 An organization in the small town of Emily gives back to the community by, in a big way, the Emily Karen Chercafe has been serving and delivering weekly donation based dinners for over 10 years. Reporter Rachel Johnson has the story. So Emily is small, their generosity is giant. This is a great bunch of people and they can cook like you wouldn't believe. The Karen Chercafe serves dinner for their community every Wednesday evening and started when the Wesleyan Church began serving a weekly meal for their members. The woman that runs the food shelf here in Emily came over to ask us if we could open up to the community. The Karen Chercafe is completely volunteer run from the people cooking and serving the meals to the drivers who deliver the dinners to surrounding communities. It's not in the paper they needed a volunteer and I walked in and they said, how would you like to do the coffee? Well I've been doing the coffee and the drinks ever since. These volunteers are showing up week after week after week and it's amazing to me that we have a great area around here. The meals vary week to week and are always filling and nutritious. Tonight the Karen Chercafe is serving taco salad with refried beans, homemade tortilla chips, a variety of salads finished with apple crisp. The food is sourced through second harvest in Grand Rapids and is bought through donations. They are a food bank that gets food that is donated to them from several of the larger companies, food chains and then they give it to people like us and the food shelves and we do straight. Though a filling delicious meal is a highlight, most people's favorite part of the Karen Chercafe is coming together every week. People get out and they talk to each other and they make friends and find out a few things and makes a nice gathering. We have people from Hilltop and Audine and Peterlase and Crosslake and we all come together and we work together for a good cause. Looking to the future, the Karen Chercafe hopes to keep growing their services and providing great dinners to Emily and beyond. Reporting from Emily, Rachel Johnson, Lakeland News. The Karen Cher is hosting its annual major fundraiser coming up on Saturday, October 6th. For more information, visit the story on our website at lptv.org. If you enjoyed this segment of Lakeland News, please consider making a tax-deductible contribution to Lakeland PBS.