Page 45 - South Mississippi Living - December, 2016

lunch program, like all the others on the Coast, survives through donations, and so her pantry is always in flux. Sometimes local schools will hold fund raisers for them, and often local churches donate food and volunteers. But there is no certainty that the shelves will be well stocked.
Leggett and her co-workers serve lunch to about 200 people five days a week and maintain a food pantry that offers un-paired food for hungry families. She says, “We don’t care who you are, if you are hungry just come in and have lunch.”
If you arrive too early for lunch, you will be invited to sit down and have a cup of coffee and maybe a pastry, or juice.
On the day I visited, Leggett was serving sausages and peppers with rice, coleslaw and homemade bread pudding. The day before it had been baked chicken and her famous mac and cheese, lima beans and a green salad. The food served varies according to what has been donated, but the pride of the people who cook and serve here never varies.
There is something amazing about all the soup kitchens I visited. The people working there are on a mission of sorts. They believe in what they’re doing. Leggett told me, “This is my purpose in life; this is what I was supposed to be doing.” And her sentiment is shared by everyone I talked to.
The three kitchens I visited feed more than 1,000 people a day. Keep the hungry in mind this holiday season and the rest of the year as well. And give thanks for people such as Jill Leggett, Charles Adrian Smith, Jimmy Peterson, and Tony Henderson who are out there on the front line.
FOR MORE REFLECTIONS OF THE GULF COAST >> www.smliving.net December 2016 • SOUTH MISSISSIPPI Living 45