San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Making a difference by feeding others
Whether on a global scale or local, there’s power in sharing
A few weeks ago, the Mendocino Complex fires raged throughout Northern California. I remember reading somewhere that it was the largest wildfire in our state’s history. But for some reason, it felt like the disaster wasn’t getting quite the level of media attention or community support that I would have expected given the fire’s massive size, especially in comparison to the press and aid given to the Wine Country Wildfires just last year.
When a situation isn’t right or doesn’t feel right, I think it’s human nature to try and do something to make it better. It could be something small, like helping someone up after they’ve tripped, or maybe something that lacks an instant result but could have a larger implication, like protesting at the airport in reaction to the Muslim ban.
In general, I think most people want to help and be empowered to do something, anything, to make a change for the better.
And so it was with the above conviction that I started researching and found that the World Central Kitchen was stationed up in a high school in Middletown (Lake County) — two hours north of San Francisco — making meals for first responders, firefighters and evacuees.
World Central Kitchen is the nonprofit organization started by chef José Andrés that helps provide meals to those in disaster areas. They have served almost 3.5 million meals to Hurricane Maria victims across Puerto Rico. Andrés chronicled his humanitarian efforts in Puerto Rico in his new book, “We Fed an Island: The True Story of Rebuilding Puerto Rico, One Meal at a Time” (HarperCollins, $27.99, 288 pages). When I saw that World Central Kitchen was in California, I shot the organization an email offering to donate a bunch of cookie dough from my cookie dough company. They responded and said I was welcome to drop off.
A couple days later, I drove up over 330 pounds of cookie dough (enough for about 4,000 cookies) to Middletown. I didn’t get to meet the chef because he was out in the field delivering meals, so I left my cookie dough with some volunteers, explained to them the baking instructions, and that was it.
On the drive home through Napa’s Silverado Trail, I zoomed by a half dozen or so different handpainted signs along the side of the road that read “Thank You Firefighters.” I remember at first feeling good knowing that I did something small — very small — hoping that my gesture would brighten someone’s day. But that feeling was quickly overtaken by worry and wonder: Would the cookies even end up being baked? Would people even eat them? What if all my time and effort and dough were for naught?
Fast forward a couple weeks later: I’m sitting down for a family-style lunch for 600 in Copenhagen for MAD, Rene Redzepi’s two-day symposium and nonprofit event, which carries a self-proclaimed mission to make the world a better place, both inside and outside of the kitchen. I sat down at a random table next to a random person from New York. After a few bites of salad she asked me what I do for a living, and I explain I have this small cookie dough company in San Francisco. She then asks if I’m the same cookie guy that delivered a bunch of cookie dough to the firefighters in Northern California — I was speechless. How could she possibly have known that?
It turns out that Nate Mook, the executive director from World Central Kitchen, was leading a breakout session on the work the organization does, and he happened to mention my donation and how grateful and stoked everyone was to have a freshly baked cookie.
I found Mook on Instagram, sent him a DM and we met up. He told me that the donation caused World Central Kitchen to rethink the way they approach desserts and he sent me this picture of a firefighter happily chomping down on my cookie:
So often, I feel so disconnected from the product I make and the people who consume it. But I can’t be alone in this sentiment. I imagine musicians, writers, artists, chefs — anyone who creates for consumption — must at some point ask themselves what it is they’re doing. Why are they making what they make?
I know in the grand scheme of things, it’s just a cookie. I’m not exactly doing god’s work here. But I do feel like we’re all just trying our best, trying to make some meaning out of what otherwise can feel like a meaningless existence. Seeing the picture really made my day and gave me meaning — you don’t have to be Rene Redzepi or José Andrés to make a difference.