Islington Council and local community partners have opened a new zero-waste community café at the Jean Stokes Community Centre, near Caledonian Road.
Over the next six months, Jean’s Café will open every Friday from 1pm, offering affordable, sustainable meals for residents.
Manor Gardens Welfare Trust, a local charity focused on health and wellbeing, runs the café. The organisation works with the London food-distribution charity the Felix Project to source surplus food donated by local suppliers.
“I am really happy to be doing this job”
The donations, which would often otherwise go to waste, arrive on Thursdays. Volunteers then use the ingredients to cook and serve low-cost or free meals for Friday’s service.
Robin Campbell, who has a background in community work, is one of ten volunteers at the café. “I am really happy to be doing this job,” she said.
Jean’s Café runs on a pay-what-you-can model, in which visitors can choose to pay any amount they wish or nothing at all. The café seats up to 24 people and can serve around 50 guests each week.
Although donations are optional, Campbell said the suggested contribution is £3, and in the first week, every guest chose to pay this amount.
The project aims to reduce food waste and encourage climate-friendly eating, additionally offering home-cooking workshops to residents.
It comes as part of Islington Council’s Building a Net Zero Islington by 2030 plan, which promotes greener local food systems.
Florrie Cole, from Islington Council’s Community Wealth Building team, said the project serves to “help change the borough’s food system from the ground up, while also helping the community.”
