Newtown United Methodist Church’s Pasta Project will celebrate its 25th anniversary this month. The monthly NUMC Saturday Pasta Dinner will be this weekend, on March 7, from 5 to 7:30 pm, in the church’s lower gathering hall.

The public will have two more opportunities to enjoy the monthly spaghetti dinner after that, longtime volunteer and project coordinator Martha Millett has announced. In June, the project will conclude its run of community gatherings.

“We have a good number of people who come out for dinner every month, and it’s been a very successful fundraiser,” said Ms Millett, “but it’s a lot of work. I’ve been asking for someone else to step up and take over for a very long time but it just hasn’t happened.”

The dinner events have been offered regularly on the first Saturday of the month, September through June, since 1989. Ms Millett was a NUMC trustee when she told fellow trustees she would host a pasta dinner to raise funds to help cover costs the Church Hill Road house of worship was facing with the addition of Wesley Hall. The first dinner was held in March 1989, and it was expected to be a short-term fundraiser.

A quarter of a century later, the First Saturday Pasta Dinner has become a staple in the calendars of many NUMC members, and even friends of the church.

Reverend Mel Kawakami, the senior pastor of NUMC, said this week that the ongoing offering has been quite an accomplishment.

“I don’t think you could have a 25-year run of anything if it didn’t have internal support — that is, the support within the community of faith — but also the wider community support,” he said Wednesday afternoon. “I think it was, without a question, a success.”

The dinners have always pulled in many members of NUMC. But there are regularly members of other house of worship, as well as those who do not identify with any religious group, sharing space at the long tables that fill the church’s gathering hall.

“We see a lot of older guests,” Ms Millett said this week. “They enjoy coming  month after month, and I can understand that. It’s a great meal, at a great bargain.”

Adult guests are asked for a$10 donation for the full dinner, senior citizens are asked for $9, and children’s dinners are $3.50. The requested donation for the adult and senior citizen dinners increased by just $1 in September, at the beginning of the current season. 

These suggested fees have been in place since November 2009, when organizers raised their prices by $1 per person. Before that, the cost of dinners had been $9 and $8, respectively, which had been held since at least September 2000.

Prep for each month’s dinner begins on the Thursday before the event, when 60 to 70 pounds of meat is delivered to the church. Four to six people make meatballs by hand that day, leaving enough meat set aside for some of the sauce that will be served Saturday night. Diners are offered options of meatless sauce, a sauce with meat, and a spicy sauce with meat.

“Five pounds of meat goes into every pot of sauce,” said Ms Millett.

About 15 people get to the church by Saturday morning to begin setting up the room, putting tables into place, setting places for diners, and precooking spaghetti.

“We cook up 60 to 80 pounds of spaghetti every month,” she said

“This is all homemade,” added Ms Millett, who also takes care of making all of the salad dressing each month. “This meal isn’t duplicated anywhere else in town.”

More volunteer help is needed by Saturday afternoon to prepare the salad — a combination of lettuces, red cabbage, peppers, and carrots — and fruit cups that are also part of each meal. Desserts are provided by more volunteers.

Once it’s time to open the doors for the public, another half-dozen volunteers are in place as servers and six others are working in the kitchen. Collecting donations and bussing tables are covered by more volunteers, as is cleanup.

“We have a night-time crew who arrives at 10 o’clock to help us clean up,” said Ms Millett, who has been helped in recent years by co-chairs Diane Rockwell and Suzanne Stawiasz.

In 1997, when the Pasta Project celebrated its eighth anniversary, a coffee house was added to the monthly offering.

Resident and award-winning banjo player Roger Sprung has headlined the music event, offering a set of bluegrass, folk, country, and similar music that all ages can enjoy. Local musicians often stop in to join Mr Sprung, creating a festive atmosphere that can be enjoyed whether guests have been to the earlier dinner or not. Students of Mr Sprung often sit in, as does Marty Maciag, Ms Millett’s husband and a musician.

Diners are welcome to stay for the music for a small donation (in addition to what they have contributed for dinner). The coffeehouse, which begins at 7:45, is also available for those want to skip dinner but enjoy the musical offering. This season’s requested coffeehouse donation is $4 for those who have already enjoyed dinner, or $5 for those who have not, a fee that has been in place for at least five years.

Last month 72 people attended the coffeehouse.

There has been talk for months within NUMC that this might be the final season for the Pasta Project.

“It still takes nearly 60 people to put this on each month,” she pointed out. Ms Millet has told NUMC members repeatedly, she said, that someone else needs to step up to be the lead organizer. She and other volunteers would also like to explore some of the other events that they have missed in recent years — such as Relay For Life for many years, Sandy Hook Fire & Rescue’s LobsterFest each June, and even the Sandy Hook Center Tree Lighting in December — that have often fallen on the first Saturday of a month.

“It’s amazing what this bumps into,” she said. “I never knew so much was going on the first Saturdays of so many months.

“We need our first Saturdays,” she added. “So June will be our grand finalé.”

At its peak, the event drew more than 300 guests during the 2½ hours of serving. Volunteers once served 384 guests in one evening, but that many meals took away from the family-style setting Ms Millet and others have long sought to offer.

“Everyone doesn’t get the comfortable experience that we want for them when the numbers get too high,” she told The Newtown Bee in May 2009, after the project’s 20th anniversary.

Last month 220 people had dinner in the church hall, and Ms Millett is just fine with that.

In the March NUMC newsletter, Rev Kawakami points out to his congregation that the project has been “a great run and an amazing achievement.” He also mentions that NUMC has been “serving pasta and creating fellowship since before our Youth Worker Brendan Fox was born.”

What he doesn’t spell out is that the long-running project also predates his time in Newtown, which began in July 2008.

“It goes way back,” he said with a laugh on March 4. “I think this probably goes back three or four pastors.”

When word got out that June would be the grand finalé, said Rev Kawakami, the feelings were mixed.

“Part of the response,” he said, “has been that people have been working hard, and with any long-term task, when you say it’s over, there is some relief.

“I also believe there is some sadness because it has been a tradition,” he continued. “We don’t let go of our traditions easily, and without some regret.”

Saturday Pasta Dinner is served from 5 to 7:30 pm with donation being $10, $9 for seniors, and $3.50 for children.

There will not be a Pasta Project/First Saturday Pasta Dinner in April because the date would fall between Good Friday and Easter. The event will return on May 2, and then the project will celebrate its finalé on June 6.

Dinner is followed at 7:45 by the coffeehouse, which runs until 10:45. The entertainment donation is $4 for those who have been at the church for dinner, or $5 for those arriving for the music. This covers the entertainment as well as coffee, soft drinks and snacks.

Entry to fellowship hall is through the lower parking lot at 92 Church Hill Road.

Call 203-426-9998 for additional information.