New York City-based restaurant Eleven Madison Park will be launching the Eleven Madison Truck on April 12, which will feed underserved food communities, reports Bloomberg. The truck was borne out of chef-owner Daniel Humm’s partnership with nonprofit Rethink.
“We had been brainstorming different ways to make the restaurant part of the community and get staff engaged beyond making meals and pushing them out of the door,” said Matt Jozwiak, co-founder and chief executive officer of Rethink. “And then Daniel called me and was, like, ‘Let’s do a food truck.’”
The truck will serve around 400 meals a day for free. Operations are covered mostly by the restaurant’s diners; each meal sold from the restaurant guarantees five meals for Rethink. The truck will be staffed by Eleven Madison Park staff on a rotating basis and serve dishes like jerk chicken with roasted vegetables, gumbo-style chicken etouffée with rice, and grain bowls, along with vegetarian and other dietary options.
To start, the truck will park on Mondays, Thursdays, and Fridays at Bronx Collegiate Academy, on Tuesdays at St Mark’s United Methodist Church in Brooklyn, and on Fridays back in the Bronx at the Mary Mitchell Family & Youth Center.
“I come from looking at food in an artistic way,” said Chef Humm. “I love the art and performance of it. But I’m also wrestling with how many people don’t have access to it.”
“Food can be meaningful, on both levels,” he continued. “Now I can say that one can’t exist without the other.” Full Story
Related: Publix Creates Program to Alleviate Hunger; Kellogg Co. Donates to Albertsons' Nourishing Neighbors Initiative.