As the students had left town for the Summer it was a good opportunity to give the Kingsgate Church food bank a Summer clean.

Claire and Farzeen started working on the fridges and freezers cleaning away the pesky crumbs and washing all the shelves and drawers.

Meanwhile upstairs the team of Luke, Tom, Jenny, Anna and Enara started to sort the canned fruit, meatballs, soup and some very strange looking drinks to identify those which had expired or were close to expiry. Anything close to expiry was put at the top of the pile and everything that had expired was separated out.

One of the freezers needed a little help defrosting for its clean so Anna joined Farzeen with some hot water to give it a helping hand whilst Tom tackled the last fridge.

Everything cleaned and sorted some brave Goodgymers decided to try the mystery drinks that would apparently provide calmness. Some slightly odd expressions followed the tasting - very sweet flavoured with a combination of berries was the verdict. Let’s hope they provided a sense of calm and serenity.

For those that didn’t fancy the mystery drinks there was an assortment of soup, tinned fruit and shepherds pies to take home that were close to expiry and prevent unnecessary food waste.

A big welcome to our newcomers Jenny and Enara!

This morning after negotiating the finding of another way in the building, the task, with some other volunteers was to check out the date of items and lay out some food cans and jars into crates ready for the onslaught of the students tommorow that need to use this resource. Anna then went up and down the stairs taking the resources needed to the correct level.

Use-by dates. Not always applied at home, provided something passes the sniff test or hasn’t gone green, but an important factor at Kingsgate Student Pantry.

Much of this fun task involved a brilliant turn out of GoodGym members going through the various items donated to the student food bank.

Ken, Marcos, Rachel, Jana, Jacqui and Ana all got stuck in straining their eyes on packets to make sure everything was safe to consume. Dave used some elbow grease to clean the freezer while Claire and Julie did the same in the kitchen.

Luke and Tom, meanwhile, very nearly consigned 50kg of lentils to the dustbin when nearly mistaking the date they were packed for the use-by. Mistake amended, they were reassigned to smaller packets, with the bag sealer getting a thorough outing.

A fun task and a warm welcome from the Kingsgate team before we reconvened at the Albion

A last-minute change of plan from our planned task, including a few late phone-calls to redirect wayward members, and we were back in Surbiton for one of our regular visits to help out at the Growbaby shop.

Rachel quickly assigned tasks around the shop. Hazel, Claire, Tom and our new recruit Marcos got to work downstairs, reassigning bags of new clothes and shoes into the appropriate crates, hanging up snow suits and occasionally venturing into the world’s most terrifying storeroom.

Upstairs, Jana repositioned wellies for a new display and Marie-Noelle and Dave tidied the rest of the shop floor. On a damp autumnal evening, we were all relieved to have a task inside. Growbaby, a valuable local resource, is always appreciative of the extra help.

Seven of us met at the Quaker Centre for our group run to Kingsgate Student Pantry. All the students have finished for the year and were heading home so the foodbank needed to be packed up for the summer.

Sarah greeted us when we arrived and we were soon put to work. Emma, Ed and Claire wiped down the fridges in the sun room, Hazel and Ben wiped the fridges by the stairs and Dave and Luke wiped down the buckets and containers. We powered through the tasks so Sarah brought over a big box of herbs and spices and we decanted the big bags into smaller plastic packets for individual use.

Soon we were all done and it was time to run home. Great session everyone! We'll be back in October to help organise the food bank when the students are back. Hope to see you there.

It was back to Kingsgate Church on Tuesday evening, where our host Sarah had some quite different tasks for us at this valuable food bank facility for local students.

Julie and Sabir were quick to work, sorting out noodles and weighing out bags of 'spicy seed mix', an alliterative combination that Jade, Luke, Rachel and Dave will not forget as they wrote out ingredient labels for the new packets.

Some super scripting solidly served - sterling stuff, squad!

As Tom and Claire checked over some new stock and moved it into crates upstairs, Jade smashed our cardboard boxes into smithereens and Luke finished wiping the fridges.

There’s always a nice welcome after climbing the infinite stairs in the church - we even got name tags and the offer of some spare pots of plant-based non-alcoholic brandy cream - and we’ll be back for another visit soon once the students disappear for the summer.