St. Vincent de Paul to serve 7,000 for holiday

Valley people in need to get taste of Christmas

St. Vincent de Paul is gearing up for its annual Christmas meals event, where they plan on dishing out more than 7,000 plates to homeless and low-income individuals in metro Phoenix.

The international nonprofit nearly doubled the number of meals it served last year in its day-to-day operations and will look to do the same this holiday season, sharing even more of their spread across its charity dining rooms, including the Champions for the Homeless Christmas event.

“We are serving more meals than ever before, but that still won’t stop us from lifting the spirits of those who walk through our doors on Christmas Day,” Chief Operations Officer Danielle McMahon said in a news release. “Our kitchen’s devotion to serving a special holiday meal with love is what makes everything possible.”

For this year, plates will consist of roast turkey with gravy, rosemary red potatoes, garlic green beans, a Hawaiian roll and pumpkin pie for dessert.

How St. Vincent de Paul prepares for Christmas dinner

With the help of new and returning community volunteers, St. Vincent de Paul began the bulk of their meal preparations on Thursday and Friday before the holiday weekend, ensuring a hot meal for those in need of one on Christmas Day.

“It’s not just Christmas, it’s every day, but it just takes some planning, knowing what our menu is and seeing if we’ve gotten any donations that we can use,” Chef Chris Hoffman told The Arizona Republic. “On top of our regular work day, we have to figure out how we’re going to get oven space for 150 turkeys or whatever we’re serving to try to kind of work with each other.”

Hoffman has been with St. Vincent for eight years now and said he has seen the operation’s growth firsthand. Having kept most of his core

staff of cooks the same — aside from a few additions to keep up with the pace — the people who truly make everything work are the volunteers.

“It’s definitely taken more volunteer hands at work in the kitchen, it’s a pretty hopping place around 9 a.m. every day,” McMahon told The Republic. “We cook with hundreds of pounds of product to make just one meal, so it’s an intense operation every day in the kitchen.”

The typical goal for St. Vincent is to have about 15 to 20 or so volunteers in the kitchen each day to aid in all the prep work and plating to get orders fulfilled on any given day.

That threshold was clearly surpassed on Thursday with volunteers, young and old, doing their part to assemble a hearty meal for those in need.

“We can always use more, though,” Hoffman said with a smile.

Those interested in signing up to volunteer at St. Vincent de Paul can register via their website,

“Christmas is definitely a special day of the year for everyone in our community, but at St. Vincent de Paul we need the help of our community every single day to bring the love and joy that we do on Christmas to each day of the year to all of our community members that need our services,” McMahon added.

stvincentdepaul.net/volunteer.

St. Vincent de Paul’s meals

St. Vincent’s Christmas meal service is scheduled for Christmas Day across the Valley at its free congregate dining halls:

Phoenix Dining Room (Champions for the Homeless): 11 a.m. to 12:45 p.m. at 1075. W. Jackson St.

Phoenix Family Dining Room: 4-6 p.m. at 420 W. Watkins St. in Phoenix. Must have someone under the age of 18 accompanying.

Mesa Dining Room: 9:30-11:30 a.m. at 67 W. Broadway Road.

Sunnyslope Dining Room: 4:305:30 p.m. at 9227 N. 10th Ave. in Phoenix.