Vending machine café offers good food for a good cause

Jul. 16—Vending machine food has never been more nutritious, and the dollars spent at a vending machine might never have been so generous as at the newly opened Forage Café. Tucked on the ground floor at the Presbyterian Northside Hospital, Forage Café has ample tables for visiting, a few comfy chairs for lounging, a little free library, complimentary coffee, and two Forage vending machines, where Presbyterian nurses can be spotted grabbing a snack during breaks. The café is also open to the public, including hospital patients and visitors. "People upstairs in the waiting room can come down here, their kids can grab a book," said Dennis Plummer, Meals on Wheels of New Mexico's chief strategy officer. "They can eat something healthy while they're waiting. There's plug-ins over there for laptops. There's a community puzzle somebody started over here." The Forage vending machines generate revenue for Meals on Wheels of New Mexico, which serves 15,000 meals per month to New Mexicans. Forage Café supervisor Gaabe Zamora did not know much about Meals on Wheels when he started working for the program, but he quickly came to understand the mission. "I came from a pretty poor family background, so I understand not having a meal or not having some security," Zamora said. "Right away, I wanted to champion that to give these people restaurant-quality food." Meals on Wheels serves free meals to all of Luna Community College's students in Las Vegas, New Mexico, and delivers medically tailored frozen meals to Las Cruces. The non-profit also provides food all over Albuquerque. There is no waitlist for the meal delivery service. "We subsidize their food up to 100% based on their level of poverty," Plummer said. Meals on Wheels was at capacity, said Plummer, when it received Mackenzie Scott funds to increase its capacity. The Forage vending machines are a project that creates revenue for the nonprofit and supports local businesses at the same time. To stock the vending machines, Meals on Wheels purchases food from local vendors, including Little Bear Coffee, Taos Bakes, burritos from Three Sisters Kitchen, BlueFly Farms seltzer water, and muffins from Santa Fe's Chocolate Maven. So far, all seven vending machines are located in health care facilities — two at Rust Medical Center, one at Kaseman Hospital, two at Presbyterian Santa Fe Medical Center, and the newest pair in the café — but they hope to expand the Forage offerings, said Plummer. Plummer would like to see Forage vending machines in the airport, at large office buildings and even some Forage offerings in the frozen food sections at local grocery stores. The vending machines are glass doored refrigerators. Customers can peruse the menu on a smartscreen, then swipe a card to unlock the fridge and pick out their food. When food in the machines is approaching expiration, it is donated to a local homeless shelter. Eventually, Zamora and Plummer would like to have 35 to 60 Forage vending machines all over Albuquerque. The nonprofit is also selling Forage merchandise, like mugs and hats, to raise funds for Meals on Wheels. "For every one person that you see on the street experiencing homelessness, there are 87 people who are experiencing food insecurity, and that's defined as they're either eating low nutrition — so fast food ... or they're actually skipping meals or watering down meals to make it stretch," Plummer said. "I think our whole community is aware of the housing crisis. The food crisis, it's just invisible, but it's even more serious." Forage Café is located at Presbyterian Northside Hospital, Building #D, 5901 Harper NW.