Pizza nights at Streetlevel
For the Wrights, cooking fresh wood-fired pizzas for community members at Brisbane Streetlevel Mission, is a family affair. (Photo by Simone Worthing)
Fresh homemade pizzas cooked onsite in a wood-fired oven is now a regular part of fellowship dinners at Brisbane Streetlevel Mission.
The Brisbane-based Wright family, who owns the mobile pizza and catering service, Fire N Dough Wood Fired Pizza ((www.firendough.com.au) , set up their ovens in the driveway of Streetlevel at 3.00pm once a month before chapel, ready to serve around 120 hungry community members three hours later.
It’s definitely a family affair. Simone, who owns the business, rolls 12 kilos of pizza dough, freshly made by Crusty Edge Bakery according to her own recipe; Stewart gets the fires going and cooks the pizza; teenage children Taylor and Luka prepare and add toppings; Brooke makes a huge fresh salad; and Jordan, who is only 10, serves the pizza.
For quite some time, Simone had wanted to reach out to the homeless in Brisbane and the rest of the family were all very supportive.
“We’ve nearly been in that situation ourselves and, with my business now established and doing well, I wanted to give back,” she explains. “I figure that if you don’t have to worry about food and you’ve at least had a good meal, the world is easier to look at, which is half the battle.”
Serving pizza to the Streetlevel community has had a big impact on the family.
“I get to feed people who are homeless and I just didn’t realise how bad the situation was here in Brisbane,” says Brooke, who has osteogenesis imperfecta(brittle bone disease), and helps prepare the food from her wheelchair.
It’s great to get the feedback and know they like our pizza,” says Taylor. “Seeing how hard it is for them makes me appreciate what I have.”
Stewart agrees. “I like coming here to Streetlevel and to hear the positive feedback from the people here; it is humbling.”
Luke Miekus, Streetlevel activities coordinator, explains that the pizza nights are a special event at Streetlevel.
“It’s warm, inviting and relaxing; and it also frees the community here to spend time eating and talking together without having to worry about who is cooking, serving or cleaning up,” he says. “It helps us build relationships and develop community.
“We are thankful to this small business for giving of their time and resources and it just shows the power of what they are doing.”
This article first appeared in the May edition of Pipeline
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