Maine Mental Health Connections - Food Pantry & Soup Kitchen

We began our Together Place Food Pantry back in the 80's when we first opened our doors with the intention of providing as many resources to those we serve as we could. We have since then continued to grow both our Soup Kitchen and Food Pantry while seeking out as many resources as we could find, from becoming an established USDA Food Pantry to obtaining membership at Good Shepherd Food Bank, which allowed us to purchase many products there at greatly reduced prices from that of a retail supermarket. We have picked up towns and cities that we serve over the past few years as food banks have closed down due to lack of resources and funding. We now serve Bangor, Brewer, Eddington, Hermon, Glenburn and Veazie. We do receive USDA commodities and limited FEMA funding, but we are always needing additional resources to fund the consistently growing needs from those in the community we serve. This huge need is due to many unfortunate circumstance that people have had to deal with in their lives, from losing their employment to just not making enough money to feed their family and pay that light bill. We are a "choice pantry" offering a choice moving on through each food category that we are able to offer so that the individual nutritional needs of the client are matched best from the selection available. A food pantry participant can expect staple items like cereal, soup, juice, vegetables, fruit, pasta, sauce, and prepared meals in a can such as stew or chili. In addition, we provide milk, eggs, meat, fresh produce, and bread as supplies lasts and funding is available. There are giving guidelines based on the size of the household and USDA income guideline Bread, produce and pastry arranged in an open-market style every Wednesday from 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. Soup Kitchen: Our Soup Kitchen is open every Monday and Friday from 11:30 - 1:00. We prepare all meals fresh and home made and work with the resources we have on hand to provide a filling delicious hot meal always consisting of as many things on the food pyramid as we can obtain. Many hours go into food prep and cooking and cleaning to make these meals happen. Both the food Pantry and the Soup Kitchen would not exist if not for the assistance of consistent volunteers.