.

“Serving others is what we teach,” said Deanna Manners, an assistant culinary professor at the College. “With these meals, we took that lesson to another level and helped our community.”

Alere offers students a restaurant experience from the stovetop to seating and serving patrons. The 12-table eatery usually caters to diners four days a week at Tri-C’s Jerry Sue Thornton Center on East 22nd Street.

COVID-19, however, closed the restaurant to the public for fall semester. That forced imaginative adjustments for the two classes — kitchen operations and dining room operations — that staff Alere.

STORY BY John Horton

Paper cutouts of people replaced diners in seats and were served beautifully plated meals prepared and presented by students. Chefs visited the tables, too, offering vivid descriptions of the dishes they made.

“We tried to replicate things as best we could,” Manners said.

The only problem? The paper people didn’t have much of an appetite. So the plated dishes quickly returned to the kitchen, where they were packaged for delivery to St. Malachi’s Back Door Ministry.

Tri-C culinary student Bre’Anna Page said cooking for those at the shelter fed her soul.

“Reaching out to others is important,” said the Euclid resident, who expects to graduate from the College in May. “It’s a good feeling to know the dishes we’re making are going to people who really need them.”