Soup kitchen providing hundreds of meals this holiday season
AUGUSTA, Ga. (WRDW/WAGT) - This time of year as our families gather and we wrap up the end of the year, volunteers are hard at work making hundreds of meals for those in need.
Leaders at the Master’s Table Soup Kitchen are hard at work making sure every tummy is fed this Christmas season.
There’s no place like home for the holidays.
They say it takes a village to raise a child but it takes a community to change the community.
And for Ladonna Doleman, the manager at the Master’s Table, home is at the soup kitchen.
“Hunger does not care of your gender. Hunger does not care of your ethnicity. Hunger does not care where you live,” said Doleman. “One minute you are opening up for fridge, freezer and pantry and you have food, and the next moment you don’t.”
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Every day from 11 a.m. to noon, Doleman and her crew fill hundreds of hungry bellies.
On a monthly basis they serve 7,000 to 9,000 yellow trays and when it comes to the holidays, numbers soar.
“Any holiday we do at least 250 to 300 trays so I am expecting the numbers to be up,” said Doleman.
The need never stops, and neither do they.
“‘Will we be open?’ We will. The Master’s Table Soup Kitchen never closes,” said Doleman.
And right now they aren’t just serving food, they’re still busy preparing it.
“We started today prepping hams, cutting up yams, getting the green beans and stuff prepared and whatnot,” said Doleman. I’ll be making cornbread to make dressing and everything that’s from scratch.”
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With Hurricane Helene impacting so many in the fall, Doleman says meals served on these yellow trays are ones that won’t be taken for granted this holiday season.
“To have this meal it means a lot,” she said. “I’ve had a lot of families recently come up to me and say ‘Miss Ladonna you know we’re not going to be able to have a Christmas meal because I don’t have the funds,’ but guess what, come down we’re going to have a Christmas meal here.”
They expect to serve close to 2,000 trays between now and the new year.
If you are in need of a hot meal, the doors are always open and Christmas Eve and Christmas Day are the same.
Food will be served from 11 a.m. to noon.
Doleman also shared they are in need of volunteers. For more information and to sign up visit their website here.
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