Soup Kitchen in Brookings
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Who says there’s no such thing as a free lunch? Two soup kitchens in Brookings dish up meals at noon on Mondays and Tuesdays each week that are not only free of charge, but also tasty and healthy. “We try to make sure the food is both nutritious and delicious,” said Roger Gilbert, who helped get the two soup kitchens started and volunteers as a cook for both. Lunch is served at the Seventh-Day Adventist Church, 102 Park Ave., on Mondays, and at St. Timothy’s Episcopal Church, 401 Fir St., on Tuesdays. Though both meals are housed in churches, they’re nondenominational, Gilbert said.“They have nothing to do with religion or politics,” he said. “No one is allowed to come in here to preach, or to talk politics. If they do, I ask them to leave. That’s not what we’re about. We’re here to help people,” he said. Currently, the two lunch programs combined serve about 100 meals per week, Gilbert said, but an expansion is in the works, he added. “My dream is to get enough churches involved so we can have a kitchen open every day where hungry people can get a hot, good-tasting meal,” he said. But before that can happen, he added, more community support is needed. “We always need volunteers, and donations of cash and food – fresh, frozen and canned,” Gilbert said. He said he and his partner, Ernest Madden, got the idea to start a soup kitchen five years ago, but it took them three years to get it off the ground. They opened the first one at the Seventh-Day Adventist Church in June, 2009, and the second at St. Timothy’s in the fall of that same year. The Seventh-Day soup kitchen serves vegetarian meals, while St. Timothy’s offerings almost always include meat, he said. “We’re positioning ourselves to be able to feed the entire population of the cities of Brookings and Harbor, just in case that should ever become necessary. “Every week, we’re getting more and more people coming for lunch. When the first kitchen opened, we’d get about ten people a week. Now, between the two, we’re averaging about 100 a week. “We’re expecting to double the meals we serve this year and are looking forward to serving 200 per week between both kitchens.” Contrary to what most people might think, he said the majority of those who patronize the soup kitchens are not the traditional homeless. “Every week, we’re getting more and more homeless, but they’re what I call the new homeless – middle class people who can’t keep their homes because they’ve lost their jobs. “They’re living in their cars, in RVs, in tents. “We see more of them than the traditional homeless.” But the majority of those who regularly eat lunch at the soup kitchens are not homeless at all, he said. “Our biggest group is mostly seniors. They cherish having a safe, clean place where they can eat a gourmet meal and meet with their friends,” he said. Gilbert said the two kitchens always serve a substantial, well-balanced hot meal for lunch – not just soup. “That way, if they only get to eat one meal a day, they could make it on the meal we serve,” he said. |
