The Soup Kitchen’s mission is to support the wellbeing of our community, both on and off campus, through affordable, convenient, nutritious and tasty food.
To support this ethos, Hiranya Anderson from the Department of Linguistics and the team of chefs at the Soup Kitchen have cooked up a great idea on how we can all do our part to give back to the University community.
The ‘Pay It Forward’ campaign encourages patrons of the Soup Kitchen to share the soup love and perform a small gesture of generosity by ‘shouting a soup’ to those in need of a delicious and nutritious meal.
The logistics are pretty simple: anyone can approach the Soup Kitchen asking to purchase a ‘Pay It Forward’ soup. The soup is then paid for and they are given a post-it note to write their message of support to a person in need. The post-it note is then kept on display at the Soup Kitchen until it is redeemed.
Anyone in need can ask for one of these soups. The system relies on trust and honesty, but the redemption can be for any reason at all: perhaps someone forgot their lunch, is stressed with work or exams, or just needs to have something brighten their day.
“This last week has been amazing,” said Executive Head Chef, Peter Brewty. “We have received such great support from staff and students on campus in just our first week and now have a whole wall of ‘Pay It Forward’ soups to give away!”
Often, eating a healthy, substantial meal is not a priority among many at Macquarie, due to time, cost or other restrictions. The Soup Kitchen wants to change this, one soup at a time, and show that it is important as a community to band together to perform more random acts of kindness to support those in need or just bring a smile to someone’s face.