Jody Adams has helped raise $1.5 million for Partners in Health, a nonprofit that provides services to the world's poorest nations, including Rwanda, where she recently visited.
(MICHELE McDONALD/GLOBE STAFF)
G FORCE | JODY ADAMS
She gives of her daily bread
Jody Adams has helped raise $1.5 million for Partners in Health, a nonprofit that provides services to the world's poorest nations, including Rwanda, where she recently visited.
(MICHELE McDONALD/GLOBE STAFF)
For the foodie set, Jody Adams, the chef and owner of Rialto at the Charles Hotel, is a known name. Her tony restaurant attracts boldface types, who plunk down $43 for a steak (granted, it's a Wolfe's Neck sirloin with portabello, arugula, endive, Parmigiano-Reggiano, and truffle oil). What people may not know about is Adams's devotion to Rwanda, where $45 will feed a family of four for a month. In the past couple of years, she has helped raise $1.5 million for Partners in Health, a nonprofit that provides healthcare, food, and other services to the world's poorest. Last year, she and her son visited Rwanda, which this week is marking the 15th anniversary of the genocide that killed 800,000.
Q. People must constantly ask you to donate your food and time. How do you handle all the requests?
A. They come in daily. I had to choose what is important to me, and that's the issues of hunger, poverty, health, and children. I decided to put my energies with people who are really making a difference at the ground level. So I chose a local, national, and international (nonprofit): the Greater Boston Food Bank, Share Our Strength, and Partners in Health. There are others. It's really hard for me to say no.
Q. What did you see in Rwanda?
A. My son Oliver and I spent a week visiting three different Partners in Health sites and going on home medical and nutritional visits. We went to visit a man who has AIDS, and we saw two families with kids who had marasmus and kwashiorkor (life-threatening diseases caused by malnutrition). We saw a family with a child who just wasn't growing. He was 8 but he looked like he was 4. We got to the house, a tiny banana-leaf covered hut with no furniture. You couldn't stand up in it, and they cooked their meals over a fire inside. It kept them warm, but they were inhaling smoke. Partners in Health provides packets of food if there's malnutrition: cornmeal, beans, oil, sugar, and salt.
Q. Did people speak of the genocide?
A. Reminders of the genocide are everywhere. There's a constant dialogue about it, and you can see it in people's eyes. One young man who works for Partners in Health, his entire family was killed in front of his eyes.
Q. How do you reconcile what you saw in Rwanda with what you see at Rialto?
A. To solve problems in places like Rwanda, places like Rialto have to exist. I provide a table (benefit dinners and auctions) for everyone to sit around. Many of the people who come to Rialto are people who are working toward addressing these issues. They're not talking about their jets and their fifth house.
Q. So what did you have to eat in Rwanda?
A. Bananas a million ways. Banana beer, mashed bananas, sweet fried bananas. I had banana stew and I loved that.
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