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Teens cook up treats to help feed the needy
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| From left; Rock County Youth2Youth members Becca Casique and Robin Engebretson spend Friday evening putting together plates of holiday baked goods. The two planned to donate 150 plates of home made goodies to ECHO’s food pantry. Staff photo by Hillary Gavan |
By Hillary Gavan
hgavan@beloitdailynews.com
The kitchen of a local teen has been steaming for months.
After witnessing the needy waiting for Thanksgiving baskets last year, several teens led a massive effort to help feed more than 150 families. Beloit Memorial High School students and Rock County Youth2Youth members Becca Casique, Robin Engebretson, Eric Starmes, Emily Starmes, Amber Ball, Steven Parker and Luz Renteria baked an array of Rice Krispies treats, date balls, banana bread, muffins, candied bark as well as no-bake, chocolate chip and peanut butter cookies.
“They worked their tails off,” said Rock County Youth2Youth Director Debbie Fischer.
“We set a goal because we know the unemployment rate is higher this year, so hopefully we can help more families,” Engebretson said.
On Friday evening the girls were working assembly-line-style in Casique’s living room in hopes of packing up at least 150 plates of goodies. The two were preparing to go Saturday morning with other Youth2Youth members to the Rock County Fairgrounds to hand out the Thanksgiving meals on behalf of ECHO’s food pantry.
ECHO, created in 1969, stands for Everyone Cooperating to Help Others, and is a non-profit serving low-income individuals and families. Every year its food pantry puts together a Thanksgiving meal for the needy, and this year 1,200 families are expected to line up at the fair grounds.
Casique said she’ll never forget the sight she saw last year when donating food at ECHO. The line of people stretched on and on, as they patiently waited for their baskets.
“They’ll be there for hours, even if they get there early,” Casique said.
Although the families were helped to an array of food, the home-made baked goods ran out midway, and some had to forgo treats.
“They saw the others and wished they could have some too,” Casique said.
Casique, who wants to open her own bakery one day, started baking on Nov. 7 with Engebretson and the other teens. Engebretson said she learned a lot about cooking from Casique who orchestrated the entire operation in her small kitchen. Over the next couple of months the teens were constantly running to the store to get more ingredients for Casique, and took turns endlessly cooking and washing dishes.
“Someone was always watching over the oven,” Casique said.
Casique stay up late with her friends struggling to stay awake.
“There were long nights, but you got through it,” she said.
Fischer said the two girls really took a leadership role in starting and finishing the project. Because Youth2Youth students get snacks during meetings from ECHO, the cooking was one way to give back to it, and a way for the kids to see a dose of reality.
“It could be any of us,” Fischer said.
“It makes you really realize what’s going on in our community and what people are going through,” Casique added.
There are 218 kids in Rock County Youth2Youth. It encourages young people to live free of tobacco, alcohol and other drugs.
Members do a variety of service projects on their own free will, and Fischer stressed it isn’t any kind of community service for bad behavior. On occasion Fischer said adults will come up to the kids and make comments about them needing to behave better. She wants the public to know that teenagers are engaged in positive behaviors of their own choosing, something paramount to the group’s mission.
“Teens do things out of the goodness of their heart all the time,” Fischer said.
hgavan@beloitdailynews.com
The kitchen of a local teen has been steaming for months.
After witnessing the needy waiting for Thanksgiving baskets last year, several teens led a massive effort to help feed more than 150 families. Beloit Memorial High School students and Rock County Youth2Youth members Becca Casique, Robin Engebretson, Eric Starmes, Emily Starmes, Amber Ball, Steven Parker and Luz Renteria baked an array of Rice Krispies treats, date balls, banana bread, muffins, candied bark as well as no-bake, chocolate chip and peanut butter cookies.
“They worked their tails off,” said Rock County Youth2Youth Director Debbie Fischer.
“We set a goal because we know the unemployment rate is higher this year, so hopefully we can help more families,” Engebretson said.
On Friday evening the girls were working assembly-line-style in Casique’s living room in hopes of packing up at least 150 plates of goodies. The two were preparing to go Saturday morning with other Youth2Youth members to the Rock County Fairgrounds to hand out the Thanksgiving meals on behalf of ECHO’s food pantry.
ECHO, created in 1969, stands for Everyone Cooperating to Help Others, and is a non-profit serving low-income individuals and families. Every year its food pantry puts together a Thanksgiving meal for the needy, and this year 1,200 families are expected to line up at the fair grounds.
Casique said she’ll never forget the sight she saw last year when donating food at ECHO. The line of people stretched on and on, as they patiently waited for their baskets.
“They’ll be there for hours, even if they get there early,” Casique said.
Although the families were helped to an array of food, the home-made baked goods ran out midway, and some had to forgo treats.
“They saw the others and wished they could have some too,” Casique said.
Casique, who wants to open her own bakery one day, started baking on Nov. 7 with Engebretson and the other teens. Engebretson said she learned a lot about cooking from Casique who orchestrated the entire operation in her small kitchen. Over the next couple of months the teens were constantly running to the store to get more ingredients for Casique, and took turns endlessly cooking and washing dishes.
“Someone was always watching over the oven,” Casique said.
Casique stay up late with her friends struggling to stay awake.
“There were long nights, but you got through it,” she said.
Fischer said the two girls really took a leadership role in starting and finishing the project. Because Youth2Youth students get snacks during meetings from ECHO, the cooking was one way to give back to it, and a way for the kids to see a dose of reality.
“It could be any of us,” Fischer said.
“It makes you really realize what’s going on in our community and what people are going through,” Casique added.
There are 218 kids in Rock County Youth2Youth. It encourages young people to live free of tobacco, alcohol and other drugs.
Members do a variety of service projects on their own free will, and Fischer stressed it isn’t any kind of community service for bad behavior. On occasion Fischer said adults will come up to the kids and make comments about them needing to behave better. She wants the public to know that teenagers are engaged in positive behaviors of their own choosing, something paramount to the group’s mission.
“Teens do things out of the goodness of their heart all the time,” Fischer said.
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Bucky Fan wrote on Nov 22, 2009 9:28 AM: