ATLANTA — There's a growing coalition of home chefs in Georgia, working to feed their neighbors in need. Their homemade lasagnas are made with love: no questions asked.
"Lasagnas not the easiest thing to make. It's very time-consuming and each layer -- there's a lot of love put into it," Kirsten Glaser told 11Alive.
Each meal is part of a mission to support families who need a helping hand.
"There were so many people that were struggling as a result of the pandemic, and because of a lot of the restrictions, we weren't able to volunteer face to face," Kelley Kolling told 11Alive. "So we make homemade lasagnas and provide them to families in need or people struggling."
Kolling and Glaser lead the Georgia group that preps around 200 lasagnas every week for local families, in addition to hundreds of meals for local community organizations.
Their efforts part of national nonprofit Lasagna Love, which started during the pandemic and has evolved into a nationwide network of 20,000 volunteers.
"We have a lot of retired people," Glaser explained. "We also have neighbors that want to be involved, but either don't have the resources to cook, or don't like to cook so they can sign up and just be a driver."
Glaser said the group has also been able to get children involved, including local Girl Scout troops, with hopes of teaching kids how to directly make an impact in the community.
Yet, the need continues to grow as the calls for meals continue to come in. While the number of Lasagna Love volunteers continues to spread throughout Georgia, help is still needed in more rural areas without lasagna chefs.
"A lot of people this is their first time ever having to ask for help, and Lasagna Love has tried to make it really easy for them," Glaser said.