ir open restaurant – they shun the term “soup kitchen” because of its negative connotations. The Carmei Ha’ir network, founded eight years ago by Rabbi Yehuda Azrad, Yitzhak Levitan and Momi Ben-Zeruel, also includes a clothes warehouse that distributes new donated clothing, blankets and heaters.

61:{"position":5,"content":"$62"} 63:{"position":6,"content":"In theory, the restaurant also was to have paying patrons who would pay however much they could for the meal. Both paying and non-paying patrons would sit next to each other eating the same meal and nobody would know who was paying and who was not, in order to protect the dignity of those who were unable to pay. That was the theory, anyway."} 64:{"position":7,"content":"They even brought in big-name cook Moshe Basson, who was the first chef of the well-known local restaurant Eucalyptus. Until then most of the soup kitchens were located in Orthodox neighborhoods, notes Oren, who four years ago retired from his paying job – which he prefers not to reveal – and began working as a full-time volunteer at Carmei Ha’ir, as the manager and cook."} 65:{"position":8,"content":"“At first it worked according to our model, with local businessmen coming to eat and pay for their meal here. But it didn’t hold on for very long and those who could afford to pay did not come he

Meals with Dignity

Carmei Ha’ir tackles poverty, redefines the traditional soup kitchen and offers quality.