Want to feel better about yourself and the human race? Volunteer to cook at Community Servings. Like most food-centric Bostonians, I thought I knew all about the organization. It’s that food charity that has all the cool fundraisers, right? Something about home delivery of meals for critically ill people who can’t cook for themselves or their families? After a recent tour of the new allgreen Community Servings commissary in Jamaica Plain, my eyes popped. What began as a modest meals-on-wheels program for families and caregivers who are homebound with illness now cooks and delivers fresh food to over 750 people a day who live in a 200-square-mile radius reaching from Brockton to the New Hampshire border. Led by executive chef Brad Stevens, the Community Servings cooks and volunteers prepare about 40 different meal variations every day to comply with their clients’ specific nutritional, diet, and medical constraints. To entice sick people to eat, multiethnic staff members contribute their best recipes, bringing Latino recipes to Latinos, soul food to their African-American clients, kid-friendly meals to the children in each household. The nonprofit also offers nutrition, shopping, and cooking classes for clients learning to cook for themselves after an illness. There’s also a Farmer’s Market and community-supported agriculture (CSA) program in Jamaica Plain, a food-services career-training program, and a new initiative with other food programs around the country to create a nutritional support program for AIDS patients in South Africa. Each month, 850 Community Servings volunteers take shifts in JP, prepping food and filling orders every day of the week. But Chef Stevens needs more volunteers. “Many hands make light work — and better food,” he says. “How else could I make roast potatoes for 800 people a day?” To learn how to be a hands-on volunteer, visit www.servings.org or call 617.522.7777.
