Breakfast for Champions

You may already know Ian Mendes as the Host of TSN1200’s ‘The Drive.’ However, to RMHCO the Mendes Family are Meals That Heal heroes who volunteer their time to prepare nutritious breakfasts for families staying at the House.

The Mendes family have a close connection with CHEO, and to families who are supporting each other through navigating a child’s health challenge. This combination of life experience and their great big hearts made them a wonderful volunteer fit for RMHCO. Originally stopping by to prepare a meal for families and share a unique volunteer experience with their daughter, the Mendes family left the House and knew they were hooked.

“We were so taken away with the love and the energy inside this home, we knew we had to do this on a regular basis.”

On the first Sunday of each month, the Mendes family get together to cook breakfast for our families. Ian’s daughter Elissa has her own RMHCO speciality; waffles deemed restaurant worthy and made with love.

Ian shares memories of connections made with families through meals, but also through slow moments of colouring with little ones or sharing their experience as parents with a child in the Hospital.

“It’s a real true sense of love and compassion that you feel when you walk through the doors and you want to be a part of that. We need to take that feeling and grow it.”

We certainly miss our volunteers at RMHCO, but we also know our families are missing those waffles!

Thank you to the Mendes family for all that you do to keep our families fed and feeling special.