Mollie Pier lost her son, Dr. Nathaniel Pier, one of the first private physicians to treat AIDS patients in New York City, to AIDS in 1989 at just 37-years-old.
Pier, now 91, will walk in today’s 27th Annual AIDS WALK Los Angeles, says she founded nonprofit Project Chicken Soup to give meaning to the short life of her son in an interview with the Los Angeles Times.
Project Chicken Soup provides kosher meals for people throughout Los Angeles County living with HIV or AIDS. Piers confounded Project Chicken Soup in 1989 and has seen the group evolve from a few volunteers, to dozens of dedicated, selfless regulars who gather twice a month in a Culver City kosher kitchen to cook for more than a hundred people. Project Chicken Soup then delivers grocery bags filled with salads, desserts, side dishes, three entrees, and two quarts of soup, one of which is always chicken and all of the food is kosher.
Pier calls clients to make sure they will be home to receive the foods, but says the phone conversations are often about much more than just what’s for dinner.
"Sometimes, they're lonely, sometimes they're upset or not feeling well and just need an ear," Pier says. "I'm kind of the resident Jewish grandmother."
Pier uses her own family recipes for many of the desserts. "I feel I have a spiritual connection with [Nathaniel] because he did everything he knew how with his medical knowledge, and I'm doing it with my cooking knowledge," she said. "There are some people who never come out of it and go into mourning," Pier continued. "I'm not that kind of person. I thought, 'I'm going to make Nathaniel's short life have meaning.'"
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