For the past six years’ a dedicated group of youth volunteers in Summerville, South Carolina have come together to focus their energy on ending hunger one vegetable garden, one harvest, one dinner, one meal at a time at Katie’s Krops Dinners. This amazing group of children devoted 628 hours preparing and serving 2,347 meals at 12 dinners in 2016. We need your support to help continue to serve healthy free meals to individuals and families in need in our community in 2017.
The concept is simple. Youth volunteers grow vegetable gardens where the whole harvest is donated to feed people in need. Once a month our youth volunteers gather their harvest and prepare a healthy meal for anyone in need under the direction of a volunteer head chef. The menu is based on the harvest in the gardens, and what they cannot grow they purchase. The meals are served at Summerville Baptist Church in the Fellowship Hall and on average our young crew serves 195 meals per dinner. The guests of the dinner are families in our own community battling food insecurity, homelessness, life altering medical diagnosis, unemployment and families who need additional support at the end of the month as food stamps run out.
The Katie’s Krops Dinner was started by Katie Stagliano, Founder of Katie’s Krops when she was only 12-years-old. When the only full-time soup kitchen in Summerville was forced to suddenly shut their doors for financial reasons Katie knew she needed to do something to help fill the void for families struggling in Summerville and the Tri County Area. With tremendous support from community members Katie has been able to serve Katie’s Krops Dinner for over 6 years without missing a single month. We hope that can continue in 2017.
We are currently seeking 2017 Katie’s Krops Dinner sponsors. You can sponsor a dinner for only $250 dollars. That is less than $1.30 a meal. These miraculous children have become very savvy in budgeting and are able to provide a healthy, well balanced meal for a large number of people at a small cost.
Katie’s Krops is a 501c3 and your donation is tax-deductible and can be made via check or on-line using our support our cause link at the top of the page. Checks can be mailed to:
Katie’s Krops
PO BOx 1841
Summerville, SC.
29484
If you have any questions, or if you would like to request to sponsor the Katie’s Krops Dinner for a specific month please contact Stacy at 843-327-3366 or Stacy@KatiesKrops.com.
Also if you like you are welcome to join us and help at the dinner that you sponsor. Thank you in advance for your support. And thank you for empowering youth in our community to end hunger, one garden, one harvest, one dinner, one meal at a time. If you ever know of a family in need who we can help, please do not hesitate to reach out.
Join us for the first Katie’s Krops Garden-to-Table Dinner of 2017 in Summerville, South Carolina. The dinner will be held on Thursday, January 26th at 6pm at Summerville, Baptist Church located at 417 Central Avenue in Summerville. The dinner is always hot, healthy and free. Everyone is welcome. Doors to the Fellowship Hall open at 5:30pm and the dinner will be served at 6pm. Our young Katie’s Krops Crew has a wonderful menu planned to kick off the new year. The dinner is limited to 200 guests. Please spread the word and help us end hunger.
We are excited to celebrate six wonderful years of Katie’s Krops Garden to Table Dinners. The 6th Anniversary Dinner will be held on Thursday, October 20th at 6pm at Summerville Baptist Church. This will be an extra special dinner that you do not want to miss. Our dinners are always free.
The Katie’s Krops Dinner started 6 years ago when the only full-time soup kitchen in Summerville shut down. Knowing that indivduals and families in her community needed healthy meals Katie gathered her friends, teachers and head of food service and started free garden-to-table dinners. Over the course of six years our young volunteers have served thousands of meals and created lasting friendships with the guests who attend the dinner.
If you would like to help make this dinner extra special please contact Katie@KatiesKrops.com We would like to extend an extra special thank you to our friends at Summerville Baptist Church for welcoming us into their home and partnering with us to end hunger.
Though proud of her new ventures and accolades, Katie’s focus has remained the same: to end hunger garden by garden.
“My vision is to have 500 gardens in all 50 states, and then I’d love to start Katie’s Krops internationally,” she says. “I know when you put all our growers together — no matter how large or small their efforts — we’re making a huge impact.”
Over the past 20 years, the Sodexo Stop Hunger Movement has been a leading force in the fight against hunger and has empowered leaders to grow communities across America like this one in Charleston, SC.
This story starts with a single cabbage. But it wasn’t just any cabbage, however. It was a 40-pound cabbage, grown by a 9 year old girl named Katie Stagliano.
This young gardener donated that huge cabbage to her local soup kitchen, and it fed more than 275 people. Inspired by that experience, she started Katie’s Krops. The non-profit now has 100 gardens around the country, all grown by kids who are donating these healthy foods to feed the hungry in their communities.
Today, Katie is 17 years, but she’s still the youngest recipient of the University of California’s 30 Under 30 leaders in the food industry. (She was also the youngest recipient of the Clinton Global Citizen Award.) I had the pleasure of meeting Katie in my garden blogging work, and she was kind enough to allow me to interview her today for UC Food Observer.
Q) Congratulations on being named among University of California’s 30 Under 30. How does it feel to be called one of 30 young leaders making a difference in our food system?
Katie Stagliano: At 17 years old, it is an incredible honor to be named among the University of California’s 30 Under 30. If you would have asked me at nine years old, before I donated my cabbage to Tri County Family Ministries, what I imagined would grow from the donation of one cabbage, I could have never foreseen how much it would change my life.
I’m so blessed to be on this journey. I hope that by being named among 30 Under 30 it will show others that age is just a number, never an obstacle. You can do anything that you set your heart to.
Q) In 2015 there were 83 Katie’s Krops gardens growing across the United States. What are the current numbers for 2016? Did you ever expect the program would grow so quickly? Why do you think this program has grown to include so many gardens?
Katie Stagliano: I’m very proud to say in 2016 that Katie’s Krops has 100 youth run gardens growing in 32 states across the United States. I could have never imagined how big Katie’s Krops would become, and how many people we have been able to provide fresh produce to at no charge.
I wholeheartedly believe that if it were not for the incredible and supportive people I’ve met along the way, who have believed in me and my dream, Katie’s Krops would not be at the level it is today.
I have found amazing kids across the United States who are passionate about ending hunger in their communities. We’ve come together and created a family of Katie’s Krops Growers. Working together I believe we can grow a healthy end to hunger, one vegetable garden at a time.
It is with great pride that we announce our Founder, Katie has been named to the The University of California inaugural Global Food Initiative 30 Under 30 Awards. The awards recognize 30 young pioneers and innovators trailblazing to solve the global food crisis by making extraordinary contributions in a wide array of food-related fields.The awards recognize individuals both inside and outside the UC system who have made outstanding contributions to a wide array of food-related fields, including food production, food access and security, food sourcing, food education and communication, and food policy and public impact. The awards are organized and bestowed by University of California President Janet Napolitano and the UC Global Food Initiative. We are proud to say, Katie is the youngest of the 30 recipients. Congratulations Katie!
https://30under30.universityofcalifornia.edu/winners/katie-stagliano/
