It is wild to look back on these posts from 2020, as we are now into 2022, and our community meal commitment is ongoing. We have cooked and served over 160,000 meals. Thanks to a steady stream of small, individual donations, we have been able to continue providing around 700 meals per week to our neighbors in Southwest Baltimore via City of Refuge, and our neighbors in Northeast Baltimore via Asylee Women’s Enterprises. We also fulfill individual requests as they arise. While we will not be regularly updating these posts anymore, we want to thank everyone for their support and for enabling us to fulfill this ongoing need.
Over the last few months, we have been working hard to figure out what is next for us. How do we build and sustain a food business, amidst a pandemic and global uprising, that is grounded in principles of solidarity and cooperation, where we put people and our planet first.
The pandemic exacerbated the inequities faced by individuals in not only Baltimore, but our state, the nation, and the world. But no matter where people live, they should have access to the same high-quality and dignified food.
That’s why on March 13th, we announced our Community Meal commitment. On March 14th, we received requests from community leaders. And by March 16th, when stay-at-home orders were in place, we were up and running. As of August 6th, we have cooked and served over 60,000 delicious, balanced, and healthy meals funded through Mera Kitchen Collective’s GoFundMe, Jose Andres’s World Central Kitchen, grants and individual donations.
Our initiative is simple, yet powerful:
We cook the food we love for Baltimore residents and address the ongoing and now heightened issues of food insecurity in our city;
We provide consistent work and training to those in our kitchens that do not have access to benefits while creating and sustaining democratic employment with paths to ownership;
We re-imagine our relationship to food systems within the hospitality industry with a priority given to the health of each individual and our planet via well-balanced and delicious food.
But access to fresh, healthy meals in Baltimore is not a temporary problem, and it needs more than a temporary solution.
Over the past four months, we’ve been able to carry out the Community Meal commitment by teaming up with over 35 groups and organizations who have helped us to distribute our meals to the folks who need it throughout Baltimore City. This includes the Asylee Women's Enterprises, the Greater Baybrook Alliance, BMore Community Food, the Corner Team and BYKE Collective, the Baltimore City Department of Aging, the Baltimore City Mayor’s Office of Children and Family Success - African American Male Engagement. We have also delivered to families at ACCE School, Dickey Heights School and Callaway Elementary School in Armistead Gardens.
As these partners recognize through their support, when we talk about the access and lack of access to healthy food, we must recognize that many Black, Indigenous, People of Color in Baltimore have been held back by centuries of institutional racism, xenophobia, and oppressive identity policies. Baltimore started redlining, which intentionally segregated Black and Brown communities, resulting in inequitable access to basic services like healthcare, education, and food.
Without access to grocery stores and affordable healthy foods, we see the development of food options that often favor foods high in fat, salt, and sugar. These foods become addictive and place residents at greater risk of developing chronic diseases.
Our cooks create meals highlighting the foods they love, with seductive and delicious flavors. Over the last four and half months, we have seen how our well-balanced meals can make a positive impact in the communities receiving our meals, by helping revert the preferences for processed and unhealthy foods.
Kitchen Team:
Our kitchens are led by our talented and skilled cooks and chefs who work cohesively to build a strong team, while sharing their cuisines from around the world. Our team brings unique talent, incredible flavors, and diverse menus. Our kitchens will continue to be fully participatory in menu creation, leadership, initiative, ordering, budgeting, etc.
Building and maintaining a democratic, inclusive, and participatory work environment is essential to how we operate. Everyone on our team has a voice in how we structure and organize our work, and takes turns leading in the kitchen. Our goal is to foster empowerment through this cooperative model. Since we began our partnership in March, we have watched our team take ownership of the Community Meal commitment, building confidence to lead and engaging more deeply in menu creation, food presentation, and costing.
The food industry is an entry point into the economy, providing opportunities for workers of all skill levels. However, it is a volatile industry; concerns range from wage and job stability, healthcare, and career advancement. While the full impact of COVID-19 on small businesses has yet to be seen, it has exposed how elements of the food system are undervalued, leaving restaurants and workers to exist on the margins.
According to the Heal Food Alliance, 86% of wages in the food industry are below poverty levels. This disproportionately impacts workers of color, who make up 48% of the industry nationwide. COVID-19 made it clear that the food industry, and the food system was and is not sustainable.
Our immediate response prioritized both the needs of our community and our workers. We have moved forward to create nourishing and delicious meals, which are part of a sustainable system for everyone, from the farmers and growers, to the cooks, and the individuals enjoying our dishes.
We will continue to provide a consistent living wage across the board, with weekly programs for growth and professional development for everyone. We have created an employee assistance fund to cover any health needs that may arise, and ensure paid medical leave, especially in light of the pandemic. We also have plans to offer childcare on site, as this is a major barrier to entry for women, especially single women.
Our Food:
All ingredients are fresh and obtained from farms, purveyors, and donations. The menus are created based on each week’s availability from these sources and are executed with flavor in mind as a way to seduce everyone’s palates. We wish to redirect the farm’s excess production to these communities instead of having them wasted and thrown away.
From years of a strong commitment to sustainability, we are naturally inclined to produce well-balanced healthy meals. Our kitchen will have a menu that complies with a diet that cares for the planet, through the right combination of animal protein, grains, fruit, and vegetables.
This does not go without challenges. Acceptance of a change in eating habits is not easy. However, the schools and organizations we work with are open to inspiring, informing, and educating toward that end.
Creating bridges in Baltimore City:
As food professionals, we dream to see a closer “co-existence” within the urban communities through food. We have recently started inviting Baltimore chefs into our kitchen to create a meal once a week. Restaurants and chefs have the opportunity to share their take on food with the community so that everyone gets to experience our city in culinary terms, creating a dialogue and building bridges through food. We want you and everyone else to be a part of this project.
Our mission is to strengthen and maintain reciprocal, meaningful, personal relationships with the people who eat our food and those at every level of our supply chain, from farmers and growers on up. This is to create a spirit of mutual support and solidarity. We are building a foundation centered on doing what maximizes the benefit for the most amount of people.
In order to make the Community Meal commitment sustainable, we are seeking additional financial support to ensure that this initiative is not just a temporary bandage on a chronic issue. Our goal is to combine federal and city funds, along with private donations, allowing us to budget each meal at $10. Thanks to the support we have received from World Central Kitchen, we have seen how this price point is both sustainable and adequately values all people involved in the process of creating our food.
Existing programs that donate food to schools, senior facilities, etc., only have a budget of around $2 to $6 per meal. These budgets make it impossible to make good, quality, balanced meals while also paying the staff a living wage and benefits. A price of $10 per meal allows us to do so, without cutting corners on the quality of meals and supporting our teams.
Our Community Meal commitment is economically sustainable because at $10 a meal we can create and deliver meals with a domino of positive effects. It is socially sustainable because not only does the community on the receiving end benefit, but it allows us to support our employees, growers, and all of the essential actors in the food system. It is environmentally sustainable because we encourage local production and a diet that is overall better for our planet.
We want our future space to be Baltimore’s kitchen, a place to link people, enhance cultural exchanges, health, dialogue, deliciousness, chefs, academics, public health, food policies, schools, farms, kids, and families.
We want to take the movement beyond just providing healthy meals, and actually work to educate residents on what it means to fuel your body with delicious and well-balanced food. We believe Baltimore is the perfect city to start, and it can be an example initiative for the world.
Our Future:
In bridging communities through food, we expect to not only offer meals to our neighbors for free (through grants and individual donations), we want to ensure we have a space for people to come purchase our food, so all of Baltimore City is enjoying the same delicious meal. We are also seeking larger institutional contracts and subcontracts so we can offset grant costs. This will have a significant impact on our sustainability.
In a time of tremendous uncertainty, it is hard to plan for the future, but we must be able to respond to the needs of our most vulnerable neighbors.
Get Involved!
The MK Foundation:
With the MK Foundation we can continue to sustain this commitment beyond the pandemic. If you would like to get involved or feel like our project aligns with your personal interest or your organization's mission, we are seeking donations and financial funding in order to build a long-term, realistic and positive direction for our new initiative. We thank you for reading, and please do not hesitate to reach out.
The MK Foundation is fiscally sponsored by the Maryland Philanthropy Network. You can donate online or send a check to to the following address:
Maryland Philanthropy Network
Note “MK Foundation” in the memo line.
1600 W 41st Street, Suite 700
Baltimore, MD 21211
Donations are tax-deductible to the fullest extent allowable by law.
We made our 20,000th free meal. It was on the same day we cooked, boxed up and served 750 in a day, our highest to date. It took six of us 1 hour and 45 minutes…we wanted to see what that looked like with a time lapse. Thank you for your ongoing support, so we can continue feeding our neighbors!
April 16, 2020
Day 24. 10,165 free meals. We started this project on March 18 with a goal to make 1,400 free meals for anyone who needed it. We agreed we’d take it week by week, hoping to continue for as long as we safely could do so. As of today, we have cooked and delivered 10,165 meals. Thank you to everyone for your continued support. We couldn’t do it without the hundreds (290!) of individual donors who have supported our GoFundMe efforts. We are still gratefully accepting donations, so we can make another 10,000 more meals. No one should be hungry, ever, and especially not now. ❤️
March 29 - This week was marked by increasing fear, uncertainty and anxiety for everyone. We continue to take each day at a time. We received more requests this week, so we doubled down in the kitchen. As of Friday, we cooked 2,980 meals, distributing them throughout the city. Working together in the kitchen provides a brief “escape” from these feelings, as we put our heads down and focus on the task at hand: cooking as much as we possibly and safely can. The sense of solidarity and generosity gives comfort and hope in surviving these times. This week we were incredibly fortunate to receive food donations from True Chesapeake Oyster Co. and the Hotel Revival/Coastal Sunbelt. As a result, we have funds to go through Wednesday (about 1,200 meals). In a time when we need to self-isolate and quarantine, it’s comforting to know our community is strong. In addition to providing meals to groups for distribution, we received requests from individuals looking out for their neighbors. We’re happy to provide folks with a hot dinner to enjoy, while providing income to both our workers and workers from businesses who have supported us. We’ve created an amazing new family and are thinking about how to safely sustain this project moving forward. We are so grateful for your donations, they are vital - we thank you for sharing and continuing to donate! As we see the needs and gaps increase, and in a time when money is tight, we’re trying to consider ideas for more stable funding. We appreciate any leads or ideas folks may have. This project works thanks to mutual community connections. Thank you for your ongoing support. With immense gratitude, the Mera Kitchen & Friends team!
L-R above: Juan, Steph, Rogelio, Kibra & Iman, plus Tim, Aisha, Ino and Emily
March 22nd - Just over a week ago, we put the community meals idea out on social media fearing what was about to come, and truly devastated the service industry by Monday. On Tuesday night, our newly assembled team was busy prepping in the kitchen. Saturday marked day four of distribution and we have given out 1,040 meals. Today and tomorrow we are resting and recharging, and planning for the week ahead while considering new meal requests and ways to make weekly packages in order to limit how much people are leaving their houses. The support we’ve received thus far has been beyond incredible. We evaluated our budget and it cost us about $1200/day (labor, food, kitchen rent) over the past four days. With our current funds on hand, we can continue through Friday. If we can reduce our food costs through any sort of bulk food donation, we can stretch the budget even further, keeping people working and fed even longer. We have distributed to community members throughout Baltimore, and yesterday to the incredible healthcare workers and essential support staff at University of Maryland and Johns Hopkins. We continue to talk to individuals throughout the city and it's clear there is a glaring gap in food services for families and adults without kids. Our goal continues to be to help fill these gaps the best we can, while keeping our team and everyone involved safe and heathy while respecting public heath measures. Thank you for your ongoing support. With love, the Mera Kitchen & Friends team!
In addition to our posts on Facebook and Instagram, we wanted to share our updates here on our website!
March 19: Thank you to everyone who supported our community meal initiative thus far! We wanted to give a little update while continue to figure things out day by day. We sent out 280 meals on Wednesday. We’ve never prepared so many individually packaged meals at once. We needed a few extra hands to keep a small, efficient team. Thanks to your donations we’re able to compensate additional workers from other worker cooperatives and restaurants who were recently laid off and may not have the option of filing for unemployment. Your donations also allow us to continue paying rent to our friends Neopol (truly the best smoked fish and bacon in town and now they deliver!) Their big beautiful kitchen space allows us to cook while social distancing. We will keep you updated each day, we’re hoping to continue this as long as the need remains and we can do so safely while paying workers. In the meantime, keep supporting Baltimore restaurants! If you know folks in need, please reach out. Our sincere gratitude, the Mera Kitchen and Friends Team!
Photo by our friend Giovanni Vargas, from the days before social distancing.