"Coventry mosque reveals plan to set up soup kitchen"

[dutchman]

The Foleshill based Mosque have had the soup kitchen planned for a while



A Coventry Mosque have revealed plans to open a permanent soup kitchen in the city.

The Al-Madinah Institute Mosque in Foleshill has fostered the idea for a community space like this for a while, but their soup kitchen will officially opened this weekend.

They already set up a foobank and helpline which has been heavily used during the coronavirus pandemic.

"We wanted to do this to mark one year since the coronavrius lockdown and pandemic, to mark that we thought we would do a new initiative" Imam Shayk Nabeel told CoventryLive.

"Things are easing and we are still going to carry on with [our community support], those people that are fit and healthy who have a home, job and finances, they struggled and suffered in this period."

The soup kitchen opened yesterday (March 27), and is open to everyone. And there are plans to make it a permanent fixture, as Imam Shayk Nabeel explained.

"We are getting planners and architects to come in and design a food court," he said.

"I am very passionate about this and something I've had in my mind for a while and we are slowly starting to get in place.

"It's not just for homeless and needy people, it's open to everyone" he said.

The soup kitchen is currently operating out of a burger van in the Mosque car park, but the wheels are already in motion to set up a kitchen and food court to feed hungry locals seven days a week.

There will be a simple menu of soup, rice and chapati.

The soup kitchen is run by volunteers, and the Mosque has leafleted thousands of homes in Coventry as well as the local homeless shelters.

Al-Madinah Mosque is based at: Unit 6, 137 Queen Mary's Rd, Coventry CV6 5LR

[dutchman]

the wheels are already in motion to set up a kitchen and food court to feed hungry locals seven days a week

Experience with a similar soup kitchen in Spon End is that it will attract undesirables from a much wider area and create a local nuisance problem. This was made worse by the ban on indoor feeding during lockdown.