Lunch for Street Kids at Orion House

ZINO Society team members Christine Gilbert, Jamee Nunnelee,
Mary Holmes and Kate DesRosier prepare the meal.

Today, at the request of the ZINO Society executive team that we do something for charity together as a group, we purchased, prepared and served lunch to around 75-80 street kids between the ages of 13-24.  The ZINO team including Mary Holmes, Kate DesRosier, Jamee Nunnelee and Christine Gilbert planned the menu, shopped together at Costco and prepared the food.


They planned a baked potato bar with all the toppings including chili, sour cream, steamed broccoli, bacon bits, green onions, salsa and shredded cheddar cheese, plus a Caesar salad, cookies and fruit juice.  Maybe roast chickens next time? 

Mary cleaned and cut all the romaine in advance and was the salad maker extraordinaire.  My thumb and forefinger are a bit burned at this point because I shared the role of "potato poufer" with Jamee which involves making a lengthwise slit in the center one-half of the piping hot potato and then firmly pressing the ends of the hot potato toward one another which "poufs" the potato in the center and makes room to put all the toppings inside.  These were definitely giant potatoes and the team cooked them perfectly.  Christine helped prep getting potatoes into the ovens and artistically prepared the menu board while Kate chopped green onions, stirred chili and then everyone helped serve.


We organized quite a service line and moved the eaters through quickly and then sent them to the condiment bar table to dress their potatoes.  The kids were generally polite and thanked us for lunch, though it was obvious that they are still kids since the food that it made its way back to the garbage was primarily the salad.  I didn't see too many cookie crumbs being thrown away.

It was fascinating to see and hear about the many services that YouthCare at Orion offers including education support for kids to get their GED credit, computer training, barista training, onsite job counselling and tutoring, a place to sleep for a limited number of kids as selected through a lotto system, a place to do laundry, a place to store their belongings during the day when they are going on job interviews, access to a phone and a healthy social environment.  There is a full schedule of programs and Orion organizes volunteers to help provide breakfast, lunch and dinner seven days a week.

At the end of the day, each of us felt good about our role in helping others in the community through our efforts today.