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08/29/2018 08:30 AMIf you’re coordinating 50,000 nutritious, delicious meals a year served up by an all-volunteer crew seven days a week, it helps to be organized, to be educated in health sciences, to hold a bakery and pastry certification, and have decades of kitchen experience. Oh, and having the endurance of a marathon runner doesn’t hurt, either.
At Community Dining Room (CDR), Kitchen Coordinator Mary Johnston checks off all of those boxes, and many more. The Branford resident and North Branford native has been in the role for nearly three years. Mary first joined CDR as kitchen volunteer.
CDR serves daily hot meals 365 days a year, including all holidays, from its Branford location at 30 Harrison Avenue. Now in its 25th year, CDR serves residents from East Haven to Old Saybrook. The kitchen and dining room puts out lunch Monday to Friday (noon to 1 p.m.), Saturday brunch (11 a.m. to noon), and Sunday lunch (noon to 1 p.m.), serving approximately 1,800 meals per month.
CDR also offers other meal programs including Tuesday Kids Meal Nights and Wednesday and Friday Take-Out Dinners (which average 350 dinners a month). In addition, the kitchen makes up fresh and frozen meals delivered to Branford residents on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday (and Tuesdays to North Branford). The Meals on Wheels program provides 2,000 meals monthly.
Mary coordinates every meal that’s put together in the kitchen, but she says the main ingredients, when it comes to CDR’s incredible meal output, are her volunteer kitchen crew and the many organizations, individuals, and businesses which support CDR.
“The people power in the kitchen—the devotion and level of dedication—is just mind-blowing to me, as well as all the donors who support us and the individuals and businesses that bring us so much food,” says Mary.
The mother of three has been in the food industry since 1980. Much of her work has been in Branford, including an apprenticeship with the former Judy’s European Baked Goods in Short Beach. She also started an in-house bakery at the former Orchard Hill Market in 1991. Mary earned her bakery and pastry certification from the Institute for Culinary Education and studied health sciences at Southern Connecticut State University.
“I’ve always been interested in nutrition and healthy eating,” says Mary, a lifelong runner who began running marathons at 40.
She just signed up for a half marathon in Madison and has been invited to run the New York City Marathon for a second time, as well as receiving a return invitation to run her second Big Sur Marathon in California.
“I’m a marathon runner, so I have a lot of energy—that’s why this is the perfect job for me,” says Mary.
At CDR, Mary has raised the bar on the nutritional value of every meal served.
“I’m all about taking care of your body, because it’s so important, and nutritional support is our core mission,” says Mary.
“When I started, I saw a lot of canned fruit,” she recalls. “Now, we can serve things like fresh fruit at brunch. I know someone’s going to cut it all up, and it looks beautiful and tastes great. And I feel great about that.”
Serving meals using fresh fruit and plenty of fresh vegetables dovetails with CDR’s effort to offer food that’s nutritional and delicious.
“We’ve started this year re-doing our home delivery program, because approximately 25 percent of our 70 participants are diabetic. So in the last three or four months, we’ve been focused on low-sodium and low-sugar [home delivery meals], and using a lot more fresh foods with donations from Bishop’s, Big Y, and the Branford Community Garden,” among others, says Mary.
In addition to those three donor organizations (the garden donates from May to October), CDR receives ongoing support in the form of regular donations from Caron’s Corner, G Bakery, Cheri’s Bakery, Starbucks, Chipotle, Fresh Market, and ShopRite.
“We count on all of that and depend on it, and then all of these wonderful cooks do things with it, and prepare extraordinary meals,” says Mary.
Mary’s idea is to extend the low-sodium and low-sugar principle to as many meals prepared at CDR as possible, she adds.
“We’ve just started focusing with diabetic meals, but I say everyone needs low sodium and low sugar [meals]—why don’t we take this further? So it’s happening; its overlapping. I do feel that most of what is coming out of the kitchen is fairly healthy,” says Mary.
CDR also gets periodic donations from Sugar bakery, Sweets on Main, La Cuisine, and La Cucina, all of which are gratefully received and shared with diners. In addition, Mary never knows when someone will pop up at the kitchen’s back door with a donation.
“Along with our donors and our businesses who donate so much food, we have individuals who walk in with food,” she says. “For the last two months, we’ve been getting at least one bag of zucchini, every day! And we have a lady who walks in every week, on a Tuesday, with a gallon of skim milk. We have a man who comes in and says, ‘What do you need?’ I’ll tell him, and he’ll come back an hour later with everything. It’s just something they want to do. It’s a great feeling.”
CDR also puts a call out for a “Needed Item of the Week” on its Facebook page (find @Community Dining Room 06405). At press time, the weekly request was for donations of regular coffee, to help support the dining room’s 21 pots served per week. Donations can be delivered Monday to Friday from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Mary’s also starting to put out the call for donations of holiday hams and frozen turkeys, which can be delivered to CDR and will help provide at least 100 holiday meals served by volunteers on Thanksgiving and Christmas (together with holiday home delivery meals).
On a late-summer Friday when The Sound visited CDR’s kitchen, fresh zucchini and fresh produce were not in short supply. The mounds of freshly-chopped vegetables were being put to work by a volunteer cook to create a delicious pasta primavera for the lunch crowd. Sausage in the mix was the meal’s protein. Diners were also served a fresh garden salad. Dessert was carrot cake, thanks to 12 cakes coming in the door from Big Y that day, says Mary.
The CDR kitchen is especially busy on Fridays when take-out dinners must also be prepared as well as the day’s home delivery meals, which will be sent out with an additional two frozen meals for the weekend.
“It overlaps with the lunch crew, so it can be a little intense in the kitchen, but all works out,” says Mary, smiling.
Mary has been at the back door to hand off bags of take-out dinners (recipients just need to call CDR in advance to receive the free meals) and says it’s always a good feeling to see the meals being carried away.
“A lot of the people I see at the back door look to me like working moms, there to get a home-cooked meal to take home to their family,” says Mary. “It’s all fresh food, like potatoes, green beans, and a really nice protein—[one cook] grilled so many steaks last week! We are just so appreciative of the work of all of our cooks.”
From cooks to kitchen and meal prep personnel, servers, and clean-up, Mary manages approximately 150 CDR volunteers—but more are welcome, and needed, she says.
“We have many seasoned, long-term volunteers; without them and their commitment, our meals wouldn’t be possible. But we’re open 365 days a year and we’re always in need of new volunteers. There’s a job for everyone,” she says.
High school students in need of community service hours are encouraged to volunteer during the summer and school vacations, but anyone aged 15 and up can sign up to be placed on the volunteer schedule.
“We prefer that you dedicate four hours a week, and we have 9:30 to 1:30 shifts Monday through Friday and Saturday shift is a little shorter,” says Mary.
Retirees and those in-between jobs or new to community may find CDR to be the perfect place to give of themselves.
“If you’re retired or looking for something to do for four hours a week, this is a great place to make new friends and see what’s going on in your community,” she says.
The lunch crowd usually numbers about 60, but that can increase by 20 or 30 more at the end of the month, when budgets are especially stretched, says Mary. Seeing the appreciation of those who take a seat to enjoy a meal in the dining room makes Mary’s day.
“I come out a lot to the dining room. They like to see the same face. That makes me feel good. I’m glad that they know there’s someone they can talk to,” says Mary. “It’s very social. They know they can socialize for an hour and sit and have a second cup of coffee, and no one’s going to bother them. It’s awesome.”
Being super organized means Mary is also always thinking about what’s needed next.
“I’m always thinking about next week,” says Mary. “I know I can count on boxes of produce coming in, and then I’m thinking of which volunteers will be moving things from the freezers to the refrigerators or what’s on the shelves. It’s a constant rotation. To me, it’s like music.”
Community Dining Room is located at 30 Harrison Avenue in Branford. For more information or to volunteer, visit www.communitydiningroom.org or call 203-488-9750.