Tortellini For Everyone

Guests at today's Wednesday Community Meal enjoyed lots of pasta thanks to a donation of 12 cases of Buitoni Tortellini.

We cooked seven of the cases today and had plenty for everyone and even some leftover that we packaged up for our guests to take with them. One guest hollered out to me when he saw me in the dining room, "Hey Heidi, thanks for lunch and dinner!" I'm just glad that nothing went to waste. We froze the remaining five cases of tortellini and will utilize them in a future meal.

After boiling all of the pasta (Thank you Sam for taking on the tough task!), we tossed it in a homemade sauce filled with tomatoes, ground beef, sauteed onion, zucchini, artichokes, garlic and herbs. It turned out delicious and we received many nice compliments from our guests. Alongside the pasta we served garlic toast, roasted vegetables and melon. The bread for the toast was donated by Grand Central Bakery, the vegetables came from the Oregon Food Bank and the melon was gleaned from the recently opened New Seasons Market in NW Portland. 

It's always a surprise discovering what ingredients we have to work with and I'm grateful for the work of our gleaners and the donations we receive which help offset the cost of feeding hundreds each week.

Trinity Episcopal Cathedral has been so supportive and purchases any additional ingredients and supplies that we need to pull the meal together. It takes a lot of planning and work but everything always comes together thanks to our dedicated volunteers. We served 384 meals today.