Meal kits to combat food insecurity

Every $2.50 reusable Fight Hunger bag sold at the Kennebunk Hannaford in October will send us a $1 donation! Every Hannaford Snack Pal Plate will send us $.25!
Every $2.50 reusable Fight Hunger bag sold at the Kennebunk Hannaford in October will send us a $1 donation! Every Hannaford Snack Pal Plate will send us $.25!
Learn more at hannaford.bags4mycause.com
Sign up to here to learn more about our meal kits and cooking lessons
Traci Anello - Executive Director / Founder
William Frank, MD
Mary Frances Frank
Laura Dolce
Courtney Ross
Ronni Roberts
Gail Crowell
Tracy McDermott
We were presented with a Daily Point of Light Award by Neil & Lauren Bush at a ceremony at Hidden Pond Resort in Kennebunkport, Maine
The Community Gourmet is a grass-roots effort to address food insecurity in Southern Maine. Our concept is to help people who utilize food pantries learn how to use the vegetables and proteins available to them along with the food that we donate (non perishable food items) by teaching them how to use the products to create healthy and delicious food. Our mission is nourishing, teaching, and caring.
Traci has extensive experience in cooking professionally as well as teaching college level culinary classes. She has also volunteered at food pantries. At the food pantries she has noticed that people often do not make the best use of vegetables and proteins offered because they may not know how to cook or how to incorporate the products received into meals, or do not have the necessary resources, i.e., cooking equipment. Traci started this organization with the hopes to bring as much knowledge into people's homes to teach them basic cooking skills.
Our mission is to provide staple pantry food items through donation . tWe go one step further and with our recipes, we tea how to use these items to create nutritious meals. By making food available, he hope to help people and to diminish the feelings of shame people experience when they need to obtain food from a pantry, and to make them feel empowered and confident.
The way we’ve done this is to create a meal kit. Our initial offering was a box with two boxes of pasta, a can of tomato sauce and Parmesan, for a spaghetti meal and mayonnaise, to create a pasta salad with vegetables from the pantry. Our second kit is a ramen kit with ramen noodles, rice, soy sauce, shelf stable tofu, broth, and fortune cookies (just for fun).
Each kit includes the items above, as well as recipes to create the meals using the foods we
we provide in each reusable bag, as well as recipes with suggestions for augmenting the kit with other ingredients typically available at our local food pantries. On the cover of the box, we’ve listed the ingredients inside, and a “shopping list” of potential proteins and vegetables to add from the pantry. Each kit also includes a basic kitchen tool, such as measuring cups and spoons, cutting boards, colanders, kitchen towels, etc., which are intended to help people learn basic cooking skills. Our recipes are easy to follow and flexible to accommodate any lifestyle.
We’ve distributed 700+ kits since we began in late January. We want to be able to do more kits each week and work with agencies that have direct contact with anyone experiencing food insecurities.
Our primary fundraising to date has been through the sale of raspberry linzer cookies, which we bake in a borrowed commercial kitchen. We’ve held fundraising cookie sales (for a suggested donation of $15) for both Mother’s Day and Father’s Day, and “Christmas in July,” baking between 35 and 45 dozen cookies for each event.
We have recently received 501(c)3 designation as a nonprofit organization. Our endeavor has been featured in Seacoast Online (https://www.seacoastonline.com/story/news/2022/06/16/community-gourmet-feeding-hungry-one-meal-kit-time/7570811001/) and the Kennebunk Post (https://www.pressherald.com/2022/06/16/cookies-for-fathers-day-yields-meal-kits-for-food-pantries/), as well as a feature on “Mainers Making a Difference” (https://wgme.com/features/mainers-making-a-difference/the-community-gourmet-helps-teach-york-county-how-to-cook)
Thank you,
Traci
2 Storer Street Suite 305A, Kennebunk, Maine 04043, United States
Our Kits are available at:
The Little Pantry, 25 Water St., Kennebunk, ME (Kennebunk Chamber)
York County Shelter Pantry, 5 Swetts Rd., Alfred, ME
Big Love One Community, 220 Buffum Rd., N.Berwick, ME
Saint Mary's Church Food Pantry, Eldridge Rd., Wells, ME
Biddeford Food Pantry, 162 Elm Street, Biddeford, ME
The Center, 175 Port Rd., Kennebunk, ME
Southern Maine Agency on Aging, 30 Barra rd., Biddeford, ME
Check back soon!
2 Storer Street Suite 305A, Kennebunk, Maine 04043, United States
Our Kits are available at:
The Little Pantry, 25 Water St., Kennebunk, ME (Kennebunk Chamber)
York County Shelter Pantry, 5 Swetts Rd., Alfred, ME
Big Love One Community, 220 Buffum Rd., N.Berwick, ME
Saint Mary's Church Food Pantry, Eldridge Rd., Wells, ME
Biddeford Food Pantry, 162 Elm Street, Biddeford, ME
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