Twenty local restaurants teamed with Nourishing Newton, the Charles River Regional Chamber’s Food assistance program, to donate over 2,000 meals to residents facing food insecurity in April and May.
Launched in 2021 during the pandemic, the program has just finished its fifth year distributing food throughout Newton in a partnership of 20 restaurants that prepared the meals and four volunteers from the Rotary Club of Newton who helped with the deliveries. The Charles River Regional Chamber recruited the restaurants and organized the program.
“It was like a little love letter from the community back to other people in the community,” said Karen Masterson, co-owner of Johnny’s Luncheonette and Cabot’s Ice Cream and Restaurant, about the Nourishing Newton Program, for which her restaurants have prepared meals since the program’s inception.
This year Masterson said her restaurants prepared comfort foods like chicken thighs with rice and vegetables, aiming to create something that is nutritious, reheatable, and delicious to best provide for the needs of the recipients of the meals.
“I just think feeding each other is a wonderful part of being in a community together […] Oftentimes the programs that are set up to provide food to people, they don’t necessarily have a prepared local meal,” said Masterson about the value of donating restaurant-style prepared foods.
Nourishing Newton is funded by a state grant that was secured by Massachusetts State Senator Cynthia Creem. In a budget amendment. Sen. Creem advocated for $50,000 to be allocated to the Charles River Regional Chamber to run the Nourishing Newton program in 2025 and for $65,000 to be allocated for Nourishing Newton in 2026.
“Food insecurity remains a challenge for many families, seniors, and individuals on fixed incomes. Nourishing Newton has proven to be a cost-effective way to meet those needs while also keeping restaurant kitchens active and workers employed. It’s an important solution that we’re proud to have funded every year since the pandemic started,” said Sen. Creem in an email.
Other communities in Sen. Creem’s district, including Brookline and Wellesley, have their own ‘Nourishing’ programs. “[The program] ensures that residents – particularly older adults, lower-income individuals, and anyone in need – have access to healthy, prepared meals,” said Sen. Creem.
These efforts are also supported by Newton’s Rotary Club, which has been involved with the program since 2021, having delivered a total of 16,260 meals, said Alexandra French, board secretary of the Rotary Club of Newton. “Serving people who are in need and helping out our local food pantries and restaurants is an incredible feeling,” said French in an email. The Rotary coordinated with restaurants to have volunteers pick up meals and drop them off at food pantries each week during the program’s duration, ensuring that people who need the meals get them.
The Greater Boston Food Bank reported that in 2024 Newton’s food insecurity rate was 14%. Meals distributed through the Nourishing Newton program play a crucial role in providing for food-insecure households.
Greg Reibman, president and CEO of the Charles River Regional Chamber, said that the Nourishing Newton program came about from a conversation with Sen. Creem when the pandemic was greatly impacting restaurants and people’s ability to go out for food. “We came up with this idea that, what if we got some state money to buy meals from restaurants so the restaurants could have that guaranteed revenue, and then we would deliver those meals to those who have needs,” said Reibman.
During the pandemic, when restaurants were struggling to stay in business, the program provided for both people in need of food and local businesses that were not sure they were going to receive any customers: “It was extremely important during the pandemic […] It was disastrous for many, many restaurants […] to know that we had [only] a few orders. [The program] was really meaningful, and it just showed that there was concern around whether restaurants were going to survive,” said Masterson.
Restaurants continue to face hardship, and despite coming out of the pandemic, the food assistance program remains beneficial to both Newton’s restaurants and the greater community.
The program’s timing this year also supported Masterson’s Newton Centre business revenue during the construction of the Newton Centre Langley parking lot. “You never know what challenges are going to arise, and as it would have it, this Nourishing Newton program rolled out at the same time that we were experiencing sales reductions because of the parking lot construction,” said Masterson about the continued positive impact of the program on local businesses.
“The organizations who are distributing the food, they mention how meaningful this is for their recipients,” said Masterson, adding that getting served food is an experience that many people in the Newton community may not get the chance to do often, if at all. “I think it’s just a really important way that the community connects within itself, and everybody benefits,” she said.
