chicagotribune--2020-04-28--Kerry Washington and ‘Scandal’ colleagues sponsor meals for workers at Roseland Community Hospital

“ When they reopened , they were only opening back up to make meals for patients , ” said Maya-Camille @ @ @ @ @ owner of the bakery Justice of the Pies .
“ A doctor who works at @ @ @ @ @ friend and she mentioned that she saw some of the doctors having to leave to @ @ @ @ @ just so dejected because they didn ’ t want to leave , but they couldn @ @ @ @ @ the cafeteria .
And you ’ re talking about 111th St. , so it ’ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s a bevy of options .
”

When a kitchen employee at Roseland Community Hospital on Chicago’s South Side started experiencing COVID-19 symptoms, the food service operation had to be shut down.
“When they reopened, they were only opening back up to make meals for patients,” said Maya-Camille Broussard, the chef and owner of the bakery Justice of the Pies. “A doctor who works at the hospital is a family friend and she mentioned that she saw some of the doctors having to leave to get lunch and they were just so dejected because they didn’t want to leave, but they couldn’t get anything from the cafeteria. And you’re talking about 111th St., so it’s not as if there’s a bevy of options.”
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On Monday evening, Broussard cooked and delivered food for 100 medical personnel working at the hospital. The meals were paid for by actor Kerry Washington and some of her “Scandal” colleagues, including Bellamy Young and Highland Park native Jeff Perry, through a national grassroots organization called Frontline Foods. The group raises money that is funneled to restaurants and caterers, who then use those funds to prepare meals for people working on the front lines during the coronavirus pandemic.
Chef Maya-Camille Broussard, owner of Justice of the Pies, delivers meals for 100 medical workers Monday evening at Roseland Community Hospital on the city's far South Side. (Armando L. Sanchez / Chicago Tribune)
The group’s Chicago website explains how far each donation goes: $50 feeds a team of three; $100 feeds a team of six; $500 feeds a small ER or ICU department. The donated money goes directly to the chef or restaurant that prepares the meals.
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“Kerry reached out to us to say she heard about Frontline Foods and wanted to help Chicago and a couple of other cities that have been hit hard,” said Karla Ikpi, a volunteer with Frontline Foods. “We happily accepted and then recommended New York, where she’s from, and Southeast Michigan, a new chapter that could use the help. She accepted our proposal and it went from there. We coordinated meal deliveries to happen simultaneously (on Monday evening) in Chicago, New York and Flint. For Chicago, we specifically worked with Maya because she’s a philanthropic chef whose mission and philosophy aligns so closely with Frontline Foods Chicago.”
Black people in Chicago are dying from the coronavirus at a higher rate than any other demographic and Roseland, a small 134-bed hospital on the far South Side, is primarily caring for black patients. Though perpetually underfunded, Tribune reporter Stacy St. Clair recently noted that the hospital is a "place where anyone can receive medical care and not be turned away for lack of money or insurance.” The hospital’s president and CEO Tim Egan told her: “We are literally on the front lines and we are being bombarded from every angle.”
In this screengrab, Kerry Washington speaks during "One World: Together At Home" presented by Global Citizen on April, 18, 2020. The global broadcast and digital special was held to support frontline healthcare workers and the COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund for the World Health Organization, powered by the UN Foundation. (Photo by Getty Images/Getty Images for Global Citizen)
The comparatively small but meaningful efforts of Frontline Foods to support hospital employees such as those working at Roseland caught Washington’s attention.
Per Ikpi, Frontline Foods specifically focuses on hospital staff because “restaurants near them were shutting down and they were working longer hours and didn’t always have enough time to prepare meals before going in for their shifts. We saw this as a simple idea: Paying restaurants to make fresh meals and deliver to hospitals is a way to help struggling restaurants stay afloat while fueling frontline workers. And so far, it seems to be working. We just need more donations to keep this going for as long as the pandemic is here.”
The organization currently has “more than 600 volunteers with 46 chapters. We launched Chicago a couple of weeks ago and have already donated over 5,000 meals to hospitals around the Chicagoland area. We’re actually using the Chicago Tribune’s map of COVID cases as a guide on which areas need the most help.”
Participating restaurants are listed on the group’s Chicago website, which also includes a rundown of area hospitals where it has delivered meals and notes that “we are thoroughly vetting our restaurants with stringent food safety handling, packaging, and drop-off instructions.” (In addition to accepting donations, the website includes a tab where medical facilities can make a request to receive meals.)
Prior to partnering with Frontline Foods, Broussard said she was “already accepting donations on my website to create meals and deliver them to Stroger Hospital because I have a connection with some of their doctors, so this was a perfect opportunity for me to expand on my mission. I had only raised so much money and I could only provide so many meals, whereas partnering with Frontline Foods I was able to provide so much more.”
Lentils and kale with cinnamon butter and sweet mashed potatoes with garlic bread, made and delivered by Chef Maya-Camille Broussard. (Armando L. Sanchez / Chicago Tribune)
The meals she prepared on Monday included an entree of lentils and kale, with cinnamon butter sweet mashed potatoes and garlic bread. “I try my best to do vegetarian options as often as I can because I know there are so many people with dietary restrictions. The lentils have the protein and there’s a little something sweet with the mashed potatoes to hold them over until their shift is done. I’m trying to be conscious of the fact that they need something that will give them fuel for a while.
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“Growing up, I hated when my dad would give me a bag lunch, I like hot lunches” she said. (Her father, Stephen J. Broussard, was a well-known Chicago trial attorney who died in 2009.)
“So I know that when someone’s morale is low and there is a lot of confusion and there’s a lot of hectic energy in one place, there’s nothing more satisfying than just being able to sit down for 10 or 15 minutes and eat a hot meal.”
For more information about Frontline Foods Chicago chapter go to www.frontlinefoods.org/chicago.
A time before face masks: Maya-Camille Broussard at her Justice of the Pies stand at Daley Plaza in 2018. (Brian Cassella / Chicago Tribune)
nmetz@chicagotribune.com