Hundreds eat Thanksgiving dinner at annual Friendship Feast put on by volunteers

Hundreds of meals were prepared on Thanksgiving Monday, Oct. 14, 2024, by volunteers at the Boyle Street Plaza in downtown Edmonton. (Adel Ahmed/CTV News Edmonton)

Many volunteers had a hand in creating a feast in friendship Monday for Thanksgiving dinner in central Edmonton.

Boyle Street Community Services and the Bissel Centre, city organizations that help people dealing with homelessness and poverty, partnered with the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology's (NAIT) culinary program to feed hundreds for the annual holiday at the downtown Boyle Street Plaza.

Dan Zimmerman, Boyle Street's community services lead, told CTV News Edmonton on Monday about 1,500 people would be fed over two meal times for the annual Friendship Feast.

"It's amazing to see their generosity and their talents," Zimmerman said of the efforts by the NAIT students and instructors to create the meals.

"The food is so good and it's something that a lot of our folks don't get to experience very often. I think a warm meal, especially as it starts to get colder, is so important.”

Zimmerman said the effort to put on the Friendship Feast "goes a long way" in building connections between people.

"Not only is it important to feed people, obviously, but having that sense of community bringing people together, we're able to gather a lot of people in this space, which is something that's not always a possibility," he said.

"I think having people in the same space with donations, with some colouring, with some live music, is just really a celebration. It's a point of pride for us to put on an event that is really joyful."

Paul Campbell, a program chair for NAIT's Culinary Services program, said the north Edmonton school and Edmonton's Food Bank help supply the food for a traditional Thanksgiving lunch-time dinner for 750 people that included turkey, parsley, potatoes, peas, carrots, dressing and gravy. In all, the NAIT crew cooked 40 turkeys, produced 80 litres of gravy and used 80 cases of bread, Campbell said.

"It's a good opportunity for (students) to give back," he said. "They also get to see that large production scale. We don't always get to see that, so it's a learning experience for them as well."

Soup and stew were on the menu at about 3 p.m.