MOUNT PLEASANT NEIGHBOURHOOD HOUSE
a small framed elderly person with a big smile hidden behind a protective face mask laughing while holding a tromboncino squash as tall as her. there are more squashes on her right side. in the background is an industrial dishwasherand with steel countertops. all the surfaces are full of cardboard boxes and produce
Shirley holding a tromboncino squash ↗ grown at Garden Don’t Care in Summer of 2020.
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a 40 Litre stockpot on the stove steaming with bone broth and a small saucepan with taro chipps inside being deep fried a 30 litres pot with tomato and chorizo based strew with chickpeas four 20 liters icecream buckets full of soup on a cart. behind the cart is Vivienna in a long sleeve jackt and their face is hidden behind a peeled squash. kitchen prepping station of carrots. a sink is in the background. and two bowls and one hotel pan. there are washed and peeled carrots in one bowl, carrot tops in another and quartered 4 inch long carrots in one bowl. a knfe and cutting board in the foreground. total of 20 kilograms or so of carrots. prepping station of brussel sprouts, one bowl of washed, one bowl of peels, and one bowl of halfed veggies with a cutting board and person in medical gloves cutting in the middle. the quantity is large, around 20 kilograms fried taro chips resting in a bowl with paper towls absorbing the grease. about the quantity of a large bag of chips. 20 or so fresh fried falafels on a plate, with a green dipping suace next to it. the fry oil is cooling in the background on the same surface 3 hotel pan trays of creamy fluid soaking over the weekend waiting for the first kitchen volunteer shift of the week to clean it a raw turkey lathered butter and herbs with a digital thermometer stuck inside it reading 6.3 degrees celcius 40 litre pot of soup with floating chicken, penne pasta, tomatoes, carrots and oil floating. the pot is full to the brim. 20 litre brasier pot with majority of white beans with some black beans inside, forming a lightly starchy bean side. a roasted turkey with browned onions on lots of fat on the bottom of the pan 40 litre pot full of peeled potatoes standing on the countertop 40 litre pot full of peeled potatoes standing on the countertop brown juices and bottom of the pan scrapings from two roasting pans of turkeys tomato, turmeric and paprika based sauce in a 40 litre pot with red oil swirls, and freshly added cream swirling into the base an industrial gas cooker with 6 stove tops, one griller and two large ovens. there are 2 big aluminum pots on the stoves. a 5 foot long squash ready to be peeled and prepped for soup making on the countertop. there is a cutting board half the size of the sqush and knives and a peepler. under the counter, there are hundreds of cutlery and tableware on carts. Vivienne posing in front of two full turkeys that have been seasoned prepped with fruit underneath.
Views from the Christmas meals 🥶
 A 40 litre pot of minced meat, mixed with a metal spoon by a hand with gloves. there are seasoning bottles of oil, salt, hot suace and vinegars in the background 8 hotel pans of scalloped potatoes laid out on the counter. 2 hotel pans of sauces cooking in their own fat, about 30 sausages per tray minced meat with fresh cherry tomatoes halved in a 40 litre pot, seasoned with herbs. to be used for bolognese sauce.
As a part of Looking at the Garden Fence project, Grayson, Anita, Derya, Vivienne and Salem volunteered at the Mt Pleasant Neighbourhood House between September 2020 - February 2021 for their Covid Emergency Response Meal Delivery Plan. The shifts were two days a week, and we needed to produce 200 meals per shift.

“Staff meal” has been a central part of our gardening & work party practice. As covid restrictions made it pretty hard to get to know the people that worked in the neighbourhood house, we started cooking a separate fun/deep fried dish for all of the staff and it made a place for people to chat, share recipes, and get to know each other.
Mount Pleasant Neighbourhood House (MPNH) ↗ is an integral part of the diverse, vibrant, and most multicultural neighbourhood in Vancouver. We envision ourselves as a community thriving in connection, celebration, engagement and leadership.

We began serving the community in 1976 with a youth leadership program that we ran from the basement of a local church, and added our second program, free income tax clinics, from a mobile trailer in 1977. Later that year, we moved to our first storefront building in the 500 block of East Broadway.

Finally, in 1995, we set up house in the spacious building we currently occupy at the busy corner of Broadway and Prince Albert. Our dedicated and engaged staff provide programs and services for more than 3,000 people annually, from more than 40 countries of origin. We work with a wide range of funders, community partners, as well as a strong volunteer base to offer community-oriented events and activities that meet the needs of the neighbourhood’s always changing population.