COMMUNITY NEWS
Community Kitchen Feeds Over 1 Million People with State-of-the-Art Kitchen
F
eeding South Florida recently unveiled its new, state-of-the-art, 5,000-square-foot community kitchen. Although the kitchen is located in Palm Beach County, it will provide meals to nearly 1.3 million people in the four counties that Feeding South Florida serves (Palm Beach, Broward, MiamiDade, and Monroe Counties). The one-of-a-kind community kitchen is a highly anticipated community resource, with years in the making. On Sunday, July 12th, a virtual grand opening celebration took place via Zoom and Facebook Live. Viewers tuned in to view some of South Florida’s favorite chefs using their talents to showcase the kitchen’s full capacity. They prepared the very first meals in the kitchen using nutritious items regularly distributed by Feeding South Florida, converted into unique, savory, and creative dishes that appeal to the whole family. Chef Ralph Pagano of Naked Taco in Coconut Creek, and Chef Randy Fisher of CREaM in Miami hosted the event. The featured chefs were Chef Lindsay Autry of The Regional Kitchen & Public House in West Palm Beach, Chef Allen Susser of Chef Allen’s Consulting in Hollywood, and Chef Timon Balloo of Balloo Restaurant in downtown Miami. “This multi-purpose community kitchen is a vision that Feeding South Florida has had for quite some time, and we are so excited to finally present it to the community,” said Vélez. “This is just the beginning because the kitchen will serve the community by providing meals, workforce training, catering as social innovation, an incubator for community support, and family cooking classes.” The kitchen will advance Feeding South Florida’s mission of ending hunger in South Florida by serving up to 10,000 meals per day for children’s after-school and summer programs, meals for older adults, and medically tailored meals. The kitchen will also provide critical meals during disaster response. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Feeding South Florida has distributed over 40 million pounds of food (33.3 million meals) in the four counties it serves (Palm Beach, Broward, Miami-Dade and Monroe Counties) in 14 weeks a pace that translates to nearly 150 million pounds over a 12-month period. To put that in perspective, for the entire last fiscal year, Feeding South Florida distributed 62 million pounds (51.6 million meals). Feeding South Florida’s food distributions are updated daily and available at https://feedingsouthflorida.org/covid19/. To find out how you can help, learn about what Feeding South Florida is doing, safety precautions, and much more, visit https://feedingsouthflorida.org/covid19/.
12 AUGUST 2020 | OUR CITY | OURCITYMEDIA.COM
