Providing Meals for Safe Harbor Shelter
September 21, 2018
Dear Meeting friends,
Last spring I raised a question at our Pastoral Care meeting about whether our Meeting would be interested in an outreach activity providing a meal once a month to Safe Harbor (SH), the homeless shelter located in West Chester. We discussed this topic again at our September meeting and I proposed to send out the details to all of you to assess whether we have enough interest to move forward. Here are the details of what would be required:
What: A complete meal for 18-25 Safe Harbor male residents. Examples of complete meals:
- Chicken & Noodle Casserole, Salad + dressings, Bread (Desserts are optional, as SH often receives ample donations from grocery stores.)
- Chili, Salad + dressings, Cornbread
Optional – We can both provide the meal and serve it, if there is enough interest. At least 2 and up to 3 people are needed to serve.
When: the 2nd Friday of each month, beginning Nov., 9, 2018. Food needs to arrive by 5:30 p.m. that day. If we provide servers, they need to arrive by 5:30 and work until about 7:15.
Where: Safe Harbor of Chester County, 20 N. Matlack St., West Chester. Foods need to be cooked off-site (our homes.) Foods need to be delivered to Safe Harbor directly or to Meeting friends willing to transport them there. Meals may not be cooked at SH, although they may be warmed on their stove top or ovens.
How: I am glad to co-ordinate the cooking, deliveries, and servers, if we have them. I’m thinking the following steps would be involved each month:
- decide on a menu (suggestions welcome)
- divide the menu among willing cooks (e.g., 3 or 4 people each make the same chili recipe; 1 or 2 make cornbread; 1 or 2 provide salad fixings)
- designate how food will be collected/delivered
- Optional: determine 2-3 people to serve the meal
- cook/deliver/and possibly serve the meal
If there are enough Meeting friends willing to serve the meal, Joe and I are happy to train servers in the routines used at SH. (It’s pretty simple; caps or hairnets required.)
To determine if this is feasible, I’ll need to hear from those interested by September 30, as Joe and I will be away most of October. If you are interested, please email me with the following information:
-
if you are willing to help cook meals
-
if you are willing to be a server
-
how often you are willing to do either of the above (i.e., once/mo., once/every other mo.,4x/year)
After September 30, I will send another email with information about what I’ve heard from all of you and whether we have enough interest to move forward.
Thank you!
In friendship,
Barbara