One day, Matt Jozwiak was a chef at the New York City restaurant that was named No. 1 in the world -- Eleven Madison Park -- and the next, he was leaving it all behind to start ReThink Food NYC, a non-profit organization that repurposes excess food from restaurants to help feed the hungry in NYC.
"I noticed that we're throwing away 40 percent of our food," Matt explains.
And it's not because restaurants don't want to help!
They're just following a myriad of regulations with the good intentions of keeping food safe -- especially after it's already been prepared.
Luckily, after leaving his chef job behind, Matt was able to dedicate his time to learning how to navigate the regulations safely -- and ReThink Food NYC was born!
"We take [the food] and we pasteurize it in accordance with the FDA, cool it down, freeze it and give it out to shelters [that] need it most," he explains.
And to put the organization's potential into perspective, the chef and and his team collected about 30 pounds of leftover food from ONE restaurant in ONE day.
Wow!
"The day that we actually dropped off the food was probably the most important day of my entire 11-year cooking career," Matt says of seeing his idea becoming a reality.
And through its ongoing efforts, ReThink Food NYC has served 1,498 meals in less than a year.
How amazing is that?!
"All the food's already there," Matt stresses. "It's all there."
"All we have to do is take it and give it to those who need it," he continues. "It's simply what we do."
Because the lovely people at Jet.com -- an e-commerce grocery and home goods company -- were just as inspired by Matt as we are, they donated $5,000 to his inspirational cause.
And Rach matched their donation! ?
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