August Meal Box: A Taste of Italy
It has long been known that Italian cuisine offers the tastiest food in the world and when you're a low-income family, the option of traveling to experience new cultures is simply not an option. That's why we decided to bring a little taste of Italy to our August meal boxes.
Tre Sorelle is an Italian restaurant located downtown Orillia, Ont and they have the absolute best fresh pasta I've ever had. I know the majority of our program's recipients have never had fresh pasta before and it is my mission to show our recipients some of the good this world has to offer. So when I reached out to Gina White, one of the owners of Tre Sorelle, and asked if their restaurant would be interested in providing our August meal boxes with their handmade fresh pasta and tomato sauce, she was thrilled to help out!
I'm so excited to be offering this in this month's meal boxes, that I even created this e-book that highlights the health benefits of fresh pasta and tomato sauce. (Click on the image below to view e-book)
August Meal Box Items Valued at $135
The items that will be included in our August meal boxes include:
32 oz of tomato sauce & four servings of fresh pasta (from Tre Sorelle)
2 lbs of organic black angus ground beef (from Thorganic Farms)
4 L of 1% or 2% milk (from Costco)
A dozen farm fresh eggs (from Homestead Farm & Kathleen Belfitt)
1 lb of butter (from Alliston Creamery)
A wedge of mild Gouda cheese (from Continental Specialties & Imports)
A block of 1000 day-old Gouda (dry; to be used like a Parmesan) (from Continental Specialties & Imports)
250 ml of real maple syrup (from Breedon's Maple Syrup Inc.)
2 lbs onions (from Dominion Farm Produce Ltd.)
2 lbs carrots (from Dominion Farm Produce Ltd.)
2 lbs beets (from Springh Farms)
2 cobs of sweet corn per person (from Johnstone's Sweet Corn and Barrie Hill Farms)
1 head of romaine lettuce (from Gaetano's Green Acres Inc. - supplier of Loblaws)
1 head of leaf lettuce (from Gaetano's Green Acres Inc.)
1 stalk of celery (from Gaetano's Green Acres Inc.)
1 pint of blueberries (from Barrie Hill Farms)
Artisan buns (from Caldense Bakery in Bradford)
Muesli morning rounds (from Ozery Family Bakery)
1 loaf of fresh bread baked same day (not day old) (from Fox's Bakery & Deli)
Portuguese pastries (from Caldense Bakery's head office in North York)
Bakery desserts (from Don's Bakery)
Going forward, our meal boxes will have a set price of $45 each. Our June meal boxes were $42 ($37 + $5 - I added the $5 toilet paper last minute) and the July meal boxes were $41. One hundred percent of the money raised goes to these meal boxes, and if we raise more then we need, it’ll go towards the next month's meal boxes. Ideally, we want to raise enough money that we can start offering this program on a weekly basis instead of a monthly basis because the need to feed our community is so great and the current support programs aren't even meeting half the need.
If you would like to sponsor a low-income family living in Barrie, please reach out to Leah directly at: leah.dyck@icloud.com to make arrangements. Now that Fresh Food Weekly has been granted charitable status by the CRA, we can issue charitable tax receipts to anyone who donates.