The Soup Kitchen tackling homelessness since 1986

On Mondays and Thursdays, the Soup Kitchen gets food deliveries from City Harvest, an organization that collects surplus food from local grocery stores – healthy and edible items that have exceeded their demand on the shelves. Volunteers then unload the shipment into storage.

A volunteer places a can of lemon-flavored Dash Water in each brown bag. These bags contain a variation of snacks, drinks clothes, sleeping bags and toiletries. The Soup Kitchen produces approximately 200 brown bags for its guests every day.

On days when the brown bags contain food, the items tend to be non-perishable so that guests can save snacks for later when they are hungry. Today, the brown bags contain a peanut butter sandwich, a fruit salad, a coconut macaroon and a sparkling water.

After the brown bags have been filled, volunteers move them to the outside serving area and prepare to open the Soup Kitchen.

Simultaneously, chefs prepare a hot meal in the kitchen. One chef (left) stirs a stew while the other (right) puts on her gloves.

An additional vegetarian hot meal is prepared every day for guests who do not eat meat. A chef holds up a freshly baked tray of aubergine with tomato and cheese.

To accompany the hot meal, two chefs prepare a salad.

Once all of the items are ready for serving, they are placed in the outside serving area with the brown bags. A chef places some of the hot meals on a serving cart.

The meal of the day is a minced meat and vegetable stew served on a bed of steamed white rice.

The Soup Kitchen opens and volunteers begin serving the cue of guests that have lined up. Hot meals, bowls of packaged soup, brown bags, tea and coffee are being offered.

To cultivate a more welcoming environment, a group of student volunteers helped brighten up the Soup Kitchen with colorful graffiti.

In addition to providing the necessities for its guests, the Soup Kitchen offers CBT – Cognitive Behavior Therapy – sessions with a professional therapist. It is the first soup kitchen in Europe to provide an on-site mental health drop-in center.