Quality Meals At The Door
By Marj Belessis
For people living alone one of the biggest barriers to a healthy old age and continuing independence is the ability-or inclination-to provide nutritious meals for themselves.
Cooking for one can be tedious and it's often much easier to resort to takeaway food or tinned and frozen meals.
Jack Barker came up with the idea of a home-delivered quality meal service in 1995 when a close friend was seriously injured in a car accident. To help out, Mr. Barker arranged meals for the friend's family.
Staff at Royal North Shore Hospital, where his friend was a patient, saw the benefits and asked him to provide a service for discharged patients. He called the service Tender Loving Cuisine (TLC).
"It's self-funded and independent and it's for anyone who needs high-quality, tasty meals," he said.
"At first we outsourced but since then we have set up our own premises and now have two chefs overseeing the production of 3900 meals a week."
"We have 28 dinners, many of which carry the Heart Foundation tick of approval and include four different roasts, various casseroles and curries and fish dishes."
Sue Jansen of Frenchs Forest is one of a dozen couriers delivering meals throughout Sydney and the Central Coast.
"At the moment I am making 11 deliveries a week on the northern beaches," she said.
"My clients range in age from 50 to 97. Some are very frail and wouldn't be able to prepare the dinners themselves. If they didn?t have meals delivered they would probably have to go into a nursing home."
Copyright, The Manly Daily
