Christmas <\/a>dinners for the charity to distribute, so people could reheat on the day.<\/p>\nBut operations manager Dawn explained they\u2019d already bought lots of frozen chickens \u2013 so asked the family to donate some of the vegetables they\u2019d need instead. The Birks ordered the entire list of produce costing around \u00a3600, to ensure FERN could deliver full fresh Christmas dinner ingredient packages to 75 families in Glasgow.<\/p>\n
Dawn said: “We had a hectic day yesterday (December 23) thanks to the Birks – we were able to give out 75 Christmas dinner packs, all with fresh potatoes, carrots, parsnips and brussels sprouts as well as 60 soup packs with lentils, stock cubes, carrots and onions.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Malletsheugh donated all the fresh veg which they ordered in specially for us, it wasn\u2019t stuff they had in stock \u2013 Bobby had it delivered as late as he could from their supplier so it would be as fresh as possible.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis donation made a huge difference to us this year. We feed over 350 people and they all received a healthy, nutritious and appetising meal along with their usual food parcel, helping to make it a more enjoyable Christmas for everyone.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s a knock-on too – having the fresh vegetables has allowed us to keep our tinned stock available for the coming month, stretching out our supplies.<\/p>\n
![\"Rachel,](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/0_rachel-left-dawn-and-teamjpeg.jpg\")
Rachel, Dawn and the team at FERN. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe would love to be in a position to provide more fresh produce so this donation felt extra special – especially at a time of year when everyone is so busy.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur requests for assistance have increased dramatically this year, particularly in the last six weeks as the weather has got colder and families are feeling the strain of the increased cost of living. Many of our clients said if it wasn\u2019t for the foodbank they wouldn\u2019t have had a Christmas dinner at all.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have been very lucky to receive several donations from the local community this year \u2013 the Glasgow Clan ice hockey ran a food drive for us which brought two carloads of tinned food, tea, coffee, treats and toiletries.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut the Christmas dinner itself is an important thing, it\u2019s a memory maker which means a lot to families, and not being able to provide it really cuts deep for parents.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe really have found it is a struggle to keep up with the demand at times so having a local business like The Malletsheugh get in touch out of the blue wanting to support us is a godsend.<\/p>\n
\u201cHave a lovely Christmas and thank you so much for supporting FERN, we truly appreciate your support and kindness.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have already had feedback from clients thanking us because the food packs are of such high quality this Christmas \u2013 that makes it all worthwhile.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/0_WhatsApp-Image-2025-12-23-at-193309-2jpeg.jpg\")
The restaurant ordered vegetables for the Christmas dinners. <\/p>\n
The Malletsheugh is known for award-winning Indian food and service, but has run a series of events and campaigns for charity and the community in the two years it’s been open, as well as making donations themselves to local causes.<\/p>\n
Bobby Birk said: \u201cIt\u2019s really important to us to be part of the community and help where we can. The people of Renfrewshire really embraced us and welcomed us when we opened up two years ago and we always want to show how much we appreciate that.<\/p>\n
\u201cBoth at The Malletsheugh and our new restaurant The Osprey in East Kilbride, we will always try to help where we can when we hear local people are in need.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe work FERN do all year round is simply incredible so we wanted to offer some nice fresh cooked Christmas dinners for families to enjoy.<\/p>\n
\u201cOf course when they told us donating the produce for them to deliver was better, that was what we would do \u2013 it\u2019s not about us or what we want, it\u2019s what charities need.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were all really happy to be able to help out and have the veg they wanted ready for Dawn and her team to make sure lots of families can have a healthy Christmas dinner and make nice memories.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re always here to help those who need it in our local area and we have a few ideas for next year to step that up a bit.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe support we have had from the community is something we will never take for granted \u2013 and we will always do our best to repay that welcome.<\/p>\n
“From our family to yours, Merry Christmas.\u201d<\/p>\n
If you\u2019d like to help FERN or find out more about what they do, go to their Facebook page here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Feed East Renfrewshire Now faced a huge shortfall until they were contacted by the Birk family, who run…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":653906,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7826],"tags":[748,35745,786,154824,918,4884,712,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-653905","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-glasgow","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-christmas","10":"tag-food-and-drink","11":"tag-foodbank","12":"tag-glasgow","13":"tag-great-britain","14":"tag-scotland","15":"tag-uk","16":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115779751019301844","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/653905","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=653905"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/653905\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/653906"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=653905"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=653905"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=653905"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"Bobby](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/0_bobby-birk-dawnjpeg.jpg\")
Bobby from The Malletsheugh and Dawn from the local food bank. (Image: Supplied )<\/p>\n