{"id":64987,"date":"2020-04-18T00:57:14","date_gmt":"2020-04-18T00:57:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-restaurants-prepare-meals-for-nurses-doctors-on-front-lines\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T10:44:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T10:44:08","slug":"durango-restaurants-prepare-meals-for-nurses-doctors-on-front-lines","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-restaurants-prepare-meals-for-nurses-doctors-on-front-lines\/","title":{"rendered":"Durango restaurants prepare meals for nurses, doctors on front lines"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Ryan
Ryan Lowe, owner of the Ore House, checks the temperature of one of his chefs, Jack Roberts, on Wednesday. The Ore House is working with Durango Land and Homes and Local First to establish Feed the Frontlines of Durango, a cooperative venture with Durango restaurants to prepare to-go meals for medical professionals at Mercy Regional Medical Center during the COVID-19 pandemic.<\/span>Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Restaurants might be the industry suffering the most collateral damage from the COVID-19 pandemic, but that hasn\u2019t stopped the Ore House and partners from starting a program to provide tasty meals for medical providers on the battle\u2019s front lines.<\/p>\n

Ryan Lowe, owner of the Ore House, is working to bring other restaurants together to prepare meals for nurses, doctors and other medical professionals at Mercy Regional Medical Center<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs we\u2019ve watched the COVID-19 virus spread around the country, hospitals have become overwhelmed. It\u2019s more in the cities, but we were worried there\u2019s the potential for Mercy to have the same issue,\u201d Lowe said.<\/p>\n

The Ore House owner heard about a national effort called Feeding the Frontline<\/a> \u2013 organized initially by a shuttered pizzeria in Boston that soon spread to San Francisco \u2013 to prepare meals for medical workers in hospitals, clinics and other medical sites.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s really a scalable program. I think it\u2019s something that will be super helpful now and potentially in the future. If we ever have a need like this, it\u2019s something that we can kind of turn the keys back on,\u201d Lowe said.<\/p>\n

\"Ore
Ore House staff from left, Regan Briggs, chef; Jack Roberts, chef; Jamie Miller, hospitality director; and Ryan Lowe, owner\/director of operations, sanitize packaged meals of beef Bourguignon, made with James Ranch beef, roasted garlic mashed potatoes, and vegetable dahl. The Ore House is working with Durango Land and Homes and Local First to establish Feed the Frontlines of Durango, a cooperative venture with Durango restaurants to prepare to-go meals for medical professionals at Mercy Regional Medical Center during the COVID-19 pandemic.<\/span>Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Besides the Ore House<\/a>, Ska Brewing Co.<\/a>, CJ\u2019s Diner<\/a>, PRIMI Pasta and Wine Bar<\/a>, Serious Texas Bar-B-Q<\/a> and Switchback<\/a> will provide meals to doctors, nurses and other medical professionals at Mercy.<\/p>\n

All participating restaurants will comply with Mercy\u2019s requirements to ensure meals are sanitary and coronavirus-free, including the wearing of masks by cooks and taking employees\u2019 temperatures every two hours.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have been working closely with the six restaurants in this effort to bring food to our campus and coordinated through the shifts. The timing needs to be central. And then of course, it also needs to be done in a way that is safe from a COVID-protection standpoint as we bring it in,\u201d said Mercy interim CEO Mike Murphy.<\/p>\n

Restaurants will also provide a service in which Mercy employees can come by at the end of their shifts to pick up meals for dinnertime, Murphy said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat is very helpful after you\u2019ve had a long shift, you don\u2019t want to come home and cook a meal,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Lowe reached out to Christina Rinderle and Chris Bettin, co-owners of Durango Land and Homes, to help organize Durango\u2019s version of Feed the Frontline.<\/p>\n

Word about the program went out to real estate offices, and Rinderle said that brought in $7,000 in seed funding.<\/p>\n

Bettin spoke with Local First, which has created a webpage to serve as a home for donations for Feed the Frontlines Durango<\/a>, and it has agreed to serve as the 501(c)(3) organization for the program in Durango.<\/p>\n

As of Wednesday, Rinderle said Feed the Frontlines Durango had raised $16,000 of its $60,000 goal to provide 60 days worth of meals.<\/p>\n

Wednesday was the initial trial run for Feed the Frontlines Durango.<\/p>\n

Lowe wants to make sure the operation has the bugs worked out before the COVID-19 pandemic peaks in La Plata County, which Murphy said he now expects in late April and early May.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe hope to have between five and 10 restaurants ready to go on a daily basis to provide 100 meals per day. That number may change as the hospital\u2019s needs change. And they give us more information about what they want. But that\u2019s kind of the plan at this juncture now,\u201d Bettin said.<\/p>\n

\"The
The Ore House is working with Durango Land and Homes and Local First to establish Feed the Frontlines of Durango, a cooperative venture with Durango restaurants to prepare to-go meals for medical professionals at Mercy Regional Medical Center during the COVID-19 pandemic.<\/span>Courtesy of Christina Rinderle<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Rinderle said the idea works on two fronts: It helps provide meals for medical workers who might find themselves fairly busy in the next month or so, and it helps restaurants provide some paid work hours and shifts for employees who have been furloughed by the stay-at-home order, which now extends through April 26.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we do have enough response with donations and we have the capacity, we\u2019d like to expand this to the police department and fire department as well as our other first responders,\u201d Rinderle said.<\/p>\n

parmijo@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

\n

Donations to Mercy increase during COVID-19 pandemic<\/h4>\n

Mercy Regional Medical Center has been receiving an influx of donated supplies, and it has created a drop-off box for donations outside its front entrance.
\n Currently, Mercy, located at 1010 Three Springs Blvd., and other Centura Health hospitals are accepting donations of only:
\n Boxed masks and N95 masks (already opened or used masks cannot be accepted).
\n Gloves still in manufacturer packaging.
\n Packaged gowns or rain ponchos with sleeves.
\n Face shields that must include eye protection and be labeled as surgical, isolation, dental or medical procedure face shields.
\n Homemade masks do not meet Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines, and they are not being accepted by Mercy. Centura has issued a news release saying homemade masks would be accepted only as a last resort.
\n Anyone who is interested in donating supplies, donating blood or supporting Mercy\u2019s Emergency Preparedness Fund can visit the
\n Mercy Health Foundation website
\n .
\n parmijo@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Program helps medical professionals, restaurant workers<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":64988,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[685,68,1269,450],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-64987","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-coronavirus-covid-19","tag-mercy-regional-medical-center","tag-nonprofits","tag-restaurant-and-catering"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64987","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=64987"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64987\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":89254,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64987\/revisions\/89254"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/64988"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=64987"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=64987"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=64987"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=64987"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}