Links Pub Serves Up Support for Open Table MDI on Thankful Thursdays This September

Sep 18, 2025

BAR HARBOR—There is something that happens when people gather around tables or sit together on a floor or swap stories while eating noodles or carrots or whatever vegetable or fruit is in season.

And there is something that happens when people pick up meals for the home-bound on a Tuesday night, head to their doors, and hand off not just sustenance, but goodness.

What happens is community.

What happens is neighbor meeting neighbor right where they are.

What happens is connection bound with sustenance mixed with heart.

For almost a decade, Open Table MDI has nourished the community with free meals and with lovely connections. Now, the community is committed to nourishing Open Table MDI back as it transitions to a new head chef.

In August, Mahandeva Singh, the leader of Open Table MDI, explained in a letter, that he was stepping down as Open Table MDI’s head chef permanently.

“Just over a year ago, I had major surgery—one that most people take two to three years to fully recover from. When I came back in May to continue running the supper, I thought I was strong enough. I was not. Each week, my body told me it was too much,” he’d explained.

The community responded with well wishes and love as the board explained and called Singh’s letter “a testament to his passion, dedication, and the joy he has poured into this community.”

Singh will no longer be in charge of the weekly and free Tuesday meal, but he will continue as the organization’s executive director.

Late this summer the Open Table MDI board looked for potential ways forward, and a donor has funded a head chef for a year so that meals can continue. They are working on other ways to fundraise and hope for the meals to begin again in December or January.

That’s a big relief for many who yearn for the connection and community that has happened at the Tuesday evening meals to continue.

“For close to a decade, Open Table MDI has been a place where food becomes more than nourishment—it becomes connection. Every Tuesday, our kitchen at 116 Cottage Street hums with the sounds of chopping, stirring, laughter, and conversation. Volunteers bustle about, and neighbors, old friends and new, gather over plates of warm, lovingly prepared meals. Some take their suppers to go; others share them at our tables; still others receive deliveries at home. In all, we feed an average of 350 people each week,” the board wrote in its August 14 letter to the community.

It’s about food, but it’s also about connection.

“There are so many people in this town who can afford a meal but they are lonely,” Board member Jean Sylvia said.

At the dinners, she’d see residents sitting down with their meals, sometimes alone, but then others would join them.

“All the kids from COA would sit down with them,” she said. “They’d be sharing life experiences.”

And then the COA students would find out that all of these people they were sharing a meal with have lived—and are living—these exceptional lives. Sylvia would find that out, too.

Going to the grocery store, she said, you can see people that you’ve seen your whole life. You recognize their faces. You might know their names. But you don’t always know their story.

Open Table MDI is a place where people invite each other into their stories. It’s a place where people don’t just say hello to each other. It’s a place, instead, where people truly see each other.

That’s something people want to hold onto. Each week, the music changes and there are often live musicians. The art on the walls change. What great vegetarian meal is being served changes, but what doesn’t change is that everyone is welcome and all are considered community.

THANKFUL THURSDAYS

Open Table MDI is also a place for everyone regardless of demographics or psychographics.

To support that mission, the Links Pub at Kebo Valley Golf Course is donating its Thankful Thursday proceeds to Open Table MDI. There are jars on the bar for donations. There’s a QR code, too, and 10% of their proceeds on that day go to Open Table MDI. There are also matching donors for the first $200 raised each week.

That will be happening every Thursday this month (September 18 and 25 are remaining.), from 11:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m.

Sylvia said Open Table MDI is so thankful for the kindness.

“Jena and Jeff (Young) have always been community-minded/community-focused,” Side Street Cafe Director of Operations Bo Jennings said. “Every chance we get to do something to better our community, we jump at. Thankful Thursdays was Jena's idea, as we looked to have something each day of the week going on at Links Pub.”

Jena Young is also the board chair of the Bar Harbor Food Pantry. She and Sylvia spoke about Open Table and then Jena Young made it the recipient for September. Friends of Acadia was the August recipient.

”Open Table provides one of the most needed (and appreciated) services in Bar Harbor. Nothing is more basic, or more crucial, than a delicious meal. Our goal is to help support that mission and further the efforts of Open Table,” Jennings said.

”Hospitality businesses in Bar Harbor do a tremendous amount for local organizations. From smaller donation requests (like gift cards) to larger cash donation requests, Hospitality is one of the first stops to make the ask. From food banks, to libraries, to schools, and so much more, hospitality answers the call as often as they can. I know from the smallest, to the largest, businesses, they all donate as much as they can. And they don't do it for publicity, they do it because it’s the right thing to do,” Jennings said.

Sylvia agreed. That’s a motivation behind Open Table MDI as well.

“It’s a community thing. The little saying under our sign, ‘building community, one meal at a time,’ it pretty much says it all,” Sylvia said.

About twenty meals go to Malvern Belmont. Drivers from Island Connections come and pick up meals and bring them to other island towns for people who are house bound.

“We’re really lucky to have this in the community,” Sylvia said.

The Bar Harbor Story is generously sponsored by Acadia Brochures of Maine.

WAYS TO HELP AND LINKS TO LEARN MORE

If you are inspired to help Open Table MDI continue its work, please reach out to Open Table MDI at opentablemdi@gmail.com or make a gift on its website or get a meal at Links Pub on Thursday.