PEOPLE in need of nourishment for body and soul are being offered free soup made in a town centre café which has had to close temporarily because of the coronavirus crisis.

Rebecca Green, who runs the vegan café The Allotment Club, is cooking soup for anyone who might need a pick-me-up in these difficult times.

So far, Rebecca, who does all her cooking herself, has sent out nearly 300 pots of soup, with her husband Shane and other volunteers including a local taxi driver delivering soup for free.

The Soul Soup & Salads project is being funded by selling takeaways to locals in Okehampton and the surrounding area on Monday nights, which Rebecca also cooks from scratch. It is also supported with donations of fresh salad leaves and herbs from Gourmet Leaves of Spreyton as well as vegetables and other fresh produce from Made-Well near Hatherleigh.

Rebecca said: ‘It is a lot more then free soup, it is about people feeling someone is thinking about them. These are people who are too proud to go to the foodbank. There are families where people have lost their jobs suddenly. It is not just just about financial hardship through, it is also about supporting mental health. Among those we have helped are a family who moved down here and immediately had to self-isolate, so we fed them for five days.

‘People can ask us to send some soup to someone. I have jigsaws and kids’ colouring books and I send those out at the same time as the soup. We are on to our third week of the project and so far we have sent out 270 soups in three weeks. I always write on the outside of the bags who has nominated someone to receive them.’

Soups over the first three weeks of the project have catered for both traditional and more adventurous tastes, including tomato and lovage, parsnip and thyme, Thai peanut and spring green, and vegetable mulligatawny. See The Allotment Club Facebook page.