A Toronto woman noticed how lonely and isolated she and her neighbours working from home were becoming, so she came up with a way to connect with them through food in a distanced fashion: by delivering soup.
Soup just has that comforting quality and is super easy to reheat even if you're juggling Zoom calls, a million emails, pet or child care and so many other at-home distractions. Colleen Cavanaugh started up Harvest Moon Kitchen to get that liquid goodness to her neighbours in the Roncesvalles neighbourhood.
"Some months into the pandemic, feeling lonely and isolated, I reached out to my neighbours with an idea to connect to them through my own cooking. I discovered a desire among many of them for comforting, healthy, and easy to prepare, while working from home, soups," Cavanaugh told blogTO.
"I've wanted to connect to people through my own food for quite a while and when I realized that the restaurant I managed downtown wouldn't be staying open during this lockdown, it seemed the timing was right. Inspired by my late mother's cooking and her love for Neil Young, Harvest Moon Kitchen was created."
Cavanaugh is a certified sommelier and restaurant manager with 20 years of experience, who most recently was the General Manager for John and Sons Oyster House in the Financial District.
She's made soups like butternut squash, tom yum, roasted tomato basil, cauliflower broccoli, mushroom, chicken noodle and more, and it doesn't stop there: she also makes and delivers items like chutneys, pickled radishes, and chia pudding which she describes as "an a.m. soup."
"The response has been incredible. Now on the playground at lunch parents are asking what the next soup with be. They tell me how a jar of my soup comforted a sick friend or was gifted for a birthday. It makes my day to know that something I created can help someone feel good and it gives me a new sense of optimism for the future," says Cavanaugh.
It's a sense of optimism and a way of connecting socially that benefits both Cavanaugh and her customers/neighbours, as she's as deep in the trenches of managing a family and working out of her home as they are.
"I'll be researching recipes while my son is participating in virtual learning and answering DM's while standing in line at the local coffee shop. Yesterday I made deliveries to my neighbours with my son in the sled, waving to his little buddies along the way," says Cavanaugh.
To order from Harvest Moon Kitchen, just review the weekly posted menu, send a DM, wait for confirmation, then pay by e-transfer and focus on killing it at that WFH life while you wait for your soup to be delivered.
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