St. Anthonys Serves 36th Million Meal on Earthday
In any economy, San Franciscos landmark St. Anthony Dining Room for the poor has no choice but to carefully utilize every resource it has. This year St. Anthonys will celebrate Earth Day and the 36th Million Meal served by the historic Dining Room on Thursday, April 22nd at 11am with a healthy meal of Chicken with Pasta and Mushrooms with dinner rolls and a serving of salad. In true recession-style cooking, it took many hands to get the chicken in the pot for this meal. The chicken was donated by Del Monte; the rolls provided by Full Bloom Bakery through Greenleaf produce; the salad from the San Francisco Food Bank; and St. Anthonys trained chefs to pull it all together. St. Anthony Dining Room has been serving free meals to the poor since 1950. Today, as the San Francisco unemployment rate soars to 12.5% and more people are in need of a hot meal, St. Anthonys continues to offer sustainably managed, healthy and filling meals 365 days a year at an average food preparation cost of 44 cents per serving. This conscious recipe of food reclamation and resource management, recycling and composting is essential to St. Anthonys everyday sustainability, and exemplifies a sustainability More than 75% of the 6000 pounds of food that is prepared and served each day to San Franciscos hungriest residents is reclaimed food, such as second-harvest fruits and vegetables or day old baked goods from bakeries, which would otherwise be thrown away. To continue the cycle of local sustainability …