Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Good/Problematic Community Meals Programs

[JoAnna Allen (jowooallen]

Hi all,

*Hoping this is not too lengthy* but I wanted to share since we at 
Phoenix Commons in Oakland have a system that IMHO works pretty well.
We are seniors, 41 units, 50+ residents, 8 years old, very urban, 4 
story building.

_Schedule_:  Mondays and Wednesdays at 6 pm are Common meals, Friday is 
Pot Luck.  Spanning 8 years we seldom have had an empty slot,
although with some regular cooks having moved away, we recently had our 
first blank meal days.  Our large size facilitates getting folks to cook.

_Manpower_:   We use our Mosaic software to sign up for such tasks as:   
cook, assistant,  salad bar, set up , and 2 cleanup persons (5 per team).
 Task Hours are credited in accord with actual time spent.  Pot luck 
has a lead person  who gets task credit but all other work and
dishes are contributed for pot luck. /[This is my favorite meal--always 
well-rounded, casual, time to try out recipes, clean out your pantry, and
use up leftovers from the common meals, and everyone chops in to clean 
up -- a nice sense of generosity all around]/

_Menu and sign up system:_   Cooks post their menus on Mosaic and do 
their own shopping.  Once posted (jenerally weeks ahead of time), others 
sign up for meal and/or tasks.
The cook indicates if options are available for gluten free, dairy free, 
and vegetarian diners.  Also if there is a limit (usually none).  
Various cooks specialize as in vegetarian
or ethnic.  We have residents who are Chinese, Filipino, Vietnamese, 
Swedish, Jewish, Japanese, and a couple of gourmet specialists. Indian 
curries are well received.
Our developer's wife is one of the top chefs and we al know to sign up 
no matter the menu.   For a while some of us offered Saturday brunches 
for 12 (as in a dozen muffins!)

_Finances_:  This system has to be separate from HOA etc. so we maintain 
a separate account under 3 names.  Each meal costs $6.00 per person, 
guests welcome,
and there is a "salad bar only" option for $4.00.  We encourage other 
residents to join us and bring their own meals from home. Theoretically 
each cook has a
budget of $6/diner and tries to stay under budget with unused funds 
going to pantry and supplies.     The over budget occasions have so far 
balanced off
the under budget.  A few cooks are amazingly shrewd in their menu 
planning and shopping as much as $40 under budget each time. Each 
incoming residents
puts in an initial deposit of $50 which is returned when they leave.  
There is also an initial pantry fee of $35 which does not repeat.  We 
recently have debated
raising the fee to $7.00 but are currently on hold.  Instead, more cooks 
are working to stay more under-budget

_Participation_:  Participation ranges from 18 to 34, depending on menu 
and who is the cook.   Several persons cook every month (for 8 years so 
far!) and others
jump in when they see a need to fill in.  We also have many residents 
who never dine due to diet restrictions or preferences. They still 
support the dining program by
signing up for tasks.

_Dining Facility: _Our dining room seats 60, with 2 stoves, frig and 
freezer. lots of storage space.  Luckily we invested at the start in 
Herman Miller stacking chairs that
slide and are relatively light.  The tables all fold quickly and seat 
6.  One of the fun components of meals is arranging the tables in 
combinations or angled in a creative layout.
We have turntables (as in Chinese restaurants) that can be placed atop 
two tables pushed together to seat 8 or even 10.

_Covid measures_:   For 5 months in 2020 we stopped all common meals but 
then in July 2020 gradually re-instituted them by using strong 
precautions and having meals picked up in clam shells.
We have an enclosed outdoor courtyard and that became the site for many 
residents to gather while spaced apart and still enjoy community 
including singing from overlooking balconies.

Happy dining!
JoAnna Allen
Phoenix Commons,
Oakland CA


On 6/18/2024 1:19 PM, Tara Gallen wrote:
> Chiming in late to note that we also pretty directly adopted Capitol Hill's
> meal plan and it's awesome. Spencer and Sheila from Capitol Hill (see video
> at the bottom of Grace's writeup) came and gave us a talk when we were
> under construction and we modeled it off of their plan. It has worked
> extremely well for us and we haven't revisited the essential concept in the
> ~10 months we have been doing meals. There are things we have tweaked and
> things we still need to tweak, but the structure is so simple and strong
> and there's such a minimal amount of administrative overhead. The absence
> of cost tracking is a joy. Our community size makes this plan possible; we
> have 12 units, 9 of them occupied.
>
> The core pieces are all the same: no cost accounting (cook pays), each
> adult cooks, delicious and nutritious, accommodates all dietary
> restrictions (and we have some challenging ones), late plates available,
> guests welcome, etc. The differences:
> -We are very informal about the 'crewing'. We don't have a formal duty
> assignment aside from the cook role. The cook does most of the cooking
> work, though they will often or usually call for a pair of helping hands to
> some degree.
> -This does mean that some people end up doing more of the cleanup work more
> of the time. We are very privileged to have a high and consistent rate of
> participation among community members. So there hasn't been a sense of
> disparity (and we have done temperature checks on this often to make sure).
> I am sure that duty assignments could be on the table if that wasn't the
> case.
> -We have the same concept of date rotation, but since we have about 2-2.5
> meals/week, the specific days of week are a bit more variable from week to
> week. We use a Google calendar to keep track of meal dates and who is
> assigned.
> -Our meals are usually at 6PM, which is necessary for weekdays, but we have
> some folks who prefer to eat on the earlier side. A meal we held at 5PM
> this Saturday landed very well. We have been testing out some variety (like
> brunches) which also seems good.
>
> Another dimension is that the cook is only responsible for providing a
> meal, not necessarily cooking a meal. In reality, almost everyone cooks,
> but it means that there is an invitation to lean more heavily on prepared
> foods or low-key meals if desired. That option provides a bit of a pressure
> release valve in the event that the assigned cook is short on time, and
> also makes it accessible to people who aren't that jazzed about cooking.
> I've put out Costco potato salad or bag salad before alongside a cooked
> main. The vast majority of our meals are absolute bangers; we have a large
> number of people who really love food and many who adore cooking.
>
> We use Slack for digital communications, and we have a channel there for
> announcing the meal components.
>
> Thank you Grace for the writeup on your meal plan, it's wonderful. We're so
> grateful that Capitol Hill have shared their experiences with us all along
> the way.
>
> Tara Gallen
> Our Urban Village Cohousing - Vancouver, BC
> Live with us: three units remaining! oururbanvillage.ca
>
>
> On Thu, Jun 13, 2024 at 2:29 PM Grace Kim<grace [at] schemataworkshop.com>
> wrote:
>
> > I should have added (though its stated in the article), we have 17 adults
> > that all take a turn cooking.  We have full participation at meals
> > (everyone eats, even if they had a tiresome day, they will come get a plate
> > and eat at home while their family joins the rest of us).
> >
> > We have meals together every other night (except Saturdays), and no money
> > changes hands.  So people on a budget work within their means, and people
> > who want to be more elaborate can do that without worry that some won't
> > come due to price.  We accommodate everyone's food health
> > needs/preferences/allergies - the meals must be "delicious and nutritious"
> > for everyone.
> >
> > Its very simple program and we've been doing it for the past 8 years (with
> > a big modification during covid).
> > When it was safe to do so, everyone was enthusiastic about resuming our
> > meal program.
> >
> >
> > grace h. kim faia | schemata workshop, inc.
> > principal
> > pronouns: she/her
> >
> > 1720 12th avenue
> > seattle wa 98122
> > p 206.285.1589   c 206.795.2470
> > schemataworkshop.com
> >
> > Watch my TED talk at TED.com
> >
> > ------------------------------
> > From: Patricia Bailey<editorialcaptive [at] gmail.com>
> > To:cohousing-L [at] cohousing.org
> > Subject: [C-L]_ Good/Problematic Community Meals Programs
> >
> > Cohousing ABQ in Albuquerque is looking for input from other communities
> > on what has worked well or not worked well when it comes to policies or
> > programs around Community Meals. Lots of factors to consider! We?re working
> > on getting our policies in place prior to construction getting started
> > later this year. Your experience in this area would be greatly appreciated!
> >
> > Pat Bailey
> > Cohousing ABQ Membership Team
> >
> > ------------------------------
> > _________________________________________________________________
> > Cohousing-L mailing list -- Unsubscribe, archives and other info at:
> > http://L.cohousing.org/info
> _________________________________________________________________
> Cohousing-L mailing list -- Unsubscribe, archives and other info at:
> http://L.cohousing.org/info


--
This email has been checked for viruses by AVG antivirus software.
www.avg.com