The busiest kitchen in the Northland fired up its stacks of roasters Monday at the Duluth Entertainment Convention Center. The first 110 boneless turkeys were in mid-roast by late morning, filling the space with their warm, familiar aroma.
With the turkeys addressed, volunteers turned their attention to stuffing - chopping 60 pounds of celery and 80 pounds of onions and cutting all sorts of bread into cubes.
Rick Frost worked at a station where they were opening 10-pound cans of applesauce to add to the dry stuffing ingredients.
“The applesauce gives it a little bit of flavor and kind of sticks it together so that it’s not so sloppy,” said Frost, a retiree who also will volunteer with his wife, Mary, during Thursday’s 25th annual Twin Ports Thanksgiving Buffet.
The event is sponsored by the College of St. Scholastica with the support of many community partners. Among the groups helping with Monday’s first day of meal preparation was Two Harbors High School’s National Honor Society.
“I didn’t do much volunteering before National Honor Society,” said junior Keely Sundstrom. “But ever since I’ve joined, I’ve served a lot and it’s expanded my views.”
There’s nothing quite as expansive as the Thanksgiving Buffet. The main event at the DECC and satellite events in Superior, Two Harbors, Cloquet and Carlton figure to serve the traditional meal to more than 6,000 people. The undertaking requires about 1,100 volunteers.
“It’s a grand example of the community working together,” said Kevin Skwira-Brown, an adjunct professor at St. Scholastica and a member of the event’s organizing board that starts meeting in September in advance of the five-hour buffet that runs from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., and features an appearance from Santa Claus, live music and hot apple cider as an after-dinner treat.
“It’s a whole event,” Skwira-Brown added. “We’re trying to make it a day of people coming together.”
Skwira-Brown held in his hand a thick stack of stapled pages - the playbook for putting together a meal of such proportions.
Quarterbacking the meal this year is Kevin Gunderson. He’s the branch manager for Wells Fargo in Cloquet and the chairman of the Thanksgiving Buffet board.
He was involved in the event during its infancy, when the meal was served at The Library/Zona Rosa in Superior. Gunderson was working his first paying job, washing dishes and bussing tables, when the co-owner of the two now-defunct restaurants, Dan Cohen, helped start the first free dinner in 1990.
“It started out with 200 people,” Gunderson said. “It’s grown.”
Gunderson credited the holiday and its spirit of giving thanks for drawing out the volunteers. To keep the momentum going, the Thanksgiving Buffet board this year is asking volunteers to commit to its “#Give25More” campaign, in which the Thanksgiving helpers are encouraged to spend an additional 25 hours in the coming year in support of nonprofit organizations in need of volunteers.
“We’re encouraging people to stay involved year-round,” said Skwira-Brown, hoping people will share their stories and photos using the hashtag campaign.
On Tuesday, volunteers from Minnesota Power, Wells Fargo and Maurices were expected to fill the DECC kitchen.
If they’re anything like Trillium Services supervisor Holly Hansmeyer, they’ll find deep reward in stepping away from their daily vocational tasks to be a part of a bigger picture. Hansmeyer was wearing her 2011 Thanksgiving Buffet T-shirt and was fresh from chopping onions.
“I love doing this,” she said. “I just love being a part of such a big community outreach.”
