In the now quiet Space of Mind building in Delray Beach, Blake Malatesta’s mind is full throttle carefully crafting menus.
“It’s about trying to get our passions out and putting our heart on a plate,” says Malatesta.
His latest passion through the nonprofit, Community Classroom Project is called the, “One for One Meal Box,” empowering you to put together tasty entrees like sweet potato curry and chicken thigh schnitzel, and then share one with the community for free.
In the six weeks since it started it’s already a big hit with families like Andrea Sheikh’s.
“We started immediately when they came out and we’ve been hooked,” says Sheikh.
Chef Malatesta says the meals are designed to be more than basic.
Sheikh agrees, “We’ve had Greek we’ve had Indian we’ve had Chinese we love having exposure to the different cultures and what’s really fun is that you can also do a math lesson and do some different measuring with the kids and they really start to learn.”
The boxes are also a lesson in kindness too for each box sold the community classroom project will donate one to a family in need.
Chef Malatesta says, “It’s the right thing to do to help just a little bit. I don’t have this I don’t have that oh well I can do this for somebody and with enough of that you just get this tremendous snowball that starts knocking down barriers.”
So far they’ve donated more than two hundred, benefiting a different nonprofit each week.
Those supporting him like Sheikh say the best meals are made for sharing, “We want to have community how are we going to connect we’re connecting through food we’re connecting through helping other communities through the classroom kitchen and we’re also supporting small business that we want to be there when we come back from the situation we’re in.”
For more info on how you can support the One for One Food Box Program head to their website https://yourccp.org/community-classroom-kitchen/.