It's another fish fry Friday, a time during Lenten season crucial to local volunteer fire departments and churches. Erie News Now wanted to know how fish fries have been panning out this year compared to previous years due to the pandemic.
We checked in with our lady of the lake church in Edinboro at the beginning of the Lenten season when they made their decision to carry on with fish fries, despite the pandemic. On Friday we stopped back to this drive-thru event to find out that it's been a successful few weeks.
“We’ve been able to put out over 400 meals in 90 minutes,” Dan Mulligan, a volunteer from the Knights of Columbus said.
He said they are averaging 400 fish dinners a week, which is even more than before the pandemic started.
“Maybe it’s because people can’t go out on Fridays and go into some other restaurants or maybe they’re not as comfortable doing that, but they can just drive right through here and get their meals,” Mulligan said.
Next week is their final fish fry but they are giving away one free meal to every 25th car. Raffle winners will also be chosen next Friday. All proceeds go back to the parish and several community organizations. The price for their fish dinner is $10.
“It makes us feel good, but what’s more important is if we’re actually helping other people,” Mulligan said.
The situation was similar out at the Fairfield Fire Department. There were lots of fish to fry cars filled the parking lot waiting in line to make their way through the drive-thru.
“This is one of our sole money makers for the year, due to the fact that a lot of our other opportunities were canceled” Fairfield Fire Chief, Jim Hawryliw said.
Hawryliw said it’s the same fish fry the community knows and loves, it’s just set up as a drive-thru this year, and more people have ordered fish dinners than in years past.
“Before COVID we were probably running 75 to 100 meals inside and now we’re doing the drive-thru and are almost at 700 a week,” he said.
That’s 700 customers giving back to a company who has worked straight through the pandemic.
“Even when the COVID was bad last year and even into this year, we never slowed down with anything,” Hawryliw said.
They are hosting two more fish fries, which run about $12 a meal and this fire chief said it's important to support everyone this Lenten season.
“Not just us, all the other fire departments and churches that are doing this because this is for everybody,” Hawryliw said.