When you watch a chef at work, you can’t help but notice how efficiently they multi-task, how focused and how quickly they are able to get things done.

A meeting with Jon Garratt, Junior Director of the Okanagan Chefs Association is like attending an organizing primer for a banquet, festival, benefit and new initiatives calendar, all in one. The Okanagan Chefs Association is part of the Canadian Culinary Federation, the largest association of cooking professionals in Canada, on which he is also a board representative. Garratt is a very busy man who clearly has a passion for his work, and exudes equal enthusiasm supporting the community’s less fortunate children, families and seniors through the Kelowna Food Bank. “There is so much more we can do out there, seeing the need and seeing the waste,” Garratt says.

“We did a calendar last year to raise funds for starving children in South Africa as part of the ‘World Chef’s Tour Against Hunger’,” he continues. “But I grew to realize that we weren’t supporting our local community and as a chef, obviously, hunger has always been an issue that is near and dear to my heart. So I set out to see what I could do to help out locally with the Kelowna Food Bank.”

Garratt was captivated by the ‘No Hungry Children’ campaign, particularly the image of a little boy dressed up and dreaming of becoming a fireman when he grew up, only wanting something to eat, today. His fiancée’s father is a local on-call Fire Chief, so it really struck home. “It was devastating to me to think about kids in our community going hungry. It is not a child’s fault there is no food on the table, so this is why my biggest target is to help families and kids,” says Garratt.

That was the beginning of Garratt’s motivation to do something to support the Kelowna Food Bank. No small thinker, he sees potential to help develop any number of initiatives here locally first, then with his national connections, looking to roll out some of the more successful ones on a broader scale to support other food banks across the country. “We have a really energetic group of chefs right across the country that are in the same position I am, that are super busy individuals, but we know that a few hours of our lives goes a long way toward helping,” he says.

Working with the Kelowna Food Bank, Garratt has already helped organize a considerable list of accomplishments involving the Okanagan Chefs Association, starting with Frank Dieter’s mobile juicing factory that was volunteered along with several bins of apples donated by Hazeldell Orchards to produce about 300, five litre bag-in-a-box packages of pure nutritious pasteurized apple juice. He would like to see this become an annual harvest event.

Then there were the ten junior chefs, along with a senior chef and a food marketing representative who showed up at the Food Bank to build Christmas hampers, tallying about 250 hampers in just over two hours. “These volunteer events provide great camaraderie for the chefs as we don’t often have a chance to get together outside of the workplace. So this is an opportunity to relax and have some fun, while giving back to the community,” says Garratt. “I’ve already had a number of calls from people involved who want to do it again next year,” he says. The Okanagan Chefs Association will also have a contingent of seventeen fully uniformed chefs helping to distribute hampers and turkeys on December 21st, as Christmas hamper distribution begins.

The wheels keep spinning as Garratt continues to talk about what a great fit it is having chefs working with the Kelowna Food Bank. Over the next while, he sees a themed dinner gala event featuring chefs cooking with ingredients available from the Food Bank.  An expanded Plant a Row, Grow a Row and food recovery program, with an upgraded community kitchen; a compilation recipe book and cooking classes for Food Bank clients;  featured local chefs and restaurant Food Bank fundraisers; celebrity chef luncheons; a loonie drive… well, you get the picture.

Garratt says, “This Christmas is going to be super special for me knowing that we’ve affected so many families with what we’ve done. When I am having my turkey dinner, I know I’ll look back and think of all those families that we have touched, also sitting around having the same turkey dinner that I’m having.”

His final thought is backed up by the hours of time and effort volunteered by his Okanagan Chefs Association colleagues. “Those who can give, should give,” he says.

Photo: Contributed

HERE’S HOW YOU CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE:

Please indicate if you wish for your name not to be listed on Castanet along with your donation amount – we automatically list it if the donor does not indicate otherwise.

Make a donation on Castanet (www.castanet.net) CAST-A-LIGHT Campaign from now until December 31^st, 2011. (A tax receipt will be e-mailed to you for donations over $10.)

Drop your CAST-A-LIGHT donation off at the Kelowna Community Food Bank at 1265 Ellis Street (Downtown Kelowna) between 9 AM and 4 PM, Monday-Friday.

Mail in your CAST-A-LIGHT donation to:

Kelowna Community Food Bank

1265 Ellis Street, Kelowna, BC

V1Y 1Z7

Phone: 250-763-7161

Fax: 250-763-9116