Food charity hits the road

FEED Me Bellarine will launch its new food truck this weekend after a two-year delay.

The local food relief charity will debut its new fundraising van at the Bellarine Music Festival this weekend, providing a tasty and meaningful food option for hungry attendees.

Feed Me Bellarine fitted out a retro caravan for use as a food truck about two years ago, but their creation has remained warehoused as the pandemic scrapped major events.

FMB co-founder and chef Anthony Woodbury said the charity was excited to finally roll out its fundraising initiative at the popular local festival.

“We always used to rescue from music festivals in the first place. We always thought that if we had our own sort of catering, we can rescue food and sell our own,” he said.

“We use food from freezers, and it’s another opportunity for people to see what we can do with wasted food.

“(The trucks) have been sitting around in storage and now everything’s opened up and we can finally use them.”

Mr Woodbury said the truck would offer range of sweet and savoury churros for festivalgoers, but its full menu selection would remain a secret until the event kicks off on Saturday.

The chef will lead a team of volunteers taking orders and cooking.

Feed Me Bellarine will also man the carpark at the weekend’s festival for further fundraising to support its important community work.

The Bellarine festival will be the first of what the charity hopes will be many events for its food truck this summer and beyond, as large-scale events return across the region.

Feed Me Bellarine has earned acclaim in recent years for its Wasted mini mart and cafe and dining evenings at Ocean Grove, which takes donated food that would otherwise go to the scrap heap and turns it into products for customers and chef-cooked meals.

The new food trucks will help take Feed Me Bellarine’s fundraising initiatives on the road.