When Covid-19 closed the country in March 2020, OneStonegrove became a kitchen. Within 24 hours of our first meeting, we were cooking. Over the pandemic, we and our partners made and shared 250,000 meals’ worth of food with people across Barnet and beyond.
250,000 meals’ worth of food over the pandemic
24 hours from our first meeting to our first meals
868 meals cooked in a single day
100+ groups we worked with
How it began
On Tuesday 17 March 2020, the groups who worked in our building met in Goldsmith Hall: the Stonegrove Community Trust team, St Peter’s Church, Bread n Butter CIC and Little Leaders nursery.
We agreed to do three things:
- cook homemade ready meals and take them to people who couldn’t get out
- grow the church’s food bank and deliver food parcels to people’s homes
- phone people living on their own, to check they were OK
That afternoon we bought food containers, deep-cleaned the kitchen and asked for volunteers. Within 24 hours we were cooking. By the end of the week the centre had closed to visitors, but the kitchen stayed open.
Why homemade meals?
To cook good quality food for someone is to show them that they matter, and that you care.
Gus Alston, CEO, writing in January 2021
We could have handed out tins. Instead we cooked proper food, every day: stuffed peppers, meatballs, bean stews, macaroni cheese. Bread n Butter CIC ran the kitchen from the first day. Later, Vishal from V’s Kitchen, a local caterer, became our kitchen lead. Meals were frozen, so people could eat them when they needed to.
The building became a food hub
The chapel, which never gets warm, became our cold store for fruit and vegetables. Fridges, freezers and shelves filled the halls. The Felix Project brought most of our surplus food. Volunteers sorted it, packed it and took it out in vans lent to us for free.
We didn’t only feed people ourselves. We cooked for other groups too, so they could feed the people they knew. Our meals went to food banks, women’s groups, youth projects, schools, a cancer care charity and staff at Northwick Park Hospital. They reached from Barnet into Harrow, Brent and Tottenham.
No one left on their own
Food was only half of it. Lockdown left many people alone at home, especially older people. Carers stopped visiting. Shopping deliveries were late or never came.
At our busiest, we were supporting more than 100 people at once: bringing food to their door, phoning them for a chat, or putting them in touch with other help. Over the whole pandemic we delivered straight to more than 300 households. The rest of our food went to partner groups, who delivered it to the people they knew.
Beaj, our Community Connector, phoned people every week to check they were OK, to listen, and to help them find other support. More than 35 people had regular wellbeing calls. Some had lost someone they loved during lockdown and couldn’t go to the funeral. Beaj made sure they had someone to talk to, and food at the door when they needed it.
Age UK Barnet and other local groups sent people to us. From September, food parcels came with handwritten cards, painted pebbles, knitting and home baking, so people knew someone was thinking of them.
Our year in the kitchen
- 17 March 2020 Partners meet and agree a plan. Within 24 hours, we are cooking.
- 24 March We start an online appeal. In the end, 173 people give £7,944.
- 6 May Meals are going to 14 community groups and 135 households. 5,567 frozen meals so far.
- Week of 18 May Our busiest week: 5,658 meals’ worth of food goes out.
- Early June More than 300 meals a day, going to around 25 groups.
- 7 June The Lord-Lieutenant of Greater London writes to thank us.
- August The centre reopens. Since March: more than 32,000 frozen meals and 2,350 food parcels.
- September A Food Projects Coordinator joins us. Parcels now come with handwritten cards and small gifts.
- 20 to 24 December Warmer Winters: in four and a half days we cook 33,000 meals and share them with partners for Christmas.
- January 2021 Lockdown again. The work carries on.
In numbers
300+ households we delivered to directly
£80,000+ raised to keep the kitchen going
100+ people supported at once at our busiest
250 volunteers
The people who made it happen
This was never one organisation. It was a whole community.
- Bread n Butter CIC cooked from day one.
- St Peter’s Church grew its food bank into a shared project and let us turn the chapel into a cold store.
- V’s Kitchen led the kitchen as it grew.
- Beaj, our Community Connector, kept in touch with people living alone.
- Our volunteers, about 250 of them, cooked, packed, drove and phoned. 18 gained a Level 2 Food Hygiene certificate.
Thank you
To our funders: Morrisons Foundation, Charles Hayward Foundation, The Hadley Trust (who gave our first £10,000), Albert Hunt Trust, The Hobson Charity, Young Barnet Foundation, The National Lottery Community Fund and WRAP.
To everyone who gave food, vans and time: The Felix Project, FareShare, Morrisons, The Bread Factory, Goodmans Autos (who lent us two vans for free), Rogers Removals, Barnet Council and the Sikh Temple in Slough. To Ursula and her colleagues at Tulchan Communications, who matched her donation with £5,000. To Nico, who looks after our website. He refused to send us a bill right through the pandemic and did everything for free. And to the 173 people who gave to our appeal.
A thank you from the Palace
In June 2020, Sir Kenneth Olisa, the Lord-Lieutenant of Greater London, wrote to everyone at OneStonegrove. He ended his letter: “Thank you, I am very proud to share London with you.”
In May 2022, our CEO Gus Alston was invited by the Lord-Lieutenant of London to a Royal Garden Party at Buckingham Palace, celebrating people who serve their communities. Gus went on behalf of every volunteer who cooked, packed and delivered.
The pandemic showed what our community can do together. Thank you to everyone who was part of it.