UXBRIDGE – If you drive onto Mendon Street from Millville Road, don’t go too fast or else you just might miss the tiny blue treasure wedged between the Providence-Worcester Railway line and a brick wall.

This hidden gem is a small blue building with white trim. It looks like a quaint house, but it’s not. This is the Mendon Street Kitchen, a local home-grown business completely run by volunteers with one main mission; to give all its profits from selling lunches and catering events to sponsor the annual Uxbridge First Night Celebration.

“This building funds the parade,” said Holly Gallerani, owner and operator of the Mendon Street Kitchen. “We are all volunteers here … We only fundraise for this parade. That’s what we’re about.”

Tommy Bellacqua, co-chair of the Uxbridge First Night Celebration committee and volunteer at the Mendon Street Kitchen, said people find it hard to believe that the Kitchen is a volunteer business. 

“We try to explain to ’em what we do and why we do it,” he said from behind the Kitchen counter. “The reason we do it is because it’s for the kids of this town. When you see state police bikes or bands stop to play in front of the kids along the parade route, all you see is smiles on their faces. If we can bring smiles to kids’ faces and get them ready for Santa Claus, that’s why we do it. We want to give back to the community. We’ve always had. I love to see the smiles!”

This winter, the Uxbridge First Holiday Night celebration will be held on December 4th. Both Gallerani and Bellacqua helped start the parade from its inception 25 years ago. At that time, the parade only consisted of a truck from the Uxbridge Fire Department and Santa Claus. “No floats! No high school bands! Just a firetruck and Santa,” Bellacqua said.

The celebration has grown significantly since then. This will be the 24th parade, only missing last year due to COVID restrictions. It has expanded from Santa on the back of a firetruck to so much more. The event can now be considered an affordable family-oriented holiday celebration. Along with the parade that starts in North Uxbridge on Main Street and finishes at the town common, each year the celebration also features fireworks; local businesses stay open that night to participate; Santa also jumps off the firetruck to take pictures with the kids at the fire station; vendors are on the common doing giveaways and selling food; and there is a large raffle at the fire station for prizes donated from local businesses. In addition, there will be face painting, balloon animals, ice sculptures, fire on the water falls, music filling the streets, and trackless train rides. The parade celebration usually brings about 5,000 people each year.

“It’s like a big block party,” Bellacqua said. “They close down Main Street at 4 o’clock from CVS to the town common and they’ll keep it closed for about 90 minutes … Then you see people along the parade route. People are having cookouts in their front yards. And they got their seats out near their yards. We look at it and go, this thing is getting bigger than we thought. It’s just cool to see people taking pride in it.”

This year marks the triumphant return of the parade. The event was canceled in 2020 due to COVID restrictions. “Two years ago, we had 75 floats. four high school bands, and five firetrucks and participants from twelve towns,” Bellacqua said. “The whole idea of first night is bringing the community out. We missed it last year and we’re glad to have it back. So, our mission statement is for people to leave your cell phones home and come and meet your neighbors.”

The Mendon Street Kitchen looks to raise about $20,000 each year for the event. The food at the Kitchen is American comfort food lunch staples, including burgers, hot dogs, BLTs, pastrami sandwiches, grilled cheese, and homemade chicken pot pie. They also offer daily soup specials, desserts like homemade cannolis, and homemade apple pie. The Kitchen has been owned by Gallerani and her husband for the last five years with the sole purpose of raising money for Uxbridge First Night.

“We don’t ask for donations, because times are tough,” Gallerani said. “Every last cent goes into the parade. I love helping the community and the parade is a wonderful event for the town. So, I cook here. I have volunteers here … Any money that’s raised here goes back to the community and the first night parade. No salaries, no nothing!”

Gallerani also said that any leftover food from the Mendon Street Kitchen is donated to local food pantries for the homeless. But there is a lot more work to it than simply making burgers and hot dogs. They need to get approval to put on the parade and that takes cutting through the red tape.

“So, what we have to do is fill out a form and send it to the state DPW to get the approval to close the street down because it’s a state highway,” Bellacqua said. “Then we go to the Uxbridge Public Safety Committee and present to them what we want to do. That’s when they give us the green light or if they want us to change things up a bit. Then we go before the board of selectmen. So, it’s like a three-step process that we have to go through to get the approvals. It’s a lot of work, but it’s worth it.”

Missing last year because of the pandemic, Bellacqua said he has heard the demands from the community to bring it back this year. “In June, we started getting calls from vendors and bands that we always had before and they are asking ‘are you doing your event this year?’ What we’re telling them, if they can keep Dec. 4th open … We’re planning it. We’re doing it.”

As he packs a lunch in a brown paper bag, Bellacqua smiled and said, “Let me tell ya something nice. People keep asking, ‘are you having the parade? You got to have the parade!’ It was funny, a gentleman came in and he said he brought his two kids to the parade when they were kids every year. He says, ‘my daughter is in college now and she brings her roommates home to watch the parade.’ You know, you hear that and we have to keep doing it!”

The Mendon Street Kitchen is open Tuesdays through Friday, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. at 9 Mendon Street in Uxbridge. To contact at the Kitchen, call 508-278-5750 or visit the Facebook page at www.facebook.com/uxbridgefirstholidaynight/.