Seniors open doors to delicious meals
What began as a way to help seniors have good nutritious meals each week during the early stages of the COVID-19 lockdown, has now turned into close to 200 meals a week, a small army of volunteers and ear-to-ear smiles from drivers and seniors opening their doors to a delicious hot meal.
“The Penticton Seniors’ Drop-In Centre Society has partnered with OneSky Community Resources to provide locally made, healthy meals at an affordable price,” said Penticton Seniors’ Drop-In Centre Society president Mignonne Wood.
“Keeping seniors connected to community is now more important than ever.”
Meals to Go operates out of the Penticton Seniors’ Drop-In Centre kitchen on
Tuesday and Thursday of each week. Chef Brian Benning prepares four-week menus offering everything from meatloaf, roast chicken and ham to pasta, prawns and roast beef.
“We try to do well balanced, healthy meals,” Benning said. “Everything is homemade — there are no processed foods in these meals.”
Seniors sign up for either Tuesday or Thursday meals.
Last Thursday, Benning was in the DropIn Centre kitchen by mid-morning to ready the large pans of meatloaf for the oven. Potatoes had to be cooked and mashed, mixed vegetables cooked, mushroom gravy made from scratch and the meatloaf generously sliced for careful assembly into 100 single-serving aluminum containers by about 3 p.m.
After Benning and kitchen partner Liz Hansen place the servings into the containers, a team of volunteers crimp each lid into place and then insert the hot meal into a plastic bag, seal it and place it in a large thermal bag.
Volunteers organize about 10 meals per thermal bag for a crew from the 20 regular drivers who arrive, receive their list of addresses and head out to deliver the hot meal to about 20 seniors on each list — often within about 30-40 minutes of the meal coming out of the oven.
“We serve approximately 200 meals a week — 100 each on Tuesday and Thursday,” Wood said. “When we started, we did 50 a week and then it grew to 100 and now we’re at 200 meals per week.
“Since the end of May, we have prepared and delivered close to 1,800 meals.”
“The hot meals program is subsidized under the Safe Seniors, Strong
Communities initiative making it possible to provide nutritious, affordable meals to help seniors who are self-isolating due to the COVID-19 pandemic or generally isolated in their community,” said Myrna Tischer, co-ordinator of Better at Home Services at OneSky Community Resources.
Safe Seniors, Strong Communities is a joint initiative between the Ministry of Health, bc211 and the United Way of the Lower Mainland.
“We’ve had a tremendous interest in the program and subsequently have many seniors on a wait list,” Tischer said. “We are happy to hear how much the meals are appreciated and enjoyed.”
Tischer said she’s been touched to receive positive feedback from seniors on how much the meal means to them.
“This is helping so much, less grocery shopping and less cooking when I don’t feel well. The meals are tasty and I am enjoying them so much.
“I look after several older seniors and getting this meal once a week makes me feel looked after. We would love to expand to reach more seniors in the community and continue this program but the funding is limited.”
Seniors pay $5 per meal and are invited, if they are able, to “Have a Meal, Give a Meal” by donating a further $5 for a meal for someone else.
To make a financial contribution to the program or for additional information about the seniors’ meals, call 250-490-7692 or email safe.seniors@oneskycommunity.com