Write a commentVona’s Restaurant will provide the next Salvation Army Guest Chef Dinner on Election Day, Tuesday, November 7, serving from 4:30 to 6:00 p.m. or when sold out, at the Worship & Service Center, 73 West Second Street, Oswego.
The staff of the popular restaurant will prepare sausage and peppers, roasted potatoes, chef salad, and assorted desserts and beverages. There is ample parking and the building is fully accessible. Dinners may be eaten in the dining room or carried out. Masks are optional. This will be the final dinner for this year.
Vona’s Restaurant was started by Tom and Mary Vona in 1946 and run for nearly 25 years. Their children, Tom Vona, Jr. and Joey Occhino and their spouses Mary Jane Vona and Murphy Occhino next operated the restaurant for nearly five decades. The third generation of the Vona family, Murphy Occhino, Jr. and his wife Debra and his sister Lesa Occhino Peterson has recently taken over responsibility for the restaurant that has been helping to satisfy the community’s taste for authentic Italian foods for the past 77 years. They offer their grandmother’s famous Vona’s red sauce along with full-service family dining and catering of banquets and special events.
The Guest Chef Dinners have been held six times each year for the past sixteen years, except for 2020. Although early records are incomplete, 8,569 meals are known to have been served and more than $106,276 raised. The dinners are organized by the Salvation Army Corps Advisory Board and offered to the community to raise funds for fresh-cooked meals in Fulton and Oswego and for other services that are provided to individuals and families in need throughout Oswego County. The food is donated, so all receipts go to the work of the Army.
In September, the Corps provided 856 soup kitchen meals in Oswego and 758 in Fulton. It supplied 109 Fulton households with groceries for 2,475 meals and 100 Oswego households with groceries for 1,926 meals. It also distributed over 1,100 loaves of bread and pastries. Thirty-nine families bought 43 packages of low-cost food from the Food Bank of Central New York through The Salvation Army in Oswego. The Corps offers 18 families its Pathway of Hope program that seeks to prepare the younger generation for breaking the cycle of poverty.
Preparations for the Christmas season are well under way. With reductions this year in several of the Army’s sources of support, the need for volunteers to stand with the kettles will be greater than ever. It is a very meaningful way to participate in the spirit of the season of giving for individuals, families, neighbors, businesses, clubs, and church groups. Volunteering is a gift to yourself and your community. And please be as generous as you can be whenever you see one of the Christmas kettles.
Persons wishing to know more about The Salvation Army or to offer voluntary service are invited to call 315-343-6491 or stop at the office at 73 West Second Street in Oswego, between 10:00 A.M. and 3:00 P.M., Monday through Friday.
