ANGELS TABLE at the
Meet the Kiwi crusaders who’ve found their own special recipe for tackling food waste – and healing communities at the same time
In looking for solutions to fight food waste, we found incredible potential for a wider impact. We became aware that a good meal in a beautiful and welcoming environment can change a community.” These are the words of Massimo Bottura, the 3-Michelin star Italian chef who you might call the international rock star of food rescue. Bottura set up his first ‘refettorio’ – community dining hall – in Milan in 2015, where he invited top chefs in the city for the Expo to come and cook for the homeless and others in need. With a team of architects, furniture makers, designers and artists, a neglected theatre was converted into a space where people could come together and enjoy top quality meals using surplus food from the Expo. Now, through his global project Food for Soul, Bottura and his team encourage organisations to donate food that would otherwise be binned, to feed the needy at his four refettorios across Europe.
The two-pronged problem of colossal food waste and widespread hunger is the ugly paradox of our times. “Almost one billion people are undernourished. One third of the food we produce globally is wasted every year, including nearly four trillion apples. Just imagine how many apple pies we could make?” Bottura writes in Bread is Gold, a collection of 150
‘food rescue’ recipes from the chefs at his first refettorio, who whipped up culinary excellence from ingredients other people didn’t want.
In Aotearoa, it’s no different. Campaign
Love Food, Hate Waste, run by 60 councils nationwide, says the average Kiwi family throws away three shopping trolleys of edible food each year. Couple this with the findings of a recent Salvation Army survey showing 37% of people skip a meal because they can’t afford it, and around one in four avoid buying fresh produce due to cost, and things start to look decidedly grim. But just as Bottura did, Kiwis have been busy finding solutions. When the refettorio chefs used bruised strawberries to prepare gazpacho, or popcorn kernels to make pesto, they weren’t just turning surplus food into something extraordinary. They were using the unwanted to reach out to the marginalised – and, as chefs, stretching their creativity around where they could take the ingredients. As you’ll see on these pages, that has been the success of our own food rescue projects. Not just using the surplus, not just feeding the needy, but breaking down social barriers and tackling an environmental problem into the bargain. In kitchens, cafés and restaurants up and down the country, people are cooking up something very good indeed.
EVERYBODY EATS, Auckland
It’s 6.30pm, and I’m sitting at a long table of fellow diners in St Kevin’s Arcade – a cluster of trendy eateries and shops with an alternative vibe, on Auckland’s K Road. The frittata on my plate is moist and flavoursome; the salad is well dressed and fresh. I’ve just polished off a bowl of creamy pumpkin soup and the dishes seem to appear, Hogwarts style, out of thin air. By the time the fruit salad with fresh cream arrives, my fuel needle is hovering on ‘Full’. We all chat between mouthfuls, leaning in to be heard above the clink of cutlery, lively chatter and occasional laughter from the other tables. The young Japanese student to my left comes here often, the others are first-timers. I have never met any of them before.
This is Everybody Eats, and the name is no lie. Everyone here eats – whether you have money to pop in the koha tin when you leave, or haven’t a cent to your name.
I was last here just after it opened a year ago, so I’m keen to learn how the award-winning pop-up restaurant – which uses rescued food to feed Aucklanders – is faring. Nick Loosley, the 33-year-old Kiwi owner of two Bay of Islands restaurants, set up the initiative after doing a Masters in green economics in the UK. There he learned all about food waste, and decided to bring the ‘pay as you feel’ model back home to New Zealand.
We retreat to a side room to chat, away from the happy cacophony. The restaurant – for now based at Lebanese restaurant Gemmayze Street – operates every Monday night when Gemmayze is closed. Nick and up to eight kitchen volunteers, including chefs from acclaimed restaurants, are here from midday to sort the food donated from supermarkets and food rescue organisations such as Kiwiharvest. Each week the chef – on loan from the likes of Mudbrick, Oyster Inn and Cazador - devises a menu and oversees the prep. And on every front, the social enterprise is thriving.
“We have a pretty serious roster system. A lot of people just turn up hoping to help on the night, but we’ve already got volunteers that we signed up weeks in advance’,” says Nick. Then adds, “But if someone signs up they’ll be volunteering within two or three weeks.”
That’s right; at Everybody Eats you book to peel spuds, not to secure your favourite table. This might be because as a social project, it works; and people love a solution. A recent Pledgeme campaign set a target of $120,000. They hit $129,080. All of that will go to infrastructure, with the aim that the model will eventually pay for itself. Nick is scouting around for a permanent venue; he wants it to be in a neighbourhood that is culturally and socioeconomically diverse, with some social housing.
So how has Everybody Eats – and the clientele it attracts – changed, in a year? “It took about a month to shake down into what it is now. Our first one was about 80 people; about 90% were in need. Now we’re doing about 280 people every Monday and about 75% aren’t paying. It’s evolved. We’ve found systems to deal with those big numbers. It’s a ratio we need to keep at. We need enough money in that [koha] tin to cover our expenses. Actually we need more money so we can start paying people.”
Tonight, as I lined up with the fast-moving queue, my new Japanese friend pointed out the blackboard announcing the night’s 3-course menu. As well as frittata, for the meat lovers there was a main of beef mince and chorizo bolognese sauce with roasted potatoes, guacamole and yoghurt.
Generally there’s a lot of “mince-y, tomato-y, rich, hearty main courses”, says Nick. “We rescue a lot of mince, so it’s like three out of four meals. And bananas are very common in food rescue so two out of three desserts involve banana. I notice some people, when they are lining up saying ‘Is it banana cake?’ as a sort of joke ‘cause we do end up with the same stuff.”
The predictability is nice, I observe. It’s like when you go to your granny’s house and she always wheels out the same type of biscuits. It fosters a sense of familiarity, of belonging. Still, Nick wants to do better.
“Once we get a permanent space we’ll have more food so we can plan ahead. With the volume we get at the moment, and the small number of outlets we rescue from, it does mean it’s more narrow what we can offer.”
For Nick, ultimately this has a wider role than filling stomachs. “I don’t think there’s a better thing than food to bring people together. It’s a great social leveller; it’s very powerful to give people exactly the same food, the same service, the same experience regardless of where they come from, whether they’re rich or poor. We are solving a social problem as well as a food, poverty and environmental problem.” Everybody Eats, Mondays from 6pm. For more see facebook.com/everybodyeatsnz
MERGE CAFÉ, Auckland
A cabinet displaying plump cream buns, a fluffily tempting red velvet cake, wraps, filled rolls and wholesome salads. So far so ordinary for a city-centre café. What isn’t so run-of-themill is the clientele… or rather, the mix of it.
Merge Café is run by not-for-profit trust Lifewise – and began life as a soup kitchen.
The man at the hub of this lively eatery is café manager Manu Kahlon and ‘everybody’s dad’, according to one of the regulars. A café manager’s role is always pivotal of course, but here even more so. It’s Manu’s job not just to whip up lattes for the city crowd, but to be
the welcoming face of a café where everybody belongs – the tourist, the unemployed, the office worker, the homeless...
Manu breaks off barista duties to explain how Merge has evolved from ladling out soup and bread seven years ago. “We saw people were only spending like five to six minutes in the soup kitchen, in and out, not getting to know each other. The sense of community wasn’t there.” The idea of a café was to break down barriers. “You and me wouldn’t go to a soup kitchen,” says Manu. “But with a place like Merge, people can talk to each other, share their stories and life experiences. No one judges each other. It’s very dignified, you can feel safe. Especially for those living on the street, it normalises the whole thing. It feels good – like home again. We see people in suits, students, nine-to-five people, homeless, all eating at the same table.”
Sometimes, this translates into practical help. “Construction guys come in here to eat, and there are guys on the street looking for jobs, so they help them find work. Or people say ‘You can crash on my couch’.”
Plus there’s all sorts of crucial life admin you just can’t do if you’re on the street. Like, for example, you can’t open a bank account if you don’t have an address. Merge offers a solution there, too. “All their bank mail, from Winz, whatever, it all comes here. We also have two computers they can use to connect with others on Facebook, find places [to stay]. They can use the phone for free to find jobs, find housing.”
While Manu says, “We need to give them a bit of responsibility to do that”, there are trained peer supporters on hand for those who need help with benefits, emergency housing, navigation to other community services or advocacy. “Some [peer supporters] were homeless themselves.”
As the café gets busier, people stop by tables and chat, nod in greeting to customers and staff. I’d intended to ask ‘so how do you foster a welcoming atmosphere?’, but Manu’s relaxed, open and warm demeanour is answer enough.
All the food is family-style fare, Manu says. “Mashed potatoes, veges, that kind of thing. Today is roast beef, potatoes, pumpkin. We offer great vegetarian options every day too. We want them to feel they’re not going to a flash café, to feel like they’re at home. People like that about us. Food made from the heart, with good intentions. That gives it a different taste.” And the meals – prepared by an excellent chef, Umender Singh, who once worked at Skycity – have to be substantial because “some of them are eating only one meal a day”.
The café is able to offer such low-priced meals ($2 for a basic breakfast, $4 for lunch and $6 for a roast lunch on Thursdays ) – thanks to grants and funding, and the occasional fundraiser, like the recent, hugely successful Merge and Dine event at AUT. They also receive funds from Sky City Community Trust, Waitemata Local Board, and Foundation North. People can also donate directly on the Lifewise website. But the key pillar is the pay-it-forward system where you can buy lunch and also ‘shout’ someone a meal by paying for two, which still makes for a very cheap meal. “Every day we get 20-25 meals that are paid forward. Even if we don’t, you can’t send someone away with an empty stomach,” says Manu.
There was one customer who, unable to pay when he first came in, insisted on cleaning the café windows in exchange for a meal. He’s still doing it to this day.
The food is donated by the likes of produce wholesaler Fresh Connection, or it’s fruit and veg from people’s backyards. “As it’s a business we have to abide by council law; we can’t take cooked food as we don’t know the source, the temperatures [it’s been kept at],” says Manu. “We can take canned food as long as it’s by the best before date. Meat mst be frozen or fresh, well packaged and well under the best before date.”
More donated goods would be a big help. “It’s hard to keep it sustainable. If we can get some big suppliers to give us meat on a weekly basis, fresh veg that we can use here, that will help us a lot. It will cut down the cost and help us do more.”
It’s now 11.35am and the queue is building. Roast day is clearly popular. Manu pops out from behind the counter. “Just one last important thing... Some people think ‘if I go in there I’m taking away from people who need the meals. It doesn’t work like that; every dollar helps us. Just come in here and see what we do.” For more or to donate see lifewise.org.nz
BASKETS OF BLESSING AND LET’S EAT, Queenstown
Sometimes great ideas start very small.
As small, in fact, as a single basket. Tam Schurmann, founder of Baskets of Blessing and now community food project Let’s Eat!, was nursing her mother through brain cancer when a surprise delivery of goodies landed on her doorstep. “We were gifted this little basket anonymously. I never found out who gave it to us but it had such an impact on me and my whole family. It made us feel supported and cared for even though it was a time of incredible isolation,” says South-african born Tam.
That act of kindness inspired the mum of two to launch Baskets of Blessings five years ago. You just nominate anyone you feel is in need, for any reason, to receive a basket to support them through a tough time. “They contain home baking, gifts, all sorts.”
Tam is warm, laughs often, and is clearly used to multi-tasking; she is on her way to a
‘chat and chop’ session when I call. She explains how Let’s Eat grew out of the realisation that in a time of crisis, one of the first things to suffer is nourishment. “In delivering these baskets, we felt we couldn’t walk away from a situation where we had someone fighting cancer or lots of problems where they couldn’t get around to
“It’s food made from the heart... That gives it a different taste”
cooking their family a nutritious meal. A lot of the time they were resorting to takeout, to the kids eating sandwiches at night, with an incredible burden of guilt and stress.”
As with Baskets of Blessing, Let’s Eat works on nominations (you can even put yourself forward), and nominees get a cooler bag with a week’s worth of meals. The project works in partnership with the Wakatipu Community Presbyterian churches in the area who loan their commercial kitchens, where the food is prepped and cooked, then packaged and delivered, all by volunteers. The menu, which changes weekly, is devised by a catering manager – who oversees the cooking – and a nutritionist. “We try to personalise the meals, which have to be nutritionally dense too,” says Tam.
All the food they receive is donated. “Countdown have been fabulous, supplying us with all their surplus food, and we have kind donations from people in the community. We have local producers who give us organic veges, we get homegrown fruit, someone supplies fresh eggs (our meat sponsor wishes to remain anonymous), and we use as much homegrown, spray free produce as we can. We try to keep it natural; no MSG or flavourings or refined sugar.
“We do gluten free, dairy free, vegan. We use tried and tested recipes that are contributed by members of the community – healthy, homestyle meals with a modern twist.”
The output is huge (500+ baskets a year and close to 400 meal portions a week), but so too is demand. “We’re getting to the point where we’re going to be reaching out for bigger grants and funding; the need is increasing enormously. Queenstown is perceived as a rich man’s playground. But a lot of people are struggling with high living costs; rental of a family home is around $800 a week. There’s a stigma attached to asking for help. But when people are nominated, it’s delivered to their doorstep.”
And the kindness comes full-circle. “We see so many of the people who’ve received baskets and meals, and when they get better they want to volunteer.”
For more, see basketsofblessing.co.nz
KIWIHARVEST, Dunedin
Imagine you’re a café owner or worker who finds themselves tossing out perfectly good filled rolls and baked goods at the end of every day. You’d no doubt feel guilty; it certainly wouldn’t tick any job satisfaction boxes. Now picture yourself loading that surplus onto a refrigerated van, then waving it off happy in the knowledge it’s all going to a good cause.
Susie Townshend, manager at Kiwiharvest Dunedin, says the cafés and supermarkets that donate food “love that there is a solution out there. They don’t want to be throwing food out either. It’s not why they got into the business. And they know we’ve got enough agencies to share the love.”
They certainly do. Registered charity Kiwiharvest, which operates in Auckland and Dunedin (soon Hawke’s Bay and Queenstown), pass on the rescued produce to social service agencies that provide food to those in need. Kiwiharvest, previously called Foodshare, has been in Dunedin since 2012 and Auckland since 2015. Every month they deliver over 60,000 kilograms of food to 215 charities nationally.
Susie says they like to call themselves
“the charity that supports other charities”. They don’t deal with the end-users directly, but supply the “amazing agencies in the community doing a fantastic job dealing with food insecurity”.
“Food insecurity doesn’t necessarily mean people don’t have any food but it might be that they don’t have access to nutritional food, that they struggle to get to the supermarket because transport is an issue, or don’t have access to culturally appropriate food,” Susie explains. “We collect from a number of cafés in the [Dunedin] CBD. We pick up their sandwiches, scones and muffins and redistribute them to a different food bank each day in time for lunch. Then we go round supermarkets and collect their surplus food and redistribute that.”
She’s keen to emphasise it’s not ‘waste’ but ‘surplus’. “It is good food which they can’t sell or choose not to depending on their inhouse regulations. It might be that they’ve had a fresh delivery of fruit and veg and they know the consumers will pick the fresher looking stuff over the older looking. But when you look at it out of that context, when you’ve got nothing to compare it to, some of that stuff is amazing.”
They try to provide perishable goods where possible. “We operate mainly with fruit, vegetables, bread, frozen meat, dairy products.”
One of the pillars of Kiwiharvest’s mission is education – whether it’s explaining to donors what items they can and can’t take, or the recipient agencies on how they can deal with the food they’re given. The better informed people are, and the better matched the food to the end recipient, the less waste there is.
Kiwiharvest is “powered by positivity”, with 45-50 volunteers a week in Dunedin. “Some have been with for six years,” says Susie.
Where would she like to see Kiwiharvest going? “We’d love more food donors, especially more fruit and veg to share around. We don’t deal with farmers yet, but in Auckland they’re getting fantastic produce from Pukekohe Growers so we’re starting to make those connections. And home gardeners who have excess food can take it to Kiwiharvest or the food rescue in their region. We had this amazing summer in Dunedin and we were getting bags of spinach, zucchini and broad beans. People love getting that.” To find out more, see kiwiharvest.org. nz
Kiwiharvest is ‘powered by positivity’, with 4550 volunteers a week