Tampa catering service hopes to feed RNC crowd, send positive message

TAMPA - Each meal made in this downtown Tampa kitchen is important for two reasons.

"The turkey club's probably our biggest most popular sandwich," said Executive Chef Cliff Barsi.

First-- they want customers to eat good food. The second reason-- because this good food is doing good.

"People walk in the restaurant they don't know who those pictures are but they know there's a story behind it. I know each one of these people in these pictures," said Chanae Jacobs. 

These are the people Jacobs works to feed. Each meal you buy at Inside the Box will also feed someone homeless in Tampa Bay. Jacobs knows her job is important because she used to be hungry too.

"I just had my son. Moving from Louisiana I didn't have anywhere else to go," she said.

So Jacobs went to Metropolitan Ministries. Now she and others at the cafe work to support their families but also the non-profit, under the guidance of Barsi.

"He asked me if I would run the front of the house and I said yes but the way he described it was like, incredible, like he's like I remember your smile, your personality, you're great with people and I want you to come work for me," explained Cliff Figueroa. 

The concept has strong community support from people like Tod Leiweke, General Manager of the Tampa Bay Lightning.

"They've brought over orders as small as two and they're getting ready to cater a 23-hundred person event so they can do it all and they do it with great culinary standards but also with great passion," said Leiweke.

Inside the Box is hoping their biggest orders are yet to come in August when the Republican National Convention comes to town bringing tens of thousands of visitors-- journalists, delegates and protestors who'll have to eat.

That's one reason to buy lunch at Inside the Box but there are two good ones.

"That whole social consciousness side of it I think is important. I think it's important for the people coming in to see Tampa and to see our program," said Barsi.