#Eleven Madison Park now serving food to city’s needy

One of the city’s priciest restaurants, where tasting menus start at $335 a head, is taking it to the streets.

No, Eleven Madison Park isn’t trying to sell its three-Michelin-star cuisine from roving Neapolitan pizza or Nepali dal bhat trucks. Instead, it’s preparing and trucking high-quality, basic meals for free to some of the city’s most disadvantaged, culinary-deprived neighborhoods.

Daniel Humm, the Switzerland-born chef-owner of EMP, has earned critical accolades while his restaurant is a favorite New York City destination for mega-spending global gourmands. But starting Monday, a bright-blue EMP truck will serve up to 400 free meals daily on a first-come, first-served basis in three different communities.

Humm operates the vehicle in partnership with Rethink Food, a nonprofit he co-founded with former EMP cook Matt Jozwiak, which is dedicated to creating a “more sustainable and equitable food system.”

The truck will open its window to hungry locals on Mondays, Thursdays and early Fridays at Bronx Collegiate Academy in the Claremont-Mount Eden neighborhood; on Tuesdays at St. Mark’s United Methodist Church in Brooklyn’s Prospect Park South; and later on Friday, at the Mary Mitchell Family & Youth Center in the West Farms section of The Bronx.

“EMP achieved so much on the critical, international level,” Humm told The Post. “Now we have this platform, a voice, to do good and be part of change.”

Sometimes, the glory he earned in running one of the country’s most exalted eateries “almost felt empty,” he said. “Now, I’m glad to have this deeper and beautiful purpose.”

And it’s no publicity stunt. Humm kept himself “completely under the radar” on earlier neighborhood visits to support local residents and restaurants. The newly launched truck will have a low profile as well, with the restaurant’s name appearing only in small letters on the back of the vehicle.

The EMP program is among several by top toques around town that give back to the community. Eric Ripert’s Le Bernardin has long partnered with City Harvest, of which Ripert is vice chairman, to provide for food kitchens and community programs throughout the five boroughs. Daniel Boulud teamed up with real estate firm SL Green to deliver over a half-million meals through their Food1st foundation.

But EMP might be the first to launch its own set of wheels.

It all started when Humm asked Jozwiak, now Rethink’s CEO, how they might collaborate on a roving food truck. Humm was already working quietly with the nonprofit on a program called Rethink Certified to help out during the pandemic.

“It was a scary time,” Humm said. “We had to furlough staff, as everyone did. I witnessed firsthand our empty kitchen, cooks without jobs, and suppliers sitting on food gone bad.”

With backing from private donors, Humm and Jozwiak’s Rethink Certified began producing lots of meals, which they offered at no cost — “3,000 a day at one point.” The effort put him in touch with neighborhoods like the South Bronx, East New York and Brownsville, “where we built amazing relationships” far removed from Madison Square Park.

Truck-delivered meals are simple: “It might be rigatoni with tomato sauce, meatballs and roast broccoli,” Humm said. “We always have a starch, a protein and a vegetable.”

Going forward, the truck will be financed not by donors but mainly by EMP customers. Although the restaurant won’t reopen until June 10, it offers $275 takeout boxes, each of which will pay for 10 free outside meals.

“We’ve raised enough to start the truck on Monday and to run it for two months before the opening” of the restaurant, Humm said. “Every one of our 120 employees will work on the truck on a rotating basis. I feel like more of a New Yorker than I ever have.”