EDISON – In the spirit of the holiday season, chef and TV host Rachael Ray and actor Denis Leary honored Edison Township firefighters for their community service with a special mouthwatering buffet luncheon filled with a menu including a when pigs fly hors d’oeuvre, a “brokenmeatballzitisanga,” and a caramel espresso brownie.
The celebrity visit to Edison Firehouse 4 on Route 27 was featured on the “Rachael Ray Show” on Dec. 23. The show was aired on ABC Channel 7 in the New York area and ABC Channel 6 in the Philadelphia area.
“Amazing,” firefighter Daniel Dinuzzo said of the visit on the show. “It’s a once-in-a-lifetime experience I think for me. Denis has always been a great guy … and Rachael, I have been watching her ever since she was on TV, she’s excellent.”
The celebrity duo came bearing a holiday gift – the award of a $25,000 grant – helping the fire department acquire new fire training equipment – the LION Attack Digital Fire Training System – to teach families and children how to properly use fire extinguishers at home, work and school, Fire Chief Brian Latham said.
The grant comes from the Leary Firefighters Foundation, which Leary created after a fatal 1999 warehouse fire in Worcester, Massachusetts, which claimed the life of his cousin, a childhood friend and five other firemen. Ray serves on the foundation’s board of directors, according to a township release.
Leary, on the show, said he was very excited to be at the firehouse.
“This is why we started the foundation in the first place, to help departments in anyway we could,” he said.
Tim Langan, fire marshal with the Edison Division of Fire, said on a daily basis township firefighters are training.
“We train with knots, ladders, you name it,” he said. “One of the most difficult things for us to train on is live fire. We came across the LION digital training system and we knew right there that was the answer.”
Langan said they were all thrilled when they received word their grant application was approved.
“The device simulates real life firefighting without putting us in dangerous conditions that we normally would encounter,” firefighter Jay Gorman said.
Firefighter Brian Kilijanski said the LION system is a fire prop that is very realistic in smoke-filled situations.
“We can actually see the glow,” he said. “It’s a great training tool for us.”
Deputy Fire Chief Andrew Toth said the grant from the Leary Firefighters Foundation gives the firemen hands on training along with public education.
Mayor Thomas Lankey said the township is “extremely grateful to the Leary Firefighters Foundation for its generosity, providing our firefighters with funding for such a valuable training tool to help keep our families safe.”
“It is especially wonderful that Mr. Leary joined Rachael Ray at our firehouse and they spent so much of time getting to know our firefighters and recognizing them for their dedicated community service,” he said.
Ray created the recipes for the firehouse luncheon, prepared by her friend, Manhattan caterer Mary Giuliani, a frequent guest on Ray’s popular daytime TV show. Giuliani introduced the buffet on the show.
Langan applied for the Leary Foundation grant earlier this year, saying his office gets many requests for demonstrations about how to properly use fire extinguishers. It hosts many annual instruction sessions at schools, community meetings, hospitals and nursing homes.
Edison is one of several fire departments across the country to receive Leary Foundation grants this year to help them acquire new firefighting technology and lifesaving equipment.
Contact Kathy Chang at [email protected].