Melissa Mullis, Root Cellar executive director, and Rossco's Pub owner Ross Beach are pictured with a pre-packaged turkey dinner that will be included in food hampers for regular clients this Holiday Season. This year the pub was able to prepare approximately 500 meals for those in need.--SUPPLIED PHOTO
bmiller@medicinehatnews.com
Kitchen staff at Rossco’s Pub had all ovens operating overtime last weekend cooking about 30 large turkeys and making approximately 500 holiday dinners for those in need.
“We started on Friday and we were rotating the ovens every four hours,” explains owner Ross Beach. “We were putting turkeys in, taking turkeys out and then having them all ready to go to prep, so it’s been a huge task.”
For the past five years the pub has partnered with the Root Cellar Wellness Hub to help cook any turkeys that are donated to the food bank but are unable to be gifted, since many who would receive one are not equipped to cook and prepare a large bird.
“They get a lot of big, huge turkeys that they possibly cannot hand out to families because they don’t have the facilities to cook them,” says Beach. “And a lot of people, they don’t have the ovens, It just doesn’t work.
“This way we can do all the work for them, and they get the full meal deal after.”
Along with a large portion of turkey, the pub cooks all the fixins’ like potatoes, vegetables, stuffing and cranberry sauce, then packages the large meals in a microwavable pan. Due to the size of turkeys donated this year, roughly 30 pounds each, Rossco’s Pub was able to prepare 500 ready-to-go holiday meals.
“We were very, very surprised, all my volunteers that helped me, we couldn’t believe it, that we hit close to the 500 mark.”
The meals are expected to be included in food hampers for regular Root Cellar clients around Christmas time, allowing more residents to enjoy a warm turkey meal over the holidays.
“This way every individual or couple or even a family of two or four or six can now have a Christmas dinner.”
