'Generous' Dublin restaurants 'happy to help', providing free meals for asylum seekers

Asylum seekers get free pizza provided by Bambino

DUBLIN RESTAURANTS HAVE come to the rescue, as a precarious food situation persists for international protection applicants who are sleeping rough.

Asylum seekers primarily get their meals through homeless services such as Lighthouse, Mendicity and Merchant’s Quay.

However, the strain on them has prompted city centre food businesses to step up.

Garret Fitzgerald is co-owner of Chimac, a Korean fried chicken restaurant with locations on Aungier Street and in Terenure. He was shocked at how difficult it is for asylum seekers to get three meals a day.

“I just assumed that the State was taking care of that, but obviously that’s not the case at the moment,” he said.

Fitzgerald can’t give leftover food from his restaurant to many asylum seekers as it’s not halal, meaning muslim people can’t eat it.

I bought in 30kg of halal chicken legs and did up a chicken stew with rice for all the lads.

“I have to do a whole different menu every week for them, which is fine, but I don’t think it’s incredibly sustainable.”

Chimac also used to help feed Dublin’s homeless people, but they had to stop due to the extra cost it incurred on the business.

The restaurant is planning a fundraiser to help continue their work.

One volunteer who has been helping rough sleepers told The Journal that the extra provisions are much-needed, particularly on weekends and bank holidays, when homeless services are slimmed down.

Volunteers are now operating with reduced resources as the continuous work has become both financially burdensome and “emotionally taxing”.

“People have been putting their own money into this for quite some time,” she said.

“A lot of people are feeling burnt out because they’re frustrated at the situation. They’ve been helping people for months. When’s the situation going to end?”

While international protection applicants get a small weekly allowance, it’s not enough for eating out in the city every day.

The volunteer said that the Dublin food community has been “amazing and so generous”.

When you put a call out there, they really react in the most positive way.

Fitzgerald says he understands the pressure the state and the services are under in an “unprecedented” situation.

“I wouldn’t be one to beat the government with a stick … I hope that this will be solved sooner rather than later,” he said.

“In the interim, when there’s things that need to be done every day, I can help out.”

He says a bonus of being a small business owner is that he is “agile and mobile”. “Whereas it’s not as cut and dry for huge organisations.”

It’s not just Chimac that’s stepping up. Popular pizza joint Bambino and burger chain Bunsen have both got involved.

“Yesterday, I couldn’t have ordered food in time to get halal stuff, so I just called up my friend Shane [Boyd] who runs Bambino on Stephen Street and he just on the spot immediately donated 10 pizzas,” said Fitzgerald.

Tom Gleeson, the owner of Bunsen, was also “more than happy to help”.

“We’re all very proud of Dublin. It’s a city we decided to set up businesses in and we think it’s a great place.

“Something like this happening on your doorstep is not something you want to see.”

The volunteer said that the involvement of so many businesses shows that Irish people “want to help this group of people”.

“It is quite shocking that anybody would be left like this, whether Irish or not Irish, without access to accommodation, sanitation, drinking water and regular food.”

Volunteers have also recently started using Olio, an app that helps people locate excess food that otherwise would go to waste.