Greenwood House seeks volunteers to deliver kosher meals-on-wheels
Together in the kitchen at Greenwood House are, from left, Joan Kritz, Darlene
Goodwin, Joe Rogoff, and Rudy Loewenstein. Photo by Marilyn Silverstein
Greenwood House is looking for a few good volunteers. The agency, which runs the Robert and Natalie Marcus Home for the Jewish Aged and the Abrams Residence assisted-living facility on its Ewing campus, has also been serving the wider community through its kosher meals-on-wheels program for the past 23 years.
But over the years, the corps of volunteers needed to deliver the meals has dwindled down to a precious few, according to Joan Kritz, director of social services.
"We desperately need volunteers, because our volunteers are getting older – as much as they would love to keep doing it," Kritz said as she sat in a meeting room at the nursing facility.
"I sent out a letter to all the rabbis in Mercer County, but I didn't get any calls," she said. "I also placed ads in synagogue bulletins. But we don't get people calling up anymore. It requires people who don't have young children and who don't need to work. It's not easy these days."
Sitting with Kritz were Darlene Goodwin, director of the dietary department at Greenwood House for the past 21 years, and two of Kritz's most seasoned volunteers – 85-year-old Rudy Loewenstein of Ewing, who has been delivering kosher meals-on-wheels for 11 years, and 81-year-old Joe Rogoff of Ewing, who has been making the appointed rounds for 16 years.
"I've done over 10,000 meals myself – way over," said Rogoff, a retired electrical engineer. He noted that he has clocked as much as 85 miles in one day as he makes his deliveries. "Within the last year, I've gone from Titusville to Scotch Road, Ewing, Lawrenceville, Lawrence Township, downtown Trenton, Chambersburg, Mercerville, Princeton Junction, and Princeton."
As he drives his route, the thing that drives Rogoff is gratitude toward Greenwood House.
"It's give back," he said with emotion. "My mother and father were here."
For Loewenstein, a retired food inspector, delivering the meals-on-wheels is kind of a busman's holiday: He used to run an egg route for 25 years.
"I would say it's a labor of love," he said. "It's very gratifying when you see some of these people. They just wouldn't be able to get out at all.
"I feel very strong about it," he added. "I feel these people have to eat. I feel wonderful about it. These people get a good meal. The food is very good and tasty and nourishing."
At any given time, Greenwood House is serving 20 to 25 people with kosher meals-on-wheels, Kritz said. "We will deliver to anyone in need, whether or not they require kosher," she said. "It's really a lifeline for some of them."
The agency delivers meals five days a week, and also oversees a two-day-a-week subsidiary operation being run in the Windsors, Hightstown, Plainsboro, and Princeton by the Jewish Family and Children's Service of Greater Mercer County. For a fee of $5 per day, each client receives one hot meal, complete with salad, drink, and dessert, and one lighter meal.
"We're doing all of the paperwork," Kritz said. "Our kitchen is making the meals and packaging the meals."
And that can add up, Goodwin noted. "On the regular route, they're delivering 87 hot main meals and 62 light meals per week," the dietary director said. Add to that the 26 meals each week for the JFCS route, and the 65 meals for the Kosher Café that meets every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday at Woodbrook House in Ewing – plus all the meals for the 132-bed home for the aged and the 20-bed assisted-living facility at Greenwood House – and you're talking about 900-plus meals every day.
"It's a lot of meals," Goodwin said. "We do our very best. When you're dealing with that many meals, it is a great deal of work. Our first cook comes in at 5:30 in the morning and our last one leaves at 7:30 at night."
When it comes to kosher meals-on-wheels, Kritz pointed out, Greenwood House is the only game in town. The nearest other provider, in Philadelphia, delivers only frozen meals, she said. "So we're the only people who deliver hot meals five days a week."
And the delivery is dependable, according to Loewenstein, who also schedules the volunteers. "We do have a very reliable route. We never miss anyone," he said.
For example, he said, one day last winter, when he showed up to deliver meals during a bad snowstorm, the staff at Greenwood House insisted on providing him with a driver and a van, rather than having him drive by himself. But at the first stop, the van stalled in the snow. Then Richard Goldstein, executive director of Greenwood House, came to the rescue.
"Mr. Goldstein came out in his four-wheel drive and both of us went out and finished up," Loewenstein said. "There was never a day when we did not deliver."
For information about volunteering for the kosher meals-on-wheels program at Greenwood House, call Kritz at 609-883-5391, ext. 120.
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