A nourishing meal served with a cup of kindness is on the menu at Essentials Café, which is cookin’ up the concept of a pay-what-you-can community café where everybody can eat regardless of the ability to pay.

The café is aiming to begin welcoming guests at 418 Third Ave. by early summer. Breakfast and lunch will be served from 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. five days a week, with the days still to be determined.

“Essentials Café is for people who have food insecurity and want community – it’s for everyone,” West Side Moravian Church pastor Rev. Tammie Rinker said. The café rents the renovated space, which has served as the parsonage for 150 years.

Pastor Rinker’s family moved from the house because the new eatery will serve the community very well, she said. Though the Moravian Church is supportive of Essentials Café, the café is not a ministry of the Moravian Church.

“The café is a way to serve the community. People can get a good meal at a decent price,” team member Dawn Fenner said. “We all need help every now and then. We want all to feel welcome. It’s a humanity thing.”

Guests will have access to free parking and Wifi.

“We’re our own 501c3, made up of folks from various backgrounds,” Pastor Rinker said.

Fenner said the café is a member of the national nonprofit One World Everybody Eats, through which these cafés create spaces where people are nourished in body and soul. People come together, eat in dignity, and form strong bonds that foster an interconnected community. “One World links the cafés together and offers mentoring and education.”

Food insecurity affects 800 million people globally, including 17 million households in every county in America. One World Everybody Eats is a response to this call.

“We need people who can pay for their meal to cover those who can’t – it’s kind of a pay-it-forward type of thing,” Rinker said. Fenner agreed, noting maybe someone on social security can only pay $5, but someone else can pay $15, which would cover the cost for others, including those who are not able to pay.

Rinker said the meal is free, and if people can’t pay, that’s fine. “If they want, they can volunteer their time, maybe picking tomatoes from our garden, so they won’t feel like they’re not contributing.”

Food will be purchased with monetary donations and the café is hoping for discounts from local vendors.

Fenner said a neighbor recently stopped to help bring tables into the house. “That’s the kind of community we want to build.”

Building community isn’t just a side dish at the café; it’s an important ingredient of the venture. One of the two dining areas will feature a community table. “We hope people will sit together and build community, if they so choose,” Fenner said.

Three years ago, Fenner attended a conference in North Carolina where Christie Melby-Gibbons spoke about Tricklebee Café, the community eatery she launched in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Fenner was so taken with the concept she made it the focus of her project for Crossroads, a lay ministry course she was taking at Moravian Seminary. She shared the project with the Rev. Christine Johnson, her pastor at College Hill Moravian Church.

Rinker, Johnson and the Rev. Lynette Delbridge, pastor of St. John Evangelical Lutheran Church, Whitehall, wanted a new project, and the seeds of Essentials Café were planted. The three had worked together some years ago with Habitat for Humanity.

Essentials Café’s core team of six includes Rinker, who keeps everyone together; Fenner, who has a business background and takes care of permits as well as working with the caretaking team on painting; Johnson, who does the grant writing; Delbridge; Rebecca Miller, treasurer; and Kasey Thomas, social media.

Volunteers will prepare the food and a part-time chef will probably be hired. The café will use local food sourcing and have its own garden tended to by the gardening team. “We’ll be able to offer fresh produce, locally grown and without pesticides,” Pastor Rinker said. The caretaking team takes care of painting, and the Foragers Group is charged with forging relationships in the community to find discounts on food.

Volunteers are needed to host and serve the food.

One volunteer is Dagny Danga-Storm, a parishioner of Rosemont Lutheran Church. She is a retired registered dietitian who worked with a patient population who were “food insecure” and had chronic health conditions such as type 2 diabetes, heart disease and HIV.

“As part of my work I helped folks get access to more healthy food. There were so many barriers, including language, insufficient finances, no health insurance, transportation and expensive housing costs,” Danga-Storm said.

“So I believe in what the Essentials Café stands for – I’m volunteering as a forager, looking into ways to get food cheaply, or donated, for the café.”

Danga-Storm said restaurants, grocery stores and families waste so much food. “We foragers are reaching out to local businesses to help repurpose some of the food that often gets thrown away.”

Essentials Café is continuing to raise funds for necessary renovations such as a side ramp, side entrance and accessible bathroom – donations are especially appreciated to complete these tasks.

Contributions can be made to Essentials Café by mailing a check to Essentials Café, 418 Third Ave., Bethlehem, PA 18018. For more information or to volunteer, email essentialscafe418@gmail.com. For updates to the cafe’s progress visit the Essentials Café Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/EssentialsCafe418/.