Twenty local restaurants teamed with Nourishing Newton, the Charles River Regional Chamber’s Food assistance program, to donate over 2,000 meals to residents facing food insecurity in April and May.
Launched in 2021 during the pandemic, the program has just finished its fifth year distributing food throughout Newton in a partnership of 20 restaurants that prepared the meals and four volunteers from the Rotary Club of Newton who helped with the deliveries. The Charles River Regional Chamber recruited the restaurants and organized the program.
“It was like a little love letter from the community back to other people in the community,” said Karen Masterson, co-owner of Johnny’s Luncheonette and Cabot’s Ice Cream and Restaurant, about the Nourishing Newton Program, for which her restaurants have prepared meals since the program’s inception.
This year Masterson said her restaurants prepared comfort foods like chicken thighs with rice and vegetables, aiming to create something that is nutritious, reheatable, and delicious to best provide for the needs of the recipients of the meals.
“I just think feeding each other is a wonderful part of being in a community together […] Oftentimes the programs that are set up to provide food to people, they don’t necessarily have a prepared local meal,” said Masterson about the value of donating restaurant-style prepared foods.
Nourishing Newton is funded by a state grant that was secured by Massachusetts State Senator Cynthia Creem. In a budget amendment. Sen. Creem advocated for $50,000 to be allocated to the Charles River Regional Chamber to run the Nourishing Newton program in 2025 and for $65,000 to be allocated for Nourishing Newton in 2026.
“Food insecurity remains a challenge for many families,…