Alissa Campbell – Page 3 – Parkdale Food Centre

August 13, 2015

The Muesli Project

What’s The Muesli Project?
Parkdale Food Centre (PFC) is ecstatic to have recently been granted funding from a donor who would like to remain anonymous. This funding will provide an opportunity for 15 youth (aged 15-21) to launch a food-based social enterprise called The Muesli Project.

The Muesli Project’s mission is to provide 15 young individuals with a one-year opportunity to start and run a business selling muesli with the help and support of a team of experts and mentors to gain valuable skills and experience for their future.

At the end of this exciting venture and training program, any profits from the business will be distributed amongst the participants upon graduation of the program in the hopes that this money will be used for further education and/or to start their own business.

After a great round of interviews, we are excited to announce that we have recently accepted 15 strong, amazing individuals to make up our Youth Team!

Teaching, mentoring and supervising our youth team will be:
Sarah Stewart: Team Leader; OCT Educator & Food Blogger at sometimesyouneedtocook.com
Jo Ann Laverty: Business Advisor; Co-founder of The Red Apron redapron.ca
Karen Secord: Parkdale Food Centre Manager
Christine Earnshaw: Parkdale Food Centre Board Representative

Why Muesli?
Muesli is a fiber-packed, nutrient-rich yet convenient breakfast and snack that has always been underrated. Muesli is a mix of oats (and sometimes other grains), nuts, seeds, and dried fruit but, as opposed to the ever-popular granola, muesli does not contain added sugar or oil and is not baked. It is usually eaten raw with a big splash of milk like other breakfast cereals, however, it can also be enjoyed as a snack like trail mix, warmed up like an oatmeal, sprinkled on yogurt, smoothies, soups, or salads. Since PFC is dedicated to providing healthy, nutritious food to its neighbours, muesli fits right in. We hope to bring muesli back to the mainstream!

Why The Muesli Project?
Parkdale Food Centre is a not-for-profit, volunteer-run organization that provides emergency food aid, cooking and nutrition education, and an open and welcoming gathering place for individuals and families in need.

While we have expanded the number of programs we offer to our neighbours in need, we know that we can be doing more for marginalized youth in our area. Over the past year, there has been an increase in support from our community partners, mainly from professionals in the food and restaurant industry, who are willing and ready to support programs for young people to gain valuable skills and experience.

Recently we have also been seeing the benefits of bringing people together to learn food skills, increase nutritional awareness and become more aware about food security issues in our community. By opening up the centre for more programs and services like The Muesli Project, we hope to continue to build a stronger and more resilient community.

When Does The Muesli Project Start?
The Muesli Project’s 2-week Business Boot Camp starts on August 17th, 2015. This is when the youth team will have essential and intensive business training with PFC’s team as well as with a wide range of industry professionals who are generously dedicating their time to this exciting venture. During this Business Boot Camp, the youth team will create a business plan together as well as develop their muesli recipes and branding. After the Boot Camp, you may see The Muesli Project’s signature blends popping up at local craft shows, farmers’s markets, artisan shops and even online!

Watch for us and the unveiling of The Muesli Project at the Taste of Wellington on September 19.

May 13, 2015May 13, 2015

Sprouting Community Gala — Sold out, $15K raised, and a surprise award all in the same evening!

On May 7th, the Parkdale Food Centre was the venue for our 2nd Annual “Sprouting Community Gala”. We were thrilled to open our new space to many folks who hadn’t yet had a chance to tour it.

It was a lovely warm evening and the party even spilled out onto the back deck! (People were curious to see how our Community Garden was coming along). We transformed the Centre with Brussel Sprout-filled mason jars, twinkle lights and Brussel Sprout centerpieces. (We also learned that Brussel Sprouts confined in mason jars and a warm location for a long time sweat quite a bit!) After the Gala the mason jars were put away until our fall canning workshops and the Brussel Sprouts were fried up to make a delicious snack for our neighbours – we waste nothing!

We also had a huge surprise — just as we were about to thank everyone for attending and pull the lucky ticket winner for 2 tickets anywhere Porter Airlines flies — to be greeted by Rabbi Bulka. On behalf of the United Way, he presented our organization with a Community Builder award. We had absolutely no idea he was coming! His amused smile as we scrambled to re-jig our agenda was quite funny!

We then made him pose with our Board Chair, Treasurer, Director and Jeff Leiper outside in front of our Reverse Food truck. Watch for this truck hitting the streets over the next few weeks!

A spirit of warmth and friendship infused the evening as our volunteers, PFC Patrons, and neighbours came together to help raise funds to support the Centre’s mounting grocery bills over the summer. Terry Owen from Buzztone Productions entertained the crowd, wandering around with his jazz saxophone. Thank you to Edelweiss for their donation of some of the rentals.

Throughout the evening, our “gala goers” were treated to some memorable morsels from our friends at The Urban Element, Dish Catering, Absinthe, and Supply & Demand. Desserts were on hand from Holland Cake & Shake and The Merry Dairy cart, which our volunteer Ben wheeled around — chased by fans of the Merry Dairy!

Beyond the Pale generously provided an array of delicious local brews and guests also enjoyed a special sangria from Dish Catering!

Guests also had a chance to bid on a fantastic lineup of Silent Auction prizes. The generosity of local business owners who provided great prizes to help us meet our fundraising target was incredible, and the silent auction included: Twiss & Weber, Historic Building Co, Saslove’s, Beyond the Pale, Gallery 3, Agave, Uproar, Kitchenalia, Merge, and the GCTC. The bidding was brisk & competitive. We had many happy prize winners and many of the items went over value!

It was a fantastic evening. Thanks to everyone’s generosity we were able to meet our fundraising goal and raise $15,000 in a single night! These funds will help us stock our shelves over the summer months, when we typically struggle to keep up with demand during a time when many of our donors are away on summer vacation. Our monthly grocery bills have mounted to over $9,000 in recent months, due to an increase in the number of neighbours we help and an increase in the number of programs we run. We couldn’t continue to run all of our programs without such a giving Community.

This was our first foray into a hosting a large-scale event in our new space and we were thrilled to show it off. A special thanks to many of our neighbours who came to give it a good cleaning in advance, since they are so proud of the space and wanted it to gleam. Also a special thanks to the extended gang from Dish Catering, who donated their time to help us be able to run our event smoothly! Thanks also to the Fundraising Committee for all the work ahead of time and on the day of. You guys were amazing!

We hope to see you at next year’s Gala! We’re already counting down the days.

May 4, 2015May 4, 2015

How does our garden grow?

If you’ve walked by our location lately, you may have noticed the new octagon-shaped planter in front of 30 Rosemount Avenue. This is our new Octogarden and it’s part of our new on-site gardening initiative. Not only does our new location offer us better ways to connect with our clients, we also have the chance to grow fresh produce that can be given to clients, used in our cooking classes and provide a way to teach people about growing their own food.

We’ve got two new garden plots – in the back we have a small area that we’ll use to grow vegetables such as tomatoes, bean, peppers, cucumbers and out front in our Octogarden we’ll grow herbs and snackable veggies like green peas.

Thanks to a fantastic team of volunteers and donations of gardening materials from the Wellington St. Home Hardware, Tamarack Wellington, Taggart and many individuals we were able to get our gardens set up and ready for growing.

Along with providing us with fresh food, our hope is that these gardens will have many fantastic trickle-down effects for our clients and community including learning about growing food, relaxing with nature and connecting with one another.

Now we’re just waiting for planting season! We’ve got a great group of volunteers and clients who are excited to get growing with us. Many thanks to the community for their support with this initiative. We lo ok forward to showing of our garden through-out the year.

If you’d like to get involved, we’ve got some great opportunities for you:

Donate fresh vegetables from your garden. Register and learn more about our community gardening program.
Support our reverse food truck. Donate online in whatever way you want – support a cooking class, buy a crockpot, buy some milk, or a bag of food.
Stop by and visit our bright red van. The Parkdale Food Centre van will be out at community events and we’d love to meet you and accept your donations of vegetables, food and toiletries.

April 24, 2015

Fisher Summit Community Helpers

This year Fisher Park / Summit Alternative School has been actively involved in the process of community building. Our students have engaged in hygiene-kit fundraising drives, healthy food drives, as well as providing hands-on service to support their fellow community members. This student initiative to act as “good neighbours” emanates from a challenge posed by Karen Secord, the executive director of the Parkdale Food Centre. Upon visiting our classroom in the fall of 2014, Karen challenged the students to become good-will ambassadors for those Kitchissippi residents facing the perils associated with food-insecurity.

The students embraced Karen’s challenge, organizing an extra-curricular group (the Fisher Summit Community Helpers), and quickly began the process of engaging with their community from a social justice perspective. Through their initiative, organization, and determination our students have helped to nourish the residents of Kitchissippi, strengthening our community as a whole. Most importantly, these students have extended dignity into the lives of their neighbours. As a culminating activity, the students who formed our Fisher Summit Community Helpers group, decided that they would like to see first hand what the Parkdale Food Centre offers to the community.

Following our visit in early April, and after a glorious year of working with Karen and the PFC, here is what our kids took away from their experience at the Centre:

During our trip to the PFC I felt happy, and that I was helping in the community. While volunteering at the PFC I experienced making memories with my friends that I will never forget and having a sense of meaning. The tasks that I completed to help the day-to-day operations at the PFC were helping around the kitchen. Completing these tasks revealed to me that you have to take responsibility and that you should cherish what you have because you are privileged.

During our trip to the PFC I felt …I felt really proud that I was part of the group, and really happy because we were helping people that needed it. While volunteering at the PFC I experienced …hope, because I wanted to go to help again, as well as see more people at the Centre. The tasks that I completed to help the day-to-day operations at the PFC were … I helped make some of the best smelling muffins that I have ever smelled. I was in charge of smashing bananas for the muffins.

During our trip to the PFC I felt very good because I felt like I was doing something to help my community. I had this warm fuzzy feeling inside. It felt awesome to help. While volunteering at the PFC I experienced feelings of accomplishment and pride when I finished a task. The tasks that I completed to help the day-to-day operations at the PFC were getting the fruit and veggies from Karen’s car and helping sort them all. Completing these tasks revealed to me that the Parkdale Food Center really tries to help keep our community healthy because everyone deserves to be healthy no matter what your living conditions are.

During our trip to the PFC I felt very happy to know that I was helping out the less fortunate in my community. I also felt shocked to see how many people so near where I live need to use a facility like this. While volunteering at the PFC I experienced happiness and joy while being with friends and helping others. The tasks that I completed to help the day-to-day operations at the PFC were sorting and stacking vegetables and fruit. Completing these tasks revealed to me the amount of care they put into all the things they do. We had to put all of the produce that was bruised, or damaged in a box, and these items would then be used to cook or bake other things.

During our trip to the PFC I felt … honoured to have been there, and happy that I was helping other people. The tasks that I completed to help the day-to-day operations at the PFC were … Completing these tasks revealed to me … When I was there I made banana muffins and it made me realize that every effort, no matter how small, helps a lot.

During our trip to the PFC I felt … like I was helping the community. The tasks that I completed to help the day-to-day operations at the PFC were … bagging foods and putting them in the right place. Completing these tasks revealed to me … that we need to be grateful for what we have, and to stop complaining 🙂

The words of children carry so much weight, and when these words are derived from a place of equity and social justice, they have the power to transform a community. Thank you to Karen, and the entire Parkdale Food Centre team for challenging our students to actively engage in their neighbourhood. This is the generation that we have been waiting for! More to come from Fisher / Summit during the 2015-2016 school year.

April 21, 2015April 20, 2015

The Wellington Record Club

The lights are dimmed, candles are lit, cell phones are switched off, and the unmistakable sound of a needle hitting a groove means another meeting of the Wellington Record Club is underway.

I first took the idea of a record listening club to Shane at the Wellington Gastropub about three years ago, based on a BBC article about similar groups in the UK. I knew that Shane loved music, and had similar tastes to me, and I felt the pub’s White Room would be a suitable venue. Shane took my simple idea and created something far better than I had ever envisaged, partnering with a local speaker manufacturer, breweries and record stores to provide monthly meetings that quickly became popular amongst the city’s music lovers for the high-quality listening experience. Notably, all proceeds from the meetings are donated to the Parkdale Food Centre – between $400 and $500 each month.

The idea behind the Record Club is to actively sit and listen to an entire album (or two) on vinyl, with no distractions – something unusual for many of us in an age where we have thousands of songs on our phones but often play music without really listening, it’s just background while driving, working or being otherwise occupied. To help promote focused listening, we have a few light-hearted ‘rules’ for the duration of each record – mainly that cell phones should be switched off and no talking until the music is over, at which time lively discussions about what we just heard usually arise.

The high-quality listening experience is provided by a pair of amazing Tetra Speakers, developed and built right here in Ottawa by Adrian Butts. They have to be heard to be believed, but the most frequent comment we hear is along the lines of “I’ve listened to that album countless times but tonight I heard things I’ve never heard before”.

The records we play are sourced either from our own collections, or from stores such as Compact Music and Hintonburg’s The Record Centre. The 23 meetings held to date have leaned heavily towards Shane and my tastes – English indie/alternative/classic rock, with Radiohead, the Beatles and the Clash amongst the early selections, and the most recent being a pair of meetings a week apart during which we listened to Led Zeppelin’s first four albums. We are looking to diversify the offerings and each meeting a sheet is passed around for attendees to suggest music for future evenings.

Before the music starts, the folks at the meeting enjoy delicious canapés provided by the Gastropub, and beer donated by Beaus or occasionally another brewery. The venue, food and beer are all provided by the Gastropub and kind supporters, enabling 100% of the requested $25 donation from each person to be passed directly on to the Parkdale Food Centre.

The only problem with Record Club is that there is so much music that we all want to listen to, that one meeting a month never seems like enough!

If you would be interested in attending a future meeting and helping to raise funds for the Parkdale Food Centre, follow @thegastroub on Twitter, or check the pub’s website at http://www.thewellingtongastropub.com/

Thanks to PFC supporter (and Wellington Record Club regular Ian Brown) for this guest post, and to Rob Riendeau for the photo, above!

April 15, 2015April 14, 2015

Friday evening cooking classes and a community meal

I was at the PFC for a Friday evening cooking class on April 10th. 16 of us worked together on making the chick pea curry and so it didn’t take long for all the vegetables to be chopped, the chick peas to be rinsed, and the tinned tomatoes to be added to the pot. A few herbs and spices and it was ready for the crock pot.

Sixteen of us sat down at one big table to eat a good nutritious curry with donated fresh bread. Vincent was the youngest at 3 years old; I’m not sure who was the oldest, I’m told its rude to ask these things! But even the magic of PFC can’t cook a crock pot curry that quickly, so we ate some curry that had been made earlier in the week. But there is some kind of miracle when people with all kinds of stories sit and share food they have prepared together. The conversations flowed easily and the sense of community was strong.

Hub Anglican Church is sponsoring these Friday nights once a month. The PFC’s tag line is “Neighbour to Neighbour”, and after all, that is really close to Jesus’s tag line “Love your neighbour”. Making new friendships doesn’t have to be complicated, the food on Friday was delicious, good value and really simple to cook; and created space for people to build friendships and community.

So what did you do Friday night? Look out for the next Friday evening cooking class in May and come and join your neighbours.

Thanks to Alan Wickham, who wrote this guest post for us. Interested in joining us for a Friday evening cooking class? Check our calendar and contact us to learn more.

April 9, 2015April 10, 2015

Inspired by neighbourhood generosity

Over the March break, I collected food for the Parkdale Food Centre. I collected it because my teacher was having a draw to go to “National We Day” in Ottawa. To get your name put in, you had to do two or more acts of community service. So, I went door to door around my neighbourhood collecting food. My neighbours were extremely generous. I also made applesauce muffins for the food centre, and I helped at my school’s Bookfest.

After I collected the food, I dropped it off at the Parkdale Food Centre. When I dropped off the food someone gave me a tour of the centre. It was amazing, they had a big kitchen for cooking meals, and I got to see how the system works, what kind of food the clients got, where they store all of food, and how they help people. Finally at the end of the tour they talked to me about why the food centre is important, like some people need to use all their money to pay their electricity bill so they can’t afford food. Then Karen the manager gave me a hug. 🙂

The entire experience made me want to help people.

– Poppy, Grade 6

Thanks Poppy, for this guest post on our blog, and for visiting us at the PFC. Your generosity (and the generosity of your neighbours) means a lot to our neighbours, too!

April 5, 2015April 5, 2015

Ottawa Foresters visit the PFC

On Saturday, February 28th, the Ottawa Foresters Volunteer Team had the absolute pleasure of coming together in support of the Parkdale Food Centre. What an amazing experience!

The Centre’s staff and volunteers were accommodating and welcoming and certainly looked after all our needs while we were on site in their beautiful kitchen cooking up pots of chili and baking dozens of muffins to fill the freezer for PFC neighbours and re-stocking many of their everyday staple supplies.

We’re already looking forward to partnering with the Parkdale Food Centre again later this year for another inspiring, community activity — meeting our Foresters’ purpose of helping to enhance the well-being of families within our communities!

Thanks to the Ottawa Foresters for joining us at the PFC and sharing an afternoon of cooking, community, and great food! (And to their member coordinator Debra Thornington for organizing the group and sharing this guest post with us.)

From time to time, we have a variety of community groups come and join us at the PFC, bringing ingredients for delicious recipes and preparing food that fills our freezers for our neighbours. Do you have a group that would be interested in something like this? Contact us and we’d be happy to chat about arranging a time.

April 2, 2015March 31, 2015

Meet VIcki! One of Our New Volunteers

We’ve got some new volunteers here at the Parkdale Food Centre, and we thought it would be a great idea to introduce them to you over the next few months.

Today, we’d like you to meet Vicki. Vicki started volunteering with us in January and has been coming to the centre every Tuesday evening to help out. We sat down with Vicki and asked her a few questions about what brought her to us, her experiences at the Parkdale Food Centre and a few more nosey questions!

So why the Parkdale Food Centre?

Well, I had been looking for a place to volunteer for quite sometime and by fortunate luck I stumbled upon the Parkdale Food Centre. I think I first heard about PFC on CBC Radio and after that I started following the centre on social media. I really like the messages about good, healthy food and empowering people to be able to cook and learn about food.

I do live in Barrhaven so often people are surprised that I’m volunteering here. But for me, the location is irrelevant – rather it’s the actions and messages that are important to me. I try to “live” in the entire city of Ottawa so even though my house is in Barrhaven, I’m often out in Hintonburg, Westboro, the Gatineau Park, Stittsville, etc. whenever I can.

Why did you decide to spend your volunteer time on a food and community-oriented mission?

Well, I like food. I appreciate how rewarding and satisfying it is to have a good meal. Food is so vitally important to all of us. And I really don’t understand how in such a highly developed country we have so many people who cannot afford to purchase or even access good quality food. There is nothing that upsets me more than reading the statistics about children who go to school without breakfast and without a lunch.

Equally important to me is being able to make a tangible difference in the lives of other people. I’ve been so very lucky in my life with a stable childhood, a university education, a good job and lots of opportunities to travel and pursue my passions. Not very many people are this fortunate and I really believe it’s important to do what I can to make even a minor difference in someone’s day-to-day. So if this is simply making a batch of granola that we can hand out or pouring someone a cup of coffee and talking with them about their day – I’m happy and pleased to do it.

What do you do when you come to the Parkdale Food Centre to volunteer?

I help out in the kitchen. So some days I’m bagging up rice, oatmeal, tea, etc. to be made available for our neighbours when they come in to shop for their food. Other times I’m busy making big batches of granola that we portion out for neighbours (a healthier and more economical choice than boxed cereal). Some nights, I’m portioning out soup, making sandwiches, and other food to be served to neighbours when they come in.

It is non-stop in the kitchen on Tuesday night and I absolutely love it. I always go out and mingle with the neighbours and make sure everyone has eaten some of our fresh-cooked food. Sometimes this means I have to convince people that just because the soup is green it still tastes good!

Is there anything else you want to tell us about your experience so far?

Honestly, and I’m not exaggerating – coming to the Parkdale Food Centre on Tuesday evenings is the highlight of my week. In my short time volunteering at PFC, I’ve been fortunate to meet so many interesting people – both volunteers and neighbours. There is nothing better than seeing the smile on the face of someone when you give them a sandwich or a bowl of soup. I really do feel so lucky to get to be part of the Parkdale Food Centre.

I talk about my experiences with Parkdale Food Centre so much that I think my friends are growing tired of me talking about it… But, I believe this is part of it – if more people realised how easy it is to make a difference in someone’s life, I really think they would volunteer and help out.

March 31, 2015

The Collective Kitchen

The moment Karen Secord mentioned the concept of the Collective Kitchen to me was the moment that I decided to stop paying lip-service to the ‘idea’ of volunteering. That conversation was a personal turning point and prompted me to make a commitment to dedicating time and energy in a program that I thought was brilliant. It aligned perfectly with my food industry skill set, and, having previously met some of the neighbours who rely on the PFC at a Crockpot chef demo/lunch, I was enthusiastic about being part of a progressive community organization that dedicated itself to supporting those in need through good food.

The essence of the program is for a group of participants to cook a casserole style meal in large quantity and package it into individual containers, thus allowing them several healthy frozen meals kept in inventory at the PFC and accessed by the neighbours as needed. Now that we are 6 sessions in, I realize that it’s about so much more than that.

Generosity — The participants decided (and were quite adamant) at the first session that a portion of what we produced collectively would be made available for others in need who were not part of the group–those in need taking care of others in need.

Learning — Laughter, debate, expanding cooking skills and food knowledge, collective participation from prep and cooking to packaging and clean up—all the neighbours take so much pride in their PFC kitchen and the opportunities if affords them.

Confidence –– Some of the most valuable moments are to see various participants flourish, from quiet and introverted to confident and open, so very proud of what they’re accomplishing.

Community — A meal at the end of each session allows us to acknowledge what we’ve achieved in a few short hours, discuss and plan what we might cook the next date, give ourselves ‘props’ for the deliciousness that we’ve created and share gratitude for the organization and people who make it all possible. Thanks to Jo-Anne Laverty, co-owner of The Red Apron, who wrote this post for us about her Collective Kitchen experience. And huge thanks to the Trillium Foundation for providing us with the financial support that makes this program possible.

Author: Alissa Campbell