Bolingbrook Golf Club Reimagined Thanksgiving Meal Amid Pandemic

BOLINGBROOK, IL — The coronavirus pandemic may have put a dampener on all holiday celebrations in 2020, but over 400 people in Bolingbrook were able to avoid a huge meal for Thanksgiving and treat themselves to some chef-made delicious fare instead.

Every year, the Bolingbrook Golf Club hosts a Thanksgiving Buffet that feeds more than 800 people. However, this past year, the concept was slightly different where interested people had to pre-order food packages.

"We wanted to offer families within the local community a way to enjoy a home cooked meal without the stress of cooking," said Jill Maldonado, director of sales at Bolingbrook Golf Club. "While the holiday looked different, we were glad to allow families to enjoy some of the same food traditions they would during any given year."

The Thanksgiving To-Go Meals contained all the traditional Thanksgiving Day favorites, including ham and turkey, green beans, mashed potatoes, yams, stuffing, cranberries, gravy, dinner rolls and pumpkin or pecan pie. The full package fed about six people, but a smaller package was available for a family of two.

The club started offering these to-go meals in 2017 when a gentleman, who lived out of state, would call and ask the club to provide a meal to his elderly parents in Romeoville. This single order then became 16 family orders in 2018. Fast forward to 2020, over 80 meals were provided, prepared by executive chef Darren Smith, and his very limited culinary staff.

Despite the financial strain caused on all organizations by the pandemic, providing these meals was not a challenge.

"It wasn’t harder financially to provide the meals...it was just different. The meals were affordable to families and generously portioned," Maldonado said. "Our patrons wanted normalcy, something convenient, fairly priced and of great quality."