On Sunday, as part The Jewish Federation’s Fed Up with Hunger Purim events, Jewish volunteers delivered food, toiletries, and other care essentials to people in need all over Los Angeles in the Purim mitzvah of matanot l’evyonim (giving gifts to the poor).

A group of volunteers from Federation’s Young Entertainment Division (some of whom helped organize the Ghostbusters JFS/SOVA benefit screening at Hollywood Forever during Sukkot) and their friends joined me to cook a meal for 60 residents of Proyecto Pastoral’s Guadalupe Homeless Project, the only men’s shelter in East Los Angeles (recipes below).

Even before the cooking started, the volunteers spent the earlier part of the afternoon buying all of the ingredients for our menu.  Sara Reich, who did the yeoman’s job of coordinating all of the volunteers and the food procurement, bought 35+ pounds of chicken.  Jeannine Hamaoui cleared out the produce departments of Vons and Albertsons to get the 30 bunches of Swiss Chard that we needed.  Rachel Fleischer brought enough chicken stock to fill a large kiddie pool. Read more »

Mike Wolf brings us along for his weekly ritual – Sundays at JFS/SOVA. Mike and other volunteers collect, pack, and distribute food to families and individuals who don’t get enough to eat.

JFS/SOVA is a nonsectarian program of Jewish Family Service of Los Angeles dedicated to alleviating hunger and poverty in the community. The majority of JFS/SOVA clients have stable housing, but their monthly incomes are insufficient to meet their own and/or their family’s needs. JFS/SOVA pantries assist an average of 7,000 people each month.

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Some Fed-staff and Hunger Committee volunteers got together at SOVA recently to sort food and pack holiday gift bags.