Four-year-old Luca Pignatiello sinks her teeth into a slice of Prima's cheese pizza at the Second Annual Pizza Challenge held October 8 to benefit the Emergency Food Pantry at The Elizabeth Peabody House.

Second Annual Pizza Challenge Supports Local Food Pantry

By Elizabeth Sheeran

Nine-year-old Erik Byfield has a whole strategy for picking a winning slice of pizza. “How much stuff is on it,” is very important, he said. So is the kind of “stuff.” It has to have enough cheese, but he’s not a fan of extra tomatoes. No small slices and no square slices. Like a lot of kids, he takes his pizza very seriously.

But there was another reason to be serious about eating pizza at The Elizabeth Peabody House on Broadway last Saturday. Byfield was among those seeking out the best slice at The Second Annual Pizza Challenge, hosted by the non-profit center to raise both funds and awareness for the plight of the hungry in Somerville.

Over 50 people paid a flat fee to sample the goods from seven local pizza joints and vote for their favorites. All pizzas were donated by the participating pizzerias, and ticket proceeds went to support the Elizabeth Peabody House Emergency Food Pantry, which provides groceries to more than 175 Somerville families each month.

“It helps the community by helping those who aren’t lucky enough to have what they need to have,” said Katrina Cipoletta, who was helping set up tables at the Pizza Challenge and is a regular volunteer at the Food Pantry.

She should know. She has been receiving groceries from the food pantry every month, to feed herself and her three children, ages eight, nine and thirteen. A single mother who’s lived in Somerville for over four years, Cipoletta said she’s been finding it tough since the economy has weakened but prices for everything have kept going up, and she’s very thankful for the Food Pantry .

“I needed to make some ends meet and I’ve had some bumps along the way,” she said. “It helps a lot around the end of the month, when there are so many things I can’t get. It’s almost like a patch that gets me through. Without them, sometimes I couldn’t put food on the table.”

The Elizabeth Peabody House opened the emergency food pantry in 2009, when children enrolled in its preschool and afterschool programs were showing signs of food insecurity.

“Many families, right here in Winter Hill, don’t know where their next meal is coming from,” said Selvin Chambers III, executive director of the non-profit institution, which first started helping immigrant families in Boston’s West End over 100 years ago, and moved to Somerville in the 1950s.

Sadly, hunger has become a growth industry. The pantry now assists six times as many families as it did when it first opened its doors just two years ago, helping feed nearly 900 people every month. But Chambers said the need in the local community far exceeds the pantry’s current capacity.

“Seventeen million kids go to bed hungry every night in this country. That’s one in four,” said Chambers. “Those numbers include people in Somerville.”

The pantry gets most of its groceries at no cost or very low cost from Stop & Shop, Farmer Dave’s, Food for Free and the Greater Boston Food Bank. But it still needs money to run the program and buy additional food, and the annual Pizza Challenge was a creative and fun way to bring local businesses and the public together to meet the need.

The event was a friendly competition, with Leone’s Subs & Pizza, Amelia’s Kitchen, Vinny’s Ristorante, Mama Gina’s, Prima Pizza, Mamma Lisa’s Pizza House and Eat at Jumbo’s all vying for bragging rights in categories like “Best Cheese Slice,” won by Mama Gina’s, “Vegetarian,” won by Eat at Jumbo’s, and “Best Tasting,” won by Leone’s.

But Leone’s co-owner Nick Riccolo said the real reward is just getting involved.

“Whether we win or not, a lot of people tried our pizza and they enjoyed it and that makes me happy. It’s a lot of fun for us and it’s for a good cause,” said Riccolo. “If you can’t help the community and the people right nearby, then who are you gonna help?”

For more information about the food pantry, go to http://www.elizabethpeabodyhouse.org/.