Victoria Trudell is the founder of Zelphia’s Community Kitchen. A SchoolCraft College graduate with a degree in food chemistry and nutrition, she has always been interested in giving back to her community. During college, Victoria had her first opportunity to combine her passions for serving others and cooking by teaching culinary classes to clients with autism through a local nonprofit. She received the Trustee and Award of Excellence Scholarship in 2019 as well as the Breaking Traditions State Merit Award for pursuing a degree in a nontraditional field for her gender.
After graduation Victoria began dreaming of her own nonprofit that could fight food insecurity in local communities. In December 2019, she started cooking hot meals for the local homeless shelter which eventually evolved into her free food distributions providing fresh produce, dairy items, and dry goods to families in need.
Today, Zelphia’s Community Kitchen currently distributes in three different cities and has provided food to thousands of families on a weekly basis. Moving forward, Victoria plans to continue expanding Zelphia’s to ensure that no one goes hungry, that no food is wasted in our community, and no one is denied the opportunity or assistance to become self-sufficient.
Zelphia’s Community Kitchen pays tribute to my great grandparents, Keith and Zelphia Otto.
Keith and Zelphia Otto were both the oldest of their sibling groups. Growing up during the Great Depression they learned at an early age the value of having a warm meal and sharing that with neighbors in need.
When Keith and Zelphia lived in Detroit, MI they were greatly involved and volunteered with the Detroit Food Bank through their local church. In 1974 they moved to Olivet, MI driving every other week to Detroit for over a year to pick up food and distribute to families in their own community. Eventually they started a local food pantry in their own home and Ministries of the Bread of Life was born.
Looking for more ways to be involved, in 1982, Keith helped construct the building for the South Michigan Food Bank that still stands and operates today. He drove truck for many years helping to ensure that food was transported and available to those that needed it the most.
For over 40 years my great grandparents ran the food pantry out of their home serving hundreds of thousands of pounds of food to thousands of people.
When my great grandmother Zelphia retired in 2018, that year alone they distributed 21,346 pounds of food to 975 people, making it the biggest year of service in the history of Ministries of Bread of Life.
Zelphia’s Community Kitchen has the honor and privilege of continuing the legacy and work that my great grandparents started many decades ago.
