A big thank you to the folks at Healthy Living Market in South Burlington!
Spectrum and Healthy Living were featured in the Burlington Free Press today. Here is the article written by Julia Melloni, Free Press Correspondent, “Spectrum, cooks up a deal with Healthy Living.”
At Spectrum One Stop on Pearl Street in Burlington young adults have had the luxury of eating fresh meals from Healthy Living Natural Foods Market for the past couple of months. Through the end of April, Healthy Living staff will volunteer to prepare and serve nutritious foods for the at-risk youths who visit the safe haven.
Healthy Living owners Katy Lesser and her adult children Eli Lesser-Goldsmith and Nina Lesser-Goldsmith changed their donation habits this year by contributing food and services rather than cash to Spectrum.
Friday, Healthy Living staff served taco salad made with rice and beans, lettuce and tortilla chips. Wellison Leal, 21, from Winooski enjoyed his taco salad and said he tries to stop in for lunch and dinner most days at One Stop.
“I don’t usually like to eat healthy food because I don’t like vegetables,” Leal said, “but this is an awesome meal today, especially after I added the hot sauce.”
For the past 22 years, Lesser has owned Healthy Living and donated money to different nonprofit organizations in the community. This program has stretched the business because planning the meals has taken creativity and budgetary planning.
“We tailor our meals to kids so we know serving chicken and mashed potatoes is going to be a hit,” Lesser said.
Mark Redmond, Executive Director of Spectrum Youth and Family Services, said the partnership with Healthy Living has been a vision and a dream come true.
“The relationship has changed the way we look at food, how we eat food,” Redmond said. “It’s nice to go beyond grilled cheese. With what we know about kids and obesity, this is an incredible opportunity to teach our young people how to cook and eat better.”
Redmond said Spectrum staff will be adding what they’ve learned from Healthy Living to the Life Skills curriculum they offer for youth when the Healthy Living partnership ends in April.
S.O.S. offers at-risk youth a place to stay, do laundry, take a shower or eat a meal in exchange for simple chores performed by the youth, such as washing the windows, cleaning up the kitchen or taking out the trash, Street Outreach Coordinator Justin Verette said.
“The first couple of times volunteers stuck to warming up and serving food. After that they started sitting down and hanging out with the youth, playing music and making a connection with the kids,” Verette said.
Verette said making connections with kids is imperative and often leads to making referrals for them to counselors for eating disorders, substance abuse or for medical issues.
Claire Marton, 20, didn’t plan on staying at One Stop but she said the experience has taught her a lot and she has made some solid friendships.
“The folks from Healthy Living are amazing and they provide an eclectic menu, like last week they made these amazing root vegetables,” Marton said. “I volunteer making meals at Dismiss House once a week and now I’m giving back what I’ve learned about healthy food and service.”
