October Kitchen - April 2021

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THE NOURISH LETTER

APRIL 2021

OctoberKitchen.com | 860-533-0588 | 309 Green Rd., Manchester, CT 06042

Meet the Team Behind Your Meals

A Tribute to Many Sweet Memories HOW MY NEIGHBORS MADE EASTER EXTRA FUN

My Nana would also create traditional pasticciotto , which is an Italian cream cheese-filled pastry that tastes almost like cheesecake. I have great memories of nearly five generations of my family enjoying them together.

When COVID-19 made headlines last year, I thought: “We can stick this out until Easter. It’ll get better by then.” You could say the pandemic exceeded my expectations! It’s a shame that we still can’t predict whether it’s safe to have family get-togethers. Easter has been a huge part of my family life ever since I started October Kitchen.

Looking back, I see it’s rare

that people aside from our relatives helped us make a holiday an especially

When I worked in a restaurant, I never got to enjoy Easter the traditional way that most people do. I stayed busy all day, as most people in the industry do on holidays. However, after I became a personal chef and October Kitchen took off, I got to spend a lot more time with my family, especially on holidays.

memorable event. For many years, though, we had a couple of amazing neighbors that made Easter a lot of fun for us and our daughter.

“Every Easter Sunday morning, at the crack of dawn, Fritz would come over and hide plastic Easter eggs filled with candy, change and trinkets for Audriana to find.”

Before most of the homes were redeveloped for retail companies, our neighborhood had many

retired couples and our daughter, Audriana, was the only kid on the street. This didn’t have much of an effect, except on holidays like Halloween. My neighbors would give Audriana all of their candy. She was swimming in candy and the best part was she didn’t even like candy. (We were happy to help her out with her harvested surplus, of course.)

I feel lucky that I never took all those valuable memories of the Easter

season — like Palm Sunday pancakes or Easter Sunday church service — for granted. Food is a very formative part of these memories. It’s not Easter without my mother-in-law’s “bunny cake,” which she bakes in two 16-inch round cake pans, cutting one to form bunny ears before frosting it all. The eyes are made with jelly beans and the whiskers are made of licorice. Everyone loves it.

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As a vegetarian with specific health needs, Lynne used to struggle juggling her family’s food preferences. Her kids (ages 9 to 16) and her husband have busy schedules — and very different tastes! There are only a few dishes that everyone can agree on. And while Lynne loves to cook, her job as an occupational therapist at a nursing home makes it hard for her to find time to do it. As you can imagine, once the pandemic started, Lynne became overwhelmed at work and had even less time in the kitchen at home. Luckily, she heard about October Kitchen because of a sample service we did at her nursing home a year back. We’re happy to say she’s loved using us ever since! “The staff are like family,” Lynne said fondly. One thing that surprised her about October Kitchen was the connection she formed as she became familiar with the same delivery guy (Rich) over the months. After her mother passed, she found a written note of condolences from him attached to one of her deliveries. Best of all, when Lynne called the office ask about her delivery guy’s name, our office manager Stephanie revealed that she was about to mail Lynne a card herself. Lynne exclaimed, “I couldn’t believe it. They’re such lovely people.” Lynne’s love for October Kitchen has become famous in her social circles! MARATHON MOM FINDS IT EASIER TO JUGGLE LIFE WITH OCTOBER KITCHEN

She tells everyone she knows, whether they’re coworkers, family or friends.

Ultimately, Lynne and her family adore October Kitchen most for the quality of our food. Due to past health complications, Lynne is very discerning about the food she eats. Now, it’s easy to satisfy her diet needs and make her whole family happy with their own dishes. “I’ve run marathons; I’m a healthy person,” she says. “I’m totally neurotic about what I put in my body and I trust [October Kitchen] completely.” Lynne says the proof is in the instructions; without unnecessary preservatives, the food expires if you don’t freeze it in time. As school began again, Lynne started to drive to our location since her daughter’s school is a couple of miles away. (Of course, she sent Rich a thank-you gift for all those months of deliveries!) She’s loved chatting with our staff and checking out the latest chef’s specials and in-house treats and we love getting a chance to see her every week! Thanks for all your support, Lynne. We love having you!

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their eyes that Fritz and Barbara were having the most fun out of us all.

The changing seasons didn’t stop the neighborhood from doting on our daughter. A retired couple that lived two doors over, Fritz and Barbara, were not only some of the best neighbors I’ve ever had, but they were also the sweetest people I’ve ever met in my life. Every Easter Sunday morning, at the crack of dawn, Fritz would come over and hide plastic Easter eggs filled with candy, change and trinkets for Audriana to find. He’d hide them all throughout the yard, dozens of them! After my daughter would wake up, she’d grab a basket and go egg hunting while Barbara helped us take pictures.

I couldn’t be more grateful that I’ve been able to celebrate Easter these past 20 years. I know these times may be rough, especially for those who love Easter as much as I do, but I’m confident that we’ll be able to get together again soon. It may be easy to be pessimistic these days, but if Jesus’ resurrection story teaches us anything, it’s that the future will often surprise you.

They were just those kinds of people. They’d raised two daughters of their own and you could tell from the sparkle in

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YOUNG CHEF SELLS PIZZAS FROM HIS SECOND STORY WINDOWFOR CHARITY!

_____________________________ Write your name here and fax the completed puzzle to 860-533-0585, send it via empty delivery box or bring it to the shop and receive 10% off your next order . Limit one per customer. Expires April 30, 2021.

Ben Berman had a pizza party scheduled with his friends, then the pandemic hit. Although he canceled the party, he didn’t cancel the pizza. He bought 40 yards of thick string from Amazon and constructed a pulley system by his window, just so he could safely lower fresh, hot pizza into the hands of his friends.

“This was just about making my friends smile. I can be self- conscious about whether my pizzas are good enough, but I knew at least if I dropped it out of the window, people would get a kick out of them,” Berman told TODAY Food. But instead of stopping there, the young chef decided to do something phenomenal. He kept making pizza and sent every cent of his earnings to charity. His passion for cooking evolved into a booming nonprofit called Philabundance that has raised over $30,000 to fight food insecurity and homelessness in Philadelphia. “It felt like food security and homelessness needed even a bigger boost this year. And these places in Philly were moving the needle,” Berman said about Philabundance. What led him to start this nonprofit? Raised in Portland, Maine, Berman and his connection with cooking started with his mother, Kerri. “My mom, who’s an amazing cook, taught me about food as a love language and a driving force to connect people. I’m never as comfortable as when I am with friends around a dinner table.” In high school, he worked in local restaurant kitchens, and, by 2012, he launched his own food truck called Mainely Burgers. He sold the company two years later, which included two trucks serving sandwiches and burgers, although one of them focused on homemade ice cream and root beer floats. Berman has never had formal training as a chef. Instead, he’s learned about producing food on a larger scale through experience. Although he is pursuing an MBA at the University of Pennsylvania, Berman is cooking again — for hundreds of strangers this time! Berman gets so many requests that he’s created a lottery system. With over 900 requests every week, 20 are randomly selected for pickup on Sunday nights. Hey, it’s a nonprofit organization operated from a second story apartment by a busy MBA student nonetheless! Without a doubt, this is one of the most amazing gigs that anyone could create for themselves.

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INSIDE How My Neighbors Made Easter Extra Fun

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Marathon Mom Finds It Easier to Juggle Life With October Kitchen

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Word Search

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We Want to Hear From You!

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A Pulley That Raises Both Pizza and Charity Funds

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Top 3 Mental Health Books to Check Out

In Honor of Libraries and Mental Health! TOP 3 BOOKS YOU’LL WANT TO CHECK OUT

‘This Is Depression: A Comprehensive, Compassionate Guide for Anyone Who Wants to Understand Depression’ by Dr. Diane McIntosh Are you completely lost about what depression is exactly? Is it a clinical or emotional issue or both? Whether for a loved one’s sake or your own, this book can give you a thorough understanding of depression that a simple Google search simply can’t offer. You’ll love Dr. Diane McIntosh’s evidence-based approach to showing the causes, impact and treatment of depression. Even if your local library is still closed due to the pandemic, we hope you check one of these — or any book — out! And if you have a great book recommendation, we’d love to hear it. Have a wonderful, book-filled April, friends.

ourselves are often the reason we feel depressed — and, luckily, solutions exist. Even Elton John loves the book, saying, “If you have ever been down, or felt lost, this amazing book will change your life. Do yourself a favor — read it now.” ‘Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Made Simple: 10 Strategies for Managing Anxiety, Depression, Anger, Panic and Thankfully, you can practice cognitive behavioral therapy on yourself in a few ways. Start your healing process today with this easy-to-understand yet medically sophisticated workbook, which contains 10 soothing strategies like setting goals, maintaining mindfulness and more. You can also use this workbook in tandem with clinical cognitive behavioral therapy or post-therapy. Worry’ by Seth J. Gillihan, Ph.D. Too anxious to go into therapy?

No matter where you or a loved one are in your mental health journey, books can provide new insights through someone else’s experiences or the medical field’s scientific understanding of mental health. So, in honor of National Library Week (April 4–10) and National Librarian Day (April 16), let’s open up a few contemporary, definitive works on mental health to celebrate books and their availability through our public libraries. ‘Lost Connections: Uncovering the Real Causes of Depression — and the Unexpected Solutions’ by Johann Hari This is one of the most recent mental health books that shocked the world. Featuring interviews with experts across the world, Hari shares his personal quest to understand depression and concrete reasons we experience it. He’s found that certain lost connections with

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