Bake Muffins & Feed Homeless People for National Muffin Day!

BY JACOB “MUFFIN MAN” KAUFMAN

National Muffin Day is coming up on Sunday, February 20! This is the day when we bake muffins and show our support for people experiencing homelessness in our communities by providing them with respect, dignity, and delicious baked goods. This year, we’re encouraging people to celebrate National Muffin Day in whatever manner they can while still staying safe and within their Covid comfort zones. Our recommended approach is to bake muffins with your family or close friends (your “pod,” if we’re still using that term), and then to donate them to homeless shelters in your cities that are accepting food donations.  If you’re in the Bay Area, we recommend the following locations:

• San Francisco: Many churches in the Tenderloin and SoMa accept food — in particular, I like GLIDE and Saint Anthony’s.  But I recently discovered this great volunteer food pantry called Free the Need — this woman has been running it out of various locations (currently her house in Miraloma) for 32 years!  If you want to donate to her, please feel free to give her a call, and tell her the Muffin Man sent ya!
• Oakland: Covenant House in Oakland is stoked to partner with us!
• Marin County: Gilead House in Novato can’t wait to see your muffins!

To sweeten the deal (yes, I use that pun shamelessly every year), for each person who bakes and gives (and lets me know by taking a picture of their muffins and posting to social media with the hashtag #givemuffins), I will donate $5 each to Project Homeless Connect (based in SF) and Family Promise (a national organization), and get matching from several sources. In the first National Muffin Day we had 70 participants, but it’s grown and in our largest years we’ve had over 500 participants, with our donations raised over the years totaling over $50,000!

National Muffin Team during a previous year.

Because we’re still in the Zoom era, we invite you to join us for a virtual baking party!  Bake with the Muffin Man and learn all of his fun baking secrets!  Please register here.

Finally, while we would love it if you would join us in baking and giving, if you’re busy but you’d still like to honor National Muffin Day by donating to a cause that benefits people experiencing homelessness, we encourage you to do so.  If you donate, please feel free to let us know so here we can track your donations in our Muffin Meter.  Looking for a good cause?  The two mentioned above are great, as is Pets of the Homeless.

Thanks a bunch!  And come February 20th, I can’t wait to see your muffins!