BRATTLEBORO — Carolyn Piesiak tells the story of how her son, state Treasurer Mike Piesiak, made peanut butter, jelly and fluff sandwiches long before they made their way into Vermont's financial ledgers.
But the 78-year-old Brattleboro resident wants to eat more of the buffet-style meals she orchestrated as the founding leader of St. Bridget's, one of the area's largest soup kitchens.
“They say chicken is cooked at 165 degrees,” she said at the beginning of a recent interview. “However, dark-colored meat won't be fully cooked that way, so we cook it at 175 to 185 degrees until it falls off the bone.”
Pieciak, who has been communicating these facts for 40 years, will step down as Lunch Spot's director. She broke the news one day this month when she welcomed dozens of people to her Walnut Street dining room.
“Probably the biggest misconception is that they're all homeless,” she says. “Instead, 76% are low-income seniors who have worked all their lives, lived on Social Security, and are struggling.”
When we spoke to Pieciak colleagues across the state, they reported similar customer changes.
Times have changed since Piesiak was a Catholic high school girl in West Springfield, Massachusetts, during the post-World War II economic boom.
“I distinctly remember feeling that God wanted me to work for the poor,” she said.
Piesiak, who moved to Brattleboro in 1970, was chairing the Peace and Justice Committee at the local St. Michael Catholic Church when he noticed an increase in the number of visitors the pastor was requesting for food.
“A lot of people didn't see the need for it,” she recalls.
Because the people seeking help were either transients riding trains along the nearby railroad tracks or former mental health patients holed up in their apartments after being released from the Brattleboro shelter. .
Piesiak and her fellow volunteers quickly began raising money, ordering and procuring food, and setting up a cooking and serving space in the church's former convent.
Then came the hard part.
“We had the biggest fight because we had to decide on a name for the kitchen,” Piesiak said. “Someone wanted St. Francis Bread's House. Martha's had a bad reputation, so someone else wanted Martha's Kitchen.”
The Bible says that Martha anxiously prepared a meal for Jesus, but was instead told to stop and soak in Jesus' teachings, but that's another story. During the discussion, someone reminded me of St. Bridget, Ireland's patron saint, known for her benevolence and charity.
“Everyone loved it,” Pieciak said.
The newly named soup kitchen opened on St. Patrick's Day in 1982. We were soon serving an average of 24 people. Among them was the local coal shoveler, who always came with bright hands.
“We thought this was a temporary solution, but we didn't expect it to last,” Pieciak said. “Things weren't great then, but they're terrible today.”
St Brigid's currently feeds over 200 people every Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday lunchtime, with around 100 volunteers preparing a total of 45,000 meals a year.
“It's like catering a big wedding four days a week,” Piesiak said.
The influx of local elderly customers reflects the situation across the state. An estimated 8% of Vermont's seniors are considered to be “food insecure,” according to the “Hunger among America's Elderly” report by the national hunger relief organization Feeding America.
“We know that inflation and rising food prices are hitting people on fixed incomes hard,” said John Sayles, CEO of the Vermont Food Bank. “It’s not just Vermont’s seniors, it’s working families as well.”
Pieciak credits food banks with helping her with food and funds to purchase kitchen supplies. That said, she believes St. Brigid's College benefits most from something else.
“I wouldn't have been able to stay here if I didn't have a strong faith that God is doing most of the work here,” Piesiak said. “Sometimes we shouldn't have been successful. We did something wrong and we worried about what was going to happen. And then it took care of itself.”
Consider the building's recent $250,000 renovation. Or when volunteers instituted COVID-19 safety protocols and kept kitchens open for grab-and-go meals during the pandemic.
Pieciak remembers getting calls from his three grown children asking him to close the store.
“This went on for weeks,” she recalls. Brigid has been watching over us for years and she certainly has no plans to stop now. ” That's why I think we were truly blessed. Without that, I don't think I would have been able to do it as long or as well as I did. ”
Now, her son had nothing but good words for his mother when he spoke at a recent local committee on poverty.
“Thank you for all the work you have done for the Brattleboro community,” the treasurer said as the audience applauded her.
When she's not dedicating her time to her husband, children, grandchildren and “a German shepherd in need,” Piechuk plans to continue volunteering regularly. Meanwhile, the three people needed to take over her position continue to request a list of everything that entails.
“You just have to have kindness and empathy for the people who show up,” she replies. “If there's anything we need right now, it's those two things.”
