Senior Center chef Rebecca Thompson and the heart smart breakfast now available at the Senior Center. The community is invited to gather there for breakfast and stay to visit with others over coffee or tea. Book groups and workplace coffee klatches can order batches of baked goods and pick them up fresh from the oven.
The Grand Marais Municipal Pool is a great place to spend time with other community members while doing something good for your body. Senior Center Director Bev Green and chef Rebecca Thompson are creating another way to do the same thing at the Senior Center. Starting February 1, breakfast is served at 8:30 a.m. Monday through Friday, and you are invited.
Thompson is baking up a storm so she can offer warm caramel rolls and fresh apple turnovers at decent prices to anyone who comes in. She is also baking “heart-smart” treats like bran muffins low in cholesterol, sugar, and sodium and “uber” (breakfast) cookies with lots of fiber and iron-rich molasses. Fruit and yogurt plates are available, and homemade banana bread will be popping out of the oven any day now. Breakfast is available until the food runs out or until it’s time to get the AEOA-sponsored lunch ready to serve.
The baked goods are either made from scratch or from highquality mixes or pre-made dough, which have improved greatly over time, Thompson said. She is a trained chef and would not serve it if it weren’t really good.
Green and Thompson want people of all ages to feel welcome and to use the Senior Center as a community gathering spot. They are not trying to create competition with local eating establishments, but they are
trying to create a comfortable atmosphere with coffee shop amenities. As funding is available, changes are being made to the inside of the building to make it look less institutional. According to Green, a lot of senior centers are opening cafés and dropping the “senior” from their identities.
Today’s customers are also wanting healthier food choices. The AEOA lunch menu is determined by a nutritionist offsite, but because of funding limitations, some of the food is high in carbohydrates and salt. Anyone in the community can eat lunch at the Senior Center as long as reservations are made by 9:30 a.m. The cost is $3.50 for registered participants over 60 and $6.50 for people under 60. “Silent” donations have enabled Thompson to provide some healthier options, such as fresh fruit instead of canned and butter instead of margarine.
Thompson believes in the high-nutrition breakfast program so much that she is spending her own time to make it happen. She would like to be able to expand it into a lunch program as well and would like to see both meals pay for themselves. Green is searching for funding and envisions creating a new job in the community, maybe volunteer, hopefully paid.
Book clubs, employee coffee klatches, or Bible study groups can pre-order baked goods and pick them up fresh from the oven by calling Thompson at the Senior Center (387-2660).
Current prices are $1 for “heart smart” bran muffins, $1.50 for apple turnovers and gooey caramel rolls, $3 for fresh fruit plates with yogurt, $.50 for whole fruit, $.50 for juice, and coffee and tea (available throughout the morning) for a $1 suggested donation. “We’re hoping to keep the costs down,” said Thompson, “so people who are on a budget feel they can come in.”
Thompson will keep things interesting by varying the menu. She welcomes suggestions and donations and hopes to see you soon!
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