PROVIDENCE – In a matter of weeks, Providence school children in April went from having their lunches, and often breakfasts, served at school to a disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
When schools were closed, the Providence Public School District became responsible for serving up to 22,000 “grab and go” meals a week, distributed from sites in neighborhoods where children and their families could access them.
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Helping to fill the demand for nutritious, healthy meals are the Cromwell Lunch Ladies.
Based out of the shared kitchen at Room & Works in Providence, the “ladies” are the owners of startup food businesses that share the kitchen space in the mill on Cromwell Street. Called the Providence Kitchen Collaborative, the shared kitchen business is run by Knead Doughnuts, which moved its operations there earlier this year.
The ladies (who are often men, too) are chefs and entrepreneurs, the owners of independent businesses that also found themselves disrupted by the pandemic.
Many of them are caterers – an industry that relies on weddings and large events that were put on hold until recently. All of them had expertise in creating nutritious – and delicious – foods.
When the pandemic shut the schools, and the catering businesses, Adam Lastrina, an owner of Knead Doughnuts, said he and Room & Works owner Federico Manaigo brainstormed how they could respond to the community need, and help their out-of-work tenants as well.
The solution – an initial donation by Room & Works to produce 500 school meals – and a Go Fund Me campaign to help raise the funds to keep the effort going.
They have committed to provide at least 300 meals for the Providence Public School District a week, to be distributed at a designated drop-off site on the West Side, said Lastrina, in a recent interview.
Begun in late April, Lastrina said the Go Fund Me donations, along with the labor of the business owners, means the meals will keep going through at least the summer. The participating businesses include Solid Gold Provisions, Big Feeling Ice Cream, Baked Bean PVD, Far West, HG80 and Brown Paper Bounty.
Each meal costs about $5 to prepare and deliver. They aren’t what you’d typically find in a school cafeteria. The chefs have whipped up homemade chili, chop suey, chicken lo main and other inspired creations.
“We have seven kitchen members and six of them are active [in the Lunch Ladies],” Lastrina said. “On Monday we have three people who go into the kitchen and they do all of the meal prep and cooking. Then the remaining three go in on Tuesday and they package it all up.”
Lastrina helps deliver the food.
The Go Fund Me campaign set a goal for the summer of $15,000. It reached $12,038 as of July 1.
“We have enough funds to do about 15 weeks,” Lastrina said. “It will certainly go throughout the summer. We are motivated to keep it going indefinitely, but we’re at the mercy somewhat of generosity.”
Providence Business News is spotlighting nonprofits, companies and workers stepping up to challenges presented by the spread of the new coronavirus.
Mary MacDonald is a staff writer for the PBN. Contact her at macdonald@pbn.com.
