Woodlands Community Garden: Growing Alternatives

Woodlands Community Garden Pop Up Café host a tasty evening of short films, spoken word, comedy and seasonal food tasting. A fresh approach to challenging food poverty and austerity – veg we can!

Programme
7pm: Introduction and Welcome - (Irina Martin Community Development Worker, Woodlands Community Garden)
7.05: About Woodlands Community Garden: Short Films - 2010 Building the garden (3 mins) & 2015 Lifting the lid (5 mins)
7.15: Food Poverty is No Joking Matter – comedy and spoken word featuring Viv Gee
7.35: Growing Alternatives - Solidarity Not Charity: Community Organising in Greece (Reel News, 2012, 22 mins), Woodlands Community Garden’s Pop-Up Café (2015, 2 mins)
8pm: Q&A discussion and campaign shout outs
8.20: Reading of Woodlands Community Garden Songs
8.30: Soup Taster

About Woodlands Community Garden’s Pop-Up-Café
“The food here is shared and in that sharing we are all made to feel equal"
“The food is brilliant and the staff are amazing"
"It’s inspirational to see what you are doing"

Since December 2013 Woodlands Community Garden have been running a free weekly pop up community cafe to tackle food poverty and reduce social isolation. We offer an alternative model to most food banks - one which centres around a shared meal rather than dried food parcels. Our Cafe not only provides access to good, fresh, and healthy food, it also actively breaks down the stigma often associated with accessing food charity. The food we serve is freshly cooked, healthy and sourced locally, including ingredients grown directly at our community garden. Meals are cooked by local volunteers who are supported by two part-time community food workers, Irina and Soghra. There is a great international flavour to our menus, which are comparable to those of top quality restaurants.

Volunteers also provide “front of house” support to people at the cafe, and ensure that it is a really welcoming and friendly place. More in-depth help is provided at the cafes from local support and advice agencies. We do not have referral criteria, vouchers or limits on the number of times people can attend as such conditions reinforce the stigma of accessing food aid.

The Community Cafe takes place every Monday evening, 5.30pm - 7.30pm at Fred Paton Centre, 19 Carrington Street, Glasgow, G4 9AJ.

For more info, get in touch via woodlandscommunityfood@gmail.com or visit www.woodlandscommunitygarden.org.uk

Woodlands Community Garden Café project is supported by Foundation Scotland, Bank of Scotland Foundation, Hugh Fraser Foundation and Capacity and Resilience Fund.