Salty’s offers free Thanksgiving meals
HALFMOON (Nov. 24) — Salty’s Pub & Bistro owner John Marzilli says it’s no big deal, that he wishes he could do more.
He is, after all, only providing more than 300 free turkey dinners on Thanksgiving. Marzilli buys all the food and does the cooking, while the Twin Bridges Rotary handles the publicity and organization and mans the dining room.
“It’s a great feeling when 300 to 400 people come to your restaurant and thank you for the food,” said Marzilli, who was a chef in Louisville and Indianapolis before taking a job as the Albany Marriott’s executive chef so he could be closer to his family in Rhode Island.
This will be the event’s fourth Thanksgiving, growing from around 150 diners at the first dinner. That year — 2006 — Marzilli asked the restaurant’s food suppliers for donation, a practice he stopped the following year because he said it didn’t feel right.
Salty's Pub & Bistro owner John Marzilli will be cooking more than 300 turkey dinners that he will share for free with community members who otherwise would eat alone.
“Plus I believe what goes around comes around.”
The idea came about shortly after Marzilli bought Salty’s and Twin Bridges — which was a new Rotary club at the time — started having meetings there. Marzilli and then-club president Chuck Chera were talking about community projects. Marzilli recalled how his father — who was also a chef, running his family’s Italian restaurant in Rhode Island — would always invite employees to the family’s turkey dinner.
“Every Thanksgiving he would bring someone home,” Marzilli said. “A dishwasher, a waitress, a busboy — there was always someone who otherwise would have been alone.”
They realized that a lot of people in Southern Saratoga spend Thanksgiving alone, so Marzilli and the Rotary decided to give them a place where they could have a good Thanksgiving dinner in a fun, social atmosphere.
“It’s a day to give thanks and share with others,” Twin Bridges president Karen Bristol said. “It’s a day nobody should be sitting home alone.”
So the Rotary reaches out to seniors organizations, food pantries and churches, asking them to help spread the word. With the increased publicity and the decreased economy, the event has grown each year.
“I’ve only got 1 or 2 tables left,” said Chera, who handles the reservations. He is up to 260 reservations already, and more are coming in. And that doesn’t include deliveries and takeouts for shut-ins.
The more the merrier.
“I wish I could feed 1,000,” Marzilli said. “It’s going to be happening here at Salty’s as long as I own Salty’s.”
For more information:
- Salty’s Pub & Bistro, 215A Guideboard Road, Halfmoon, 371.1120
- Twin Bridges Rotary Club
