SERVING HOPE

'One Plate, One Child & One Life At A Time'
Exclusive Interview with Sir Bruno Serato
Featured in 'Innerviews'
Hosted by Allié McGuire

​Sir Bruno Serato is an internationally recognized chef, humanitarian, and founder of Caterina’s Club. His life changed forever when his mother looked at a hungry child and said, “If he’s hungry, feed him pasta.” Those few words became the foundation of a mission that has fed millions of children, housed hundreds of families, and reminded the world that compassion is often measured one person at a time.

ALLIÉ: Let’s go back to 2005, when you met a little boy whose only dinner was a bag of potato chips. What do you remember most about that moment, and what changed inside you?

BRUNO: I remember every detail. My mom was visiting from Italy, and after lunch I said, “Mom, let’s go to the Boys & Girls Club,” because I knew how much she loved children.

The director at the time, Mike Baker, showed my mom around the facility. Then there was this eight-year-old boy. Mike said, “Bruno, this is Billy. He’s eating potato chips right now, and that could be his only dinner.”

I asked, “Why do you say that could be his only dinner?”

​He explained that some of the children came from low-income families. Sometimes they were living in motels. Sometimes ten people were living in a single room. Their mothers might not be available to cook for them, so the children ate whatever they could find. Sometimes, that was all they had.
I was shocked.

I translated everything Mike had told me to my mom, and the first thing she said, like an Italian mama, was, “Why don’t you feed him pasta?”

I said, “Yeah, Ma. You’re right.”

When I was a little boy, my family was also very poor. Whenever my friends, brothers or sisters came over, my mom always had something for them. Pasta. Bread. Maybe just a little sugar on top. There was always something.

So I went back to the restaurant and prepared pasta for some of the children. Billy was the first one.

And we never stopped.

We’ve done it every single day for 21 years. Recently, we celebrated serving our 12 millionth meal. I’m proud to say that what started with one location, one city and one club has now expanded to 30 cities and 150 locations.

People sometimes think it’s only Anaheim, but we’ve served children in many other communities as well. It expanded because children are in need everywhere. It isn’t just one city or one location.

When we served the 12 millionth meal, I invited 300 children from different clubs and cities to come to the Anaheim White House. The restaurant was packed. We had games, a jumping house and so much fun.

And on top of that, I served French fries. The kids went crazy. They love French fries. I thought, “Uh-oh. I have to double the order!”

​ALLIÉ: Who doesn’t love French fries, especially when they’re done well?

But let’s pause for a moment. It all began with what your mom said: “If he’s hungry, feed him pasta.” It’s one thing to have that mission, but how did you actually accomplish it? Twelve million meals is extraordinary. What did it take to do this work?

BRUNO: I tell people this when I give speeches around the world about Caterina’s Club, which is named after my mom. We started with one location. Then two. Then ten, fifteen, twenty. We didn’t begin by serving 3,000 or 4,000 meals a day. You would go crazy. We started small. We went from one location to two, then three, four and five. Every three or four months, we added another location and another pasta program.

Eventually, we started counting the meals because we needed the numbers for auditing. Personally, I never cared about counting. I just served, prepared and fed the children.

But they told us we needed to keep track of every meal, so the women in my office started counting everything. At first, I thought they were crazy. I said, “It’s impossible.”

They said, “No, that’s what we do!”

When I serve a meal, I might put pasta in the container along with chicken or beef and vegetables. Sometimes there’s an extra piece of chicken or something else. We count the individual portions that go onto each plate.

After so many years, I look at those numbers and think, “Wow.” Of course, we also have to be careful because it’s costly. The food is free for the children, but it isn’t free for Caterina’s Club. Our costs continue to increase because of food prices, gas and transportation.

I have four full-time drivers traveling throughout Orange County, Los Angeles County and even into San Bernardino County. We used to go as far as San Diego County, but eventually I had to say, “It’s too far. It takes too much time for the drivers.”

​We do what we can. Sometimes I wish I could go all the way to New York.

​ALLIÉ: And you have actually served pasta in New York.
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BRUNO: Yes. I don’t tell too many people that. I think you’re one of the first people I’ve told. I served pasta at the Madison Boys & Girls Club in Brooklyn with the help of Barilla. They had a restaurant in New York, and they helped me serve pasta there.

They also did something similar in Chicago. A friend of mine did it in Texas, and other people have done it in Oklahoma. I focus on Orange County and Los Angeles County, but people around the country and around the world have taken part. People have served pasta in Mexico, Africa, Italy and other places.

I think I have spread the virus of kindness and feeding children. It’s a really special part of my life. I believe it’s the mission God gave me.

ALLIÉ: It’s so beautiful, Bruno. I love that it’s spreading. If we’re going to talk about a virus, this is the kind of virus we actually need in the world. Let’s talk about that number again: 12 million. When you think about 12 million meals, do you still see the face of that first boy you served?

BRUNO: I still see his face because I see him once in a while.

I invited Billy when we served our 10 millionth meal, and I had him cut a big cake for the children who came to the restaurant.

When I see Billy, it’s difficult to hold back my tears.

The best part is that he’s a good man. He has worked for the City of Anaheim, the same city where I first met him. Sometimes children go in different directions, but Billy went in the right direction. I’m very happy about that.

There’s another girl I can never forget because she was such a kind and wonderful girl. Her name is Alejandra.

Her brother passed away recently. I wished her a happy birthday, and she sent me a message saying, “I never forget what you did for all the children in the area.”

They used to live in a mobile home park, and I went there every day to deliver pasta. At Thanksgiving, I also delivered turkeys to the families. There were about 150 mobile homes.

That girl has a special place in my heart.
There are some stories I can never forget.

One day, I gave her socks because she told me there were holes in all the socks she owned. When she saw me a month later, after we had delivered socks to her and the other children, she hugged me and cried for ten minutes.

I was concerned. I thought something bad had happened.
But she was crying tears of joy and gratitude because we had given her socks.

Those are the kinds of moments I will never forget in my life. I will carry them with me all the way to heaven.

​ALLIÉ: It’s beautiful, this work you’ve been called to do, because it isn’t just spaghetti. It’s turkeys. It’s socks. It’s seeing what a child and a family actually need. When did you realize that feeding a child also meant helping create a safer and more hopeful future for the entire family through things like housing and jobs?

BRUNO: That’s a good question. About 12 or 13 years ago, I was at the Boys & Girls Club and noticed two children, Carlos and Maria, who always looked sad.

When you go to a Boys & Girls Club, children usually play. Even if they’re poor, they play and smile. I was very poor growing up with my brother and sister, but we weren’t sad. We were happy. We had spaghetti, leftover bread and milk at night, and we were happy.

​But these two children were different. They always had sad faces.

I talked to the director and asked, “Is there something wrong with those two children? I don’t see them playing very much, and they always look sad.”

When you see a child with a sad face, you notice it.

It reminded me of my little niece, Anna. She lost her mother, my niece. When I went back to Italy this year, Anna wasn’t the same child I had known when her mother was alive. She was very sad.

I spent two weeks in Italy trying to help her. I took her to school and picked her up. By the second or third day, when she came out of school and saw me and my sister Flavia waiting for her, she had a smile on her face.

That makes me emotional even now, because there’s nothing better than seeing a child smile.

When I talked to the director about Carlos and Maria, he told me, “Bruno, they live in a motel room.”
I asked, “And?”

He said, “There are six of them.”

Their mother, father and four children were all living in one room. Two or three would sleep on the bed, and two or three would sleep on the floor.

Eventually, I went to see their motel room. Their entire life was in that one room. Boxes were stacked all the way to the ceiling and around the walls.

I asked the father, “Why have you been living here for so long?”

He was a handyman. He told me, “Bruno, I make enough money as a handyman to pay the monthly motel rent, but I can’t save enough for the first and last month’s rent needed to move out.”

I had never thought about that before. Sometimes you don’t understand someone’s situation until you see it yourself.

I asked him, “If I pay your first and last month’s rent, will you move out?”

He asked me, “Why do you want to help me?” He was almost scared.

I told him, “Because I’m a good man, and I want to help you. You have beautiful children.”

When I saw those four children, I remembered myself, my brother and my sister. I told him, “Let me help you pay the first and last month’s rent. You move out, and we’ll stay behind you for one year because you need time to get used to paying the electricity, water and all the other expenses.”

I paid the first and last month’s rent, and they moved into an apartment.
They were very happy.

I’m not saying every motel is bad, because there are some nice ones, but some of these environments can expose children to drugs, prostitution and other dangerous situations.

Think about the children.

That was the first family I helped in this way. Since then, I’ve done it many times when I find a family who qualifies.

They have to have children because we’re doing this for the kids. The parents also need to have a job because they have to be able to continue paying the rent every month.

I’m proud to say that I’ve paid the first and last month’s rent for 280 families.

ALLIÉ: What?! Oh my goodness!

BRUNO: I think I may be the only person in the world who has done that on this scale, just as I may be the only person who has served 12 million meals.

I’m not saying that to brag about myself. I just wish more people would do things like this.
The world would be a better place.

No child should go to bed hungry, and no child should have to live in one room with seven, eight, nine or ten other people. I’ll tell you another short story.

One little girl once told me, “Chef Bruno, I do my homework sitting on the toilet.”

I asked, “Why?”

She said, “It’s the only quiet place where I can do my homework.”

Think about that.

We might sit on the toilet and play with our phones, but children like her were doing their homework there because it was the only quiet place they had.

When six, seven or eight people live in one room, it’s difficult for anyone to concentrate. That’s another part of what I call the Welcome Home program at Caterina’s Club.

ALLIÉ: And you mentioned there was a third part.

BRUNO: Yes. The third one is something I’m very proud of. It’s called Chef Bruno Hospitality.

After doing this work for so many years, I realized that after children leave the Boys & Girls Club, they often go home or spend time in parking lots and other environments that may not be good for them.

So I decided to bring teenagers from school into my restaurant and teach them how to work.

They start with basic jobs such as being a busser, working in the kitchen, peeling potatoes and cleaning the floor. We usually take seven, eight, ten or twelve kids at a time for a three-month training program.

They earn about $150 a week while they’re training.
After three months, they leave because I want to train another group of ten kids.

So far, I’ve graduated more than 1,000 young people. The best part is that some of the kids improve so much and show us that they really want to work. We then hire some of them as employees at the restaurant. I have three or four of them working for us now.

It’s a gift because you get to know them for three months. They practice, learn from you, work with your crew and interact with customers. They receive real-world training. When you finally say, “Okay, it’s your time to go out on your own,” it’s a great feeling.

Some of them have gone on to build their own careers. One boy graduated from the Culinary Institute of America in Napa Valley. Another girl opened a small pastry shop. Another works at the Cambria Hotel in Anaheim.

There are many stories like that. I don’t know what happened to every single one of them, but some have gone on to do great things. This is what Caterina’s Club does.

ALLIÉ: It’s absolutely phenomenal, all that you’ve done and all that you continue to do. I hope your story inspires other people to mirror the good you’re putting into the world.
​

​ALLIÉ: For one last question today, this is for the person watching who believes they’re only one person and couldn’t possibly make a difference. What have 12 million meals taught you about the power of beginning with one act of kindness?

What would you say to someone who simply doesn’t know where to start?

BRUNO: If you turn around and look, you will see someone in need.
Everywhere you look, there is always someone who needs help.

Don’t tell me you don’t know where to start.
Open your eyes.

Someone may be in need next door, in your neighborhood, at a school, at a church or at work.
There is always somebody.

Open your eyes and listen.

And don’t think you have to serve 4,000 or 5,000 meals a day.
Just give someone a little pasta.

You can even say, “Hello. How are you?”

One of the things I teach students around the world is simply to say hello to an elderly person. Many elderly people are abandoned by their families.

Just say, “Hello. Good morning. Good night.”
You’ve done something without spending any money.

It takes zero money to be a kind human being. ∎

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​Follow Sir Bruno Serato on Instagram: @serato7
Learn more about Caterina’s Club: caterinasclub.org
Visit the Anaheim White House: anaheimwhitehouse.com