On a Tuesday evening at Joseph A. Foran High School, the culinary room hums like a small restaurant at the dinner rush. Colored stations, each with its own assignment, click into action. Onions and garlic are chopped, salad greens washed, sausage sizzling on the stove. There’s rock music playing, a homemade card making its way around the room, and a deadline: one hour to turn ingredients into a hot, nourishing meal headed for a Milford family that needs it.
The scene is the heartbeat of The Giving Table, a student club led by culinary and bake shop teacher Randy Colin with co-advisor Rachel Pangu. The idea is disarmingly simple: prepare and deliver ready-made meals for neighbors navigating food insecurity, illness, or loss. Colin calls the finished plates “hugs of food,” a phrase that captures both the practical help and the emotional lift these dinners deliver.
Colin first piloted The Giving Table at Oxford High School, where she taught for 13 years. After moving to Foran six years ago – drawn in part by the chance to serve in her own hometown – she secured principal support to formalize the idea as a student club. Today, returning juniors and seniors provide the institutional memory; newcomers bring fresh energy. The result is a “well-oiled machine,” Colin says, one that can produce multiple meals for two families at a time, when demand spikes.
Requests for help arrive through school social workers. At the start of the year, Colin and Pangu circulate a sign-up sheet to administrators across Milford Public Schools. Social workers add anonymous entries to protect privacy, along with family size, circumstances, and any allergies. Each week, a student leader begins the meeting by sharing the story behind that day’s recipient: a parent between jobs, a family navigating a hospital stay, neighbors facing a tough stretch. Students cook with intention, knowing exactly whom the meal will comfort.
But they also learn practical skills along the way. Pangu notes that though the club's primary objective is to give back to the community, students are introduced to culinary concepts like knife skills, food waste, and basic nutrition over the course of the year. "We're supporting the community, educating, and building confidence together," she notes as she gestures around the busy room.
If The Giving Table runs like a restaurant, it’s one that depends on community investors. The club is not funded by the district, so Colin and Pangu have become pragmatic fundraisers: walking gift-card requests to local grocers, applying for grants, and gratefully accepting small contributions from churches and charities. The Milford Bank has emerged as a linchpin supporter, awarding recurring grants to the organization over the last few years. Those resources become weeknight dinners: sauce, pasta, chicken, produce, dessert – whatever fits the dietary needs and the week’s menu.
Organization is the secret ingredient. Through Google Classroom, students claim roles at color-coded kitchen – salad prep here, sauté there, card writing at the final table. Colin shops ahead, lays out mise en place, and moves through the room with Pangu, coaching chopping and seasoning decisions. Participation is open to all grades; culinary experience is welcome but not required. Students learn techniques in the flow of service, and they learn something larger, too: how it feels to be part of a team that shows up for strangers. “When you have what you need,” Colin tells them, “build a longer table, not a higher fence.”
The club's reach is expansive: present for this particular meeting was Ms. Valleau, a beloved Latin teacher at Foran who stopped by simply to lend a hand and learn. Two students, Emilia and Allison, spoke with me in between dicing peppers for baked ziti. "I just love being able to give back," Emilia said. "And especially to our own community right here in Milford," added Allison.
Perhaps the most remarkable element of The Giving Table is what it offers the cooks themselves. Teenagers, often measured by grades or GPAs, discover a different metric for success: Did we get the timing right? Does the sauce taste balanced? Will this meal say “you matter” to someone we may never meet? Music plays, sleeves roll up, and busy adolescents become hosts, learning that generosity is not abstract – it’s tactile, aromatic, plated, and delivered warm.
Colin, now in her nineteenth year of teaching, hopes students carry these lessons well beyond high school. The Giving Table teaches the craft of cooking, yes, but also the craft of community: how to turn empathy into action, and how to do it again and again.
For donation inquiries, contact Randy Colin at rcolin@milforded.org. Special thanks to Randy Colin, Rachel Pangu, Caroline Collen, and Joseph A. Foran High School.
"When you have what you need, build a longer table, not a higher fence.”