Feeding San Diego’s Youth Meals Program Provides Scratch-Made Meals to Kids All Over the County

They say raising kids takes a village. To feed the kids of San Diego County facing hunger involves a partnership between Feeding San Diego and Top Notch Catering. Feeding San Diego has many programs that provide hunger relief to kids, and during the summer months, the focus is on our youth meals program. Our organization works with local vendors both during the summer for the Summer Meals Program and during the school year for the After School Meals Program to help meet children’s needs. Both federal programs provide free and nutritious snacks or meals at sites throughout the county. 

Truly Top Notch

For the past five years, Feeding San Diego has worked with Top Notch Catering to provide meals to low-income families via these programs. Top Notch Catering stays within the USDA guidelines while also expressing creativity and pushing the boundaries of what kid’s lunches can be. The result is scratch-made, memorable meals for kids that could brighten up anyone’s day.  

“The government puts out a menu pattern that you are required to follow. It outlines grains, protein, milk, milk alternates. Within these guidelines, you need to serve and meet the thresholds of these things, but you have freedom beyond this to create meals,” explains Nick Goldsobel, a Registered Dietician and the Director of Operations for Top Notch Catering.

“Our team members are a mix of parents and grandparents and have kids in their lives in different ways. Food is very important to all of us. In some ways, the guidelines are the least important thing about what we do. We have the opportunity to expose kids not only to food that they want but to push the boundaries of new fruit. We get to work with local farmers. Maybe we can throw in a local apricot and a kid has never seen that before. It helps them to learn and create good associations with food,” he continues.   

Top Notch Catering’s team also knows that kids love pizza, but they put their own spin on it. “The kids bring up pizza day because we make our own dough, a multigrain mix. We shred the cheese for it. We put a lot of care into all the personal pizzas,” adds Lynley Connor, Chief Operating Officer and Co-Owner of Top Notch Catering. 

Taking the Stress Out of School Meals

A differentiator of these programs from Feeding San Diego’s other food assistance programs is that these meals come prepared, which eases the burden on families to pack meals for their kids.  

“Something that we’re both very proud of is that families don’t have to worry, the meal is already prepared for you,” Goldsobel says. “It’s important to us to minimize that stress and confusion around this kind of food programming.”  

Top Notch Catering specifically works with schools in San Diego County, from early childhood education to charter schools to child and adult care after-school programs through partnerships like ours. The company’s philosophy is to remain local while supporting as many local small businesses as possible to create an ethical economy within San Diego County. It’s evident in their meals the care that they put into them, and that stems from co-owner Lynley Connor’s career experience that she brought to her role.  

A Dream Come True

“I began working for the Department of Education on the East Coast and I got my start running 14 schools. I had the exact opposite experience of what someone should. I saw all the problems with the food system,” she shares. “The government had gotten too involved in what the menu should be. There was no understanding of the ethnic groups and areas. There was no heart in it. When I came to San Diego I was really lucky in my journey that I was really connected. I began to learn all the differences in California that I was missing in New York.”

“This is actually bigger than I ever dreamed. Top Notch works with over 95 charters and nonprofits. It’s a bigger reach to communities than I thought I could accomplish. I’ll give everything I can to make sure free and reduced-price [meal/lunch] students are always our priority. There’s a higher purpose to what we’re doing.”  

More than 284,000 children are facing hunger across San Diego County according to San Diego Hunger Coalition. Feeding San Diego raises money for our Feeding Kids programming, including Summer Meals and After School Meals programs, through our Fuel for Summer campaign. To learn more, including how you can help, visit fuelforsummer.org