On October 22, 1982, in response to the urgent need of the homeless men and women congregating  across the street in Chelsea Park, members of the Church of the Holy Apostles served its first 35 meals and Holy Apostles Soup Kitchen was born. Under the direction and vision of the Rev. Rand Frew, Holy Apostles was dedicated from its first day to serving every hungry guest for as long as the need existed. No one imagined that need would still exist 27 years later and at such an alarming rate.

In a matter of weeks, the Soup Kitchen was serving 300 meals a day. Four short years later it would grow to 800 a day; today the Soup Kitchen serves over 1,200 meals each weekday. What started as a temporary, emergency feeding program has grown to become one of the largest on-site feeding programs in the country.

A few months after the first meals were served, the Rev. William A. Greenlaw came to Holy Apostles. Under his direction, Holy Apostles Soup Kitchen established itself as a model program for feeding the city’s hungry and homeless.

From 1982 through 1990, the Soup Kitchen operated out of the Mission House adjacent to the church. In a room the size of a large living room, a maximum of 69 guests crammed in at seven tables. In 1990, HASK was serving an average of 933 meals a day. Guests had less than 10 minutes to eat their lunches and then move on so that space would be freed for the next hungry person.

In 1990, the impossible happened – a disastrous fire destroyed the church’s roof and much of its interior. Despite the devastation of the fire, one thing could not be forgotten – there were hundreds who depended on Holy Apostles for what was often their only meal of the day. The very next day following the fire, the usual line of men and women formed outside the Soup Kitchen. Without electricity, a small army of volunteers provided food for all of the 943 people who came to the Soup Kitchen. In fact, the Soup Kitchen has never missed a single day of serving meals. How could we?

The church was restored in 1994 with improved accommodations for our guests. The fixed pews in the church were replaced with movable seating so that the spacious nave of the church could be turned into one big dining room. It is here, amid the serenity of the church, that guests eat lunch each weekday. "They come to us as brothers and sisters in need, and we offer hospitality and the most nourishing meal we can provide," says Program Director Elizabeth G. Maxwell. "This sacred duty to reach out to all of God’s children appropriately takes place in our own sacred place, a place of beauty and hope."

Our dream at Holy Apostles is that someday the need for the Soup Kitchen will disappear. "The real solution to ending hunger," says the Rev. Maxwell, "is a long-term commitment to social change. Not until concrete national policies are set up and administered will the problem of hunger and homelessness truly be eradicated."

 

 

 

Holy Apostles Soup Kitchen provides hot, nutritious, well-balanced meals every weekday, including holidays, from 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. to guests who come from throughout the five boroughs of New York City.  These meals help sustain a person for the next 24 hours, a period when many will not have the means to eat again.  Everyone is welcomed without question or qualification.

A Typical Day for the Food Program

The day begins at 6 a.m. when the chef, sous chef, and prep cook arrive and roll eight dumpsters of garbage out of the church courtyard into the street for the Sanitation Department. There are boxes and cans, napkins and aprons and hats and food scraps.  Yesterday’s trash disposed of – attention is turned to today’s meal.

The Menu

Escalloped Turkey Ham and Pasta Casserole
(8 oz. portion)
Seasoned Sliced Carrots (3.5 ounce portion)
Broccoli Florets (3.5 ounce portion)
Sliced Peaches (6 ounce portion)
Bread and Butter (3-4 slices per person)
Iced Tea : For 1,150 Soup Kitchen Guests!

 

They begin with the pasta dish:

48 pounds of raw elbow macaroni
23 pounds of butter
17 pounds of flour
38 gallons of hot milk
23 pounds of grated sharp cheddar cheese
23 ounces Worcestershire sauce
23 ounces salt
23 ounces pepper
100 pounds cooked turkey ham

Cook macaroni, rinse with cold water and set aside. Melt butter, add flour and blend well. Add hot milk, stirring constantly. Cook 10 minutes or until thick and glossy, stirring occasionally. Add remaining ingredients to the milk mixture. Cook 10 minutes. Add cooked macaroni and mix well. Keep hot and serve.  Cooking this dish is followed by the preparation of 240 pounds of seasoned sliced carrots and 240 pounds of broccoli florets.

Throughout the morning the Soup Kitchen’s 12 staff members arrive on a staggered schedule to prepare the food and maintain the premises. By 10 a.m., some 55-60 volunteers are awaiting tasks to be done or assignments for when serving begins at 10:30.

The Soup Kitchen resembles a bee hive. Staff is opening 450 pounds of canned peaches. Two hundred pounds of bread – rye, pumpernickel, raisin, challah, white, wheat, cinnamon – awaits volunteers and staff who will spread it with 30-40 pounds of butter. Sixty gallons of iced tea is being brewed that will be sweetened with 100 pounds of sugar. Four hundred trays are moved into position, spoons are being wrapped in napkins; water and sugar is being distributed to tables. Volunteers are dashing in and donning gloves, hats, and plastic aprons.

As the serving lines are supplied with food, the Volunteer Coordinator assigns tasks to the volunteers needed to collect tickets, serve the food, keep the tables and chairs clean, serve the beverage of the day, watch the doors, empty the garbage, and greet guests. 

Promptly at 10:30, the doors open and the first of the guests begin to stream through. Each guest picks up a tray from the food line, stops at the beverage station for a drink, and quickly goes to one of the large round tables that seat eight each. By 12:30 p.m. the last of the guests have received their meals. Staff and volunteers, eager to sit down, line up for their own lunches.

 

 

 

By 1:30, the volunteers have departed. Now the cleaning begins.

Eight porters/service assistants wash trays and silver, pots and pans, clean stoves, ovens, and refrigerators, floors, walls, tables, chairs, and restrooms. The steward receives food deliveries for the coming weeks and begins to move the food for tomorrow from the basement storage area to the first floor kitchen. The operations manager sits quietly in his office planning the next 6-week meal cycle. The chef pulls recipes for the following week and prepares the chopping charts for vegetables. The prep cook works on the vegetables needed for the following day. At 4 p.m., the last of the mops disappear into the closet, the cutting/chopping machines shut down – and quiet prevails. Ten hours have elapsed and all is ready for tomorrow. Including those eight full dumpsters that need to be rolled to the street at 6 a.m. 

 

 

More than food

Holy Apostles Soup Kitchen's Counseling and Referrals (C&R) services respond to guests’ needs above and beyond food. We make every attempt to help them sort through a maze of problems – often the results of a lifetime of poverty, neglect, mental illness, or addiction. Volunteer counselors assist guests in taking the first steps toward getting their lives back on track.

Anyone waiting on line for a meal may ask to see a counselor. Counselors help guests assess their needs and then link them with one or more of the dozens of social service agencies that may assist them. It is our goal to help those motivated to find the means to leave the Soup Kitchen line forever.

C&R services offer information and assistance with drug and alcohol rehabilitation, permanent housing, shelter, clothing, legal aid, health care, social security benefits, public assistance, food stamps, additional food services, and employment. Just as important, the program provides guests with a place where their concerns will be listened to with dignity and understanding.

With a little help from

our friends

Holy Apostles Soup Kitchen realizes it alone cannot provide all the help needed. To better assist this difficult-to-reach population, Holy Apostles collaborates with other social service agencies to provide on-site aid.

• Project Renewal sends a medical van three times a week offering direct medical care.
• The Urban Justice Center provides staff and volunteers every Wednesday to assist guests with legal problems.
• Project Torch does regular outreach to homeless veterans.
• Positive Health Project outreach workers provide weekly education and services about HIV/AIDS.
• Chiropractic for Life, one of the most popular programs, is a group of volunteer chiropractors that provides physical “adjustments” for guests, volunteers, and staff every Thursday.
• Food Bank representatives come occasionally to help with the process of applying for food stamps.
• New York Open Center's InReach Project has a volunteer provide polarity therapy and reflexology to guests once a week.
• The Veterans’ Administration sends one of their full-service Eagle vans occasionally to offer veterans medical assistance, shelter and housing assistance, benefits counseling, and mental health and substance abuse assessment and treatment.

These vital services are equally important to our overall program and commitment to helping guests on line truly find the help they need.

Food for the Soul

The Holy Apostles Soup Kitchen Writers' Workshop was created in 1995 by award-winning author Ian Frazier (right, standing) out of the recognition that people eating at the Soup Kitchen have needs and aspirations beyond a meal.

The Workshop has been a driving motivation for our guests to take that first step forward, or rather two steps forward and one step up. The isolation many guests experience because of hunger and homelessness is one of the many struggles faced daily. Taught by professional writers, the Workshop gives these individuals power to give voice to their lives. The poetry and prose created express the uniqueness of each participant’s creativity and experience.

The Workshop meets in the spring on Wednesdays for ten weeks after lunch has been served. It teaches guests the craft of writing and helps them to explore new and different ways to express themselves. Provided with pens, paper, a table to write on, and supportive instructors, participants are given the opportunity to tell of the pain and humor that makes their lives unique. Of the works, Ian Frazier says, "They show the wit, resilience, and courage that bring the creative intelligence back on top when adversity knocks it down."

The Workshop has been successful and has had over 300 Soup Kitchen guests participate. Some of them have not only benefited by getting off the Soup Kitchen line and improving their lives, but have even enjoyed the success of becoming published writers. Workshop participants have had works published the OP-ED section of The New York Times, The New York Times Book Review, The Forward, and The Wine Spectator.

At the completion of the Workshop, Holy Apostles collects and binds the works of the participants and presents a pubic reading. Participants gain confidence and pride in seeing their works in print. The public reading gives guests a further opportunity to showcase their creativity and a chance to tell their stories.

An anthology of writings from 25 participants in the Writers' Workshop over the years was published in October 2004. Find out more about Food for the Soul: Selections from the Holy Apostles Soup Kitchen Writers' Workshop.

You can also read about our guests' stories in our new blog!

Ian Frazier's work about the Soup Kitchen has appeared in The New Yorker magazine in an article entitled "Hungry Minds".  To read his article, Click Here

To accomany his article, Mr. Frazier was interviewed about running a writer's workshop with our guests.  To hear the audio of this interview,  Click Here.

Keeping the issues of poverty and hunger
before the public

At Holy Apostles, we know that soup kitchens are not a long-term answer to the problem of hunger. Rather, we need public policies that make affordable housing, child care for working parents, universal health care, and living wage jobs for all who are able to work. In the meantime, we need adequate food and funding for emergency food programs and food stamp outreach to ensure that all who are eligible receive these important benefits.