Marissa Hermer’s restaurant burned down in the LA wildfires. Now she’s feeding families in need

If there’s one thing Marissa Hermer knows how to do, it’s feed people.

The restaurateur and former “Ladies of London” star is among the thousands affected by the devastating wildfires ravaging the Greater Los Angeles area. Hermer, who evacuated from her Pacific Palisades home on Wednesday, is now giving back to the community she’s lived in for the last decade.

“(My ex-husband and I) both had to walk in, carry all of the belongings that we could grab on our backs and our fronts and piled up,” Hermer tells TODAY.com. “I wore every piece of jewelry that I owned and carried tons of bags and walked out about a mile … you scan your house and you think, OK, what am I gonna take? You know, there’s no planning for this. We didn’t have a go bag.”

Marissa Hermer evacuating from her Pacific Palisades home.Courtesy Marissa Hermer

Hermer tells TODAY.com about launching a food delivery service for those impacted by the fires called “YOU GIVE. WE COOK. THEY EAT.” In less than 24 hours after losing her popular French brasserie The Draycott in the Pacific Palisades Village shopping center, she has turned her tragedy into action.

“As I was driving the kids and the dogs down to a hotel I thought about what all parents think about at around six o’clock at night, which is, ‘What’s for dinner?’ And then I thought there are a lot of people in Los Angeles who are wondering what’s for dinner. And when you don’t have a kitchen, that’s an even bigger challenge.”

people packing to go bags
Marissa Hermer with her team at Chez Mia packing meals.Courtesy Marissa Hermer

Hermer has now opened the kitchens at her other restaurants Chez Mia and Olivetta in West Hollywood to cook warm meals — including bread, salad and pasta — for families, firefighters, shelters and hospital workers.

“When you don’t know if your house is standing and if you don’t know where your kids are gonna go to school or you don’t know what you’re gonna do, lean into the things that you do know — and I know how to cook dinner,” she says. “So I thought, ‘OK, let’s cook dinner for a lot of people because we can. And we have a team who can do it.”

Hermer says she’s already raised enough money to feed 250 families of four. It’s a program she initially launched during the COVID pandemic, and anyone anywhere in the world can donate by texting “DINNER” to 707070.

On Hermer’s Instagram, displaced families in LA who need food can comment “family” for a free meal; folks can nominate a displaced family who needs food by commenting “nominate family” and tagging the individual; and drivers who can pick up food from the restaurants and deliver it to families can comment “driver.”

“Sometimes it’s hard to say, ‘By the way, I want food or I need a meal.’ We’re not programmed to ask for what we need,” she says. “So if you know about a family who needs a meal or someone who could use it, you can nominate them and we’ll get in touch.”

The program, which Hermer says successfully fed thousands of people during the pandemic, also relies on volunteers to drive the food to those in need.

people in a kitchen
Marissa Hermer (right) with members of her team preparing meals at Chez Mia.Courtesy Marissa Hermer

“What we learned in the pandemic is community is a lot more than your post office and your local coffee shop and the bricks and mortar of community. This is what community is. It’s togetherness and connecting,” she says.

But it’s not just Hermer’s restaurant that she lost: Her children’s school is gone, the homes of her friends are no longer standing and she isn’t sure if she has a home to return to.

But for now, Hermer, who is staying at a hotel with her children, is focused on giving back.

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