Cookoff Crew Hits Streets With 200 Meals

Eshe Ward found two men on a park bench on the Green taking in the afternoon. She offered each a plate of Thanksgiving fare, a bag of hygiene products, and a pair of warm socks.

“Hot dang,” said Dee (who asked to be identified by his first name) as he opened the container. There was roasted chicken, stuffing, yams, and macaroni salad.

“This is our lucky day. What’s this from?”

Ward told him it was from the Eat Up Foundation, referring to the nonprofit founded by Brian Burkett-Thompson and Kristen Threatt to leverage Burkett-Thompson’s cooking chops and Threatt’s business smarts to change communities for the better.

Ward, director of Family and Children Services with the anti-violence group Ice the Beef, teamed up with the Eat Up Foundation for the Give Back event Saturday, a two-part affair that started with a Chili Cookoff the previous week at the Omni Hotel.

Proceeds from the Cookoff, which tallied over $4,000, paid for the hot meals and the care bags, which volunteers were distributing at the event headquarters at the People’s Center on Howe Street.

In all, Eat Up gave away over 200 plates of food and over 100 hygiene packages this weekend, according to Threatt.

Ice the Beef’s Chaz Carmon said their teams spread the word through social media and by posting flyers at bus stops, around the Green, and on Chapel Street. They also deployed someone to walk around and inform people where to go.

“We deliver too,” said Carmon, who stopped in at the People’s Center to get more flyers. ​“There’s a number anyone can call on the flyer. Or we just go to where we know they’re needed most.”

One of those places was the Roger Sherman House, a prison early-release halfway house where Threatt and his team distributed stacks of hot meals and care bags to about a dozen residents.

“They’re going through a lot right now,” Threatt said as the group crossed Howe Street back to headquarters in the cool November air. ​“This is their bottom, so to be able to bless them when they hit rock bottom is amazing. That could be any of us right now.”

Among the group was New Haven native Josh Diaz, a member of the Eat Up team.

“When I was growing up, there were days when my mom couldn’t feed us, so I want to make sure no one else has to go through that,” Diaz said. ​“I’m gonna follow this guy, him and Brian, wherever they go.”

On his way up the steps, Threatt encountered a woman leaving the People’s House, a plate in her hand.

“You got everything you need?” he asked her.

“Yessir yessir. Thank you thank you,” she said. ​“You’re a blessing.”

Threatt’s partner, Burkett Thompson, was bringing a bin of care bags outside to his car.

How you doin’? You need some food?” he asked a man approaching the house.

“No,” he said, chuckling. ​“I came to help out.”

The man was named King. He was, it turned out, a corrections officer. Jules Kierce knew him. Kierce is an outreach officer with Ice the Beef and just joined up with Eat Up. He was helping out with the Give Back.

“I’m an ex-con, and he was my C.O,” Kierce said, after he and King shook hands warmly. Kierce said he’d been in and out of prison for years for felonies ​“from firearms to drug convictions.”

The turning point came when his mother, Patricia Kierce, died from breast cancer in 2017. She was 52.

“I was in prison and I couldn’t be there for her,” he said. ​“That changed me. I woke up. I decided I wanted to be part of the solution instead of the problem. That’s why I’m here.”

King, his corrections officer, he said, ​“helped me when I wanted to be helped. He helps people on an individual basis and he gives them that respect, and he shows up. He shows up for things like this.”

“I don’t treat them as if they’re criminals but as individuals,” King said of his charges, before heading to the kitchen.

At that moment, Jerine Thompson and Michelle Jones appeared in the doorway.

“We’re here for the food,” Jones announced.

Brittiny Johnson welcomed them.

“This is for you if you need it,” she said. She was overseeing a table crammed with care bags and other hygiene products. A college advocate at Hillhouse, she enlisted the aid of senior Tyonna McCrea, her student, to distribute the bags. McCrea brought her cousin Chantel Starke.

“I just felt like getting them involved in what is going on in our community would be great,” said Johnson, who’s in the process of opening a nonprofit youth rec center in the Hill neighborhood. She’s calling it The Kick Stop.

Over at the food table, Jayvon Freeman was offering Thompson a cup of coffee to go with his plate of food. Freeman and his brother Chy Quan come from the family of Thelonious Monk, they said.

“Just like him, we’re here with a sense of caring,” Freeman said. ​“We’re here to give back. This is part of our service, giving back.”

“How do you like your coffee?” Quan asked Thompson. ​“Cream? Sugar?”

Jones returned. She asked for macaroni salad. ​“I’m missing that,” she said.

“One moment,” Quan said. He went into the kitchen.

A moment later, Ice the Beef member Leighton Johnson emerged with a bowl of macaroni salad.

“You get some baked Ziti?” Johnson asked her.

“No,” she said. ​“The macaroni salad is what I want. I had some of Jerine’s ​‚and that was good. Very good. Very nice. Thank you so so much.”

“Always,” Johnson said, as she made her way across the room and outside to enjoy her meal.