Starting at 9am, the soup kitchen is bustling – staff and volunteers are arriving and preparing for the busy day ahead. Volunteer coordinators are assigning volunteers to various tasks, various organizations and services are setting up tables to provide resources for our guests, and volunteers are putting on their gloves, hats, and aprons. But for the soup kitchen chefs, their workday started hours before, at 6am.
Every single weekday, the soup kitchen chefs prepare meals for more than 1,000 hungry New Yorkers. David Soto and Jerry Brady have both been employed as full time chefs at Holy Apostles Soup Kitchen since 2011, and Carlton Nesbit became a full time chef in May 2013. The newest additions to the team are our interns, Rah-Shon Hardy and Deborah Jones, who joined the soup kitchen community in June 2013.
Jerry, David, and Carlton worked in the Doe Fund Ready, Willing & Able project and completed the Culinary Training Program, while Rah-Shon and Deborah are still working toward completing the program. Driven by the simple premise that work works, Ready, Willing & Able ends devastating cycles of homelessness, incarceration, and addiction through paid transitional work and training, safe and comfortable housing, education, job placement, and lifelong graduate resources.
With the generous support of the Oak Foundation, a groundbreaking recent evaluation by Harvard University’s renowned criminal justice expert, Dr. Bruce Western, found that Ready, Willing & Able graduates are 60% less likely to be convicted of a felony within three years of their release from incarceration when compared to a matched control group. Holy Apostles Soup Kitchen works in partnership with the Doe Fund and regularly offers culinary internships to Ready, Willing & Able participants.
The soup kitchen chefs are vital – they prepare all the food so that we can continue to serve every guest that walks through our door. It’s thanks to their early mornings, hard work, and dedication that our guests have delicious and nutritious food to eat!
