The Sausalito waterfront is known for being a tight-knit community. So when residents started to see their neighbors’ sources of income dry up due to the COVID-19 pandemic, they sprung into action.

Maria Finn, a Sausalito houseboat-dweller, writer and private chef who recently lost her job, is part of the Sausalito chefs collective Port & Provisions. When she ran into fellow chef David Johnson, owner of Davey Jones Deli in Sausalito a few weeks ago, they decided to tackle the task of feeding their neighbors through their network of chefs.

"We were talking about how we wanted to make it affordable, nutrient-dense food," said Finn. "We also wanted to keep people from leaving their houses, especially older people and people going through cancer treatments."

Johnson’s Port & Provisions already existed, but primarily as a resource for organizing events. So when the crisis hit, they knew they'd have to pivot quickly to home delivery. Mere days after hatching the idea, they’d launched a dinner service, delivering healthy, seasonal meals to their neighbors in Sausalito, Marin City and Mill Valley three days a week.

For $18, you can get a Port & Provisions dinner delivered to your house. This Monday’s menu included Mary's organic chicken and spinach paella, as well as a squash, saffron and orange soup with Meyer lemon bars for dessert, plus an optional add-on of a roasted beet and leafy green salad with pistachio dressing. On Fridays, they serve local fish: this week's Friday menu includes a smoked black cod chowder with local black cod from Bodega Bay.

But if you can't afford the $18, you're not out of luck. Port & Provisions has set up a "No Neighbor Left Behind" service that provides free meals to those in need, funded by contributions from the community.

"There’s a myth that everyone in Marin is wealthy, but we know from living on the waterfront that this is not the case," explained Finn.

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They deliver to everyone from seniors who live in affordable housing in Sausalito and a wheelchair-bound woman on disability in Mill Valley, to a single mother of three going through cancer treatment in Belvedere and their out-of-work houseboat neighbors facing financial crisis.

"That's the coolest part of the program," said Johnson. "When we put the donate button out, we were surprised at the support it garnered. It's worked out to about 50-50 [free and paid-for meals] naturally, without us having to promote it."

And the "No Neighbor Left Behind" service really is fully neighbor-powered. They rely on word-of-mouth from neighbors they trust to figure out who needs the meals. Often, they find themselves filling in gaps for free meal services that used to exist, but can't continue under pandemic conditions: many volunteers who served free meals at churches are elderly and unable to continue volunteering, because they are must quarantine to protect themselves.

Within the first week, Port & Provisions saw orders double and triple. Currently, they are serving about 100 meals a week — a task for which Finn and Johnson were well-prepared. Finn has experience cooking for camps of 80 people at Burning Man; Johnson spent 10 years cooking on historic tall ships and is well-known in the community for his "paella parties."

"We were built for this," said Finn. "[Davey] is often wielding huge paella pans or soup pots for big public events, telling stories, and doing crab imitations with his tongs, all at once."

The paella pans are good for way more than just paella, too, Johnson notes — he's been using them for the delivery service to cook up huge batches of everything from curry to chickpeas.

But Finn and Johnson couldn't do it all themselves.

Floundering under the chaos of cooking, packing and delivering dozens of meals, some neighbors stepped in to help: Kristine Barrett Johnson, an artist and musician who is married to Dave, launched their website. Tre Balchowsky, who is co-founder of the Odd Salon and produces events for the Long Now Foundation, as well as Kristin McManus, a chef and senior product manager for a major tech company, lent their organizational skills to overseeing delivery routes and packing orders.

Josh Rickett, who runs a nearby farm stand at the Marin Farmers Market at Civic Center, provides their produce. Nearby Portside Bakery provides their bread. Seafood comes from TwoXSea, a local sustainable seafood company, and everything else is sourced from suppliers of the Davey Jones Deli, where most of the food is cooked.

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Delivery is covered by volunteering neighbors, as well as Johnson himself, who delivers batches via electric bike.

Everything is done following the CDC's safety guidelines as carefully as possible: Recipients are asked to leave coolers outside their doors, and when their meal is dropped off, they get an email. People are then asked to discard packaging and wash their hands before eating, and drivers sanitize between deliveries. They also keep their Port & Provisions team as small and streamlined as possible.

"I've talked to professionals in the medical field about whether the risk is outweighing the value, and they've said no, absolutely not," said Finn. "You have this conflicted terror of all these people not getting food, versus exposing them to something. I've researched it pretty extensively, but the virus is not foodborne. We're being really careful around that. And it's still a hundred times safer than going to the grocery store."

The whole endeavor is time-consuming and physically taxing, but it's keeping these out-of-work chefs at least somewhat employed.

"We're not making much, and we're not charging enough for the meals to cover the cost of the free meals," said Finn. "It'll sink us if we don't get enough donations."

Therefore, as the service grows in popularity, they are searching for a fiscal sponsor and may expand into another underutilized kitchen in the area. For now, it's helping to keep these chefs afloat — and it's also keeping them busy. Johnson is working between 12 and 14 hours each day between the delivery service and managing his deli, which is still open for takeout.

"It's pretty exhausting, but it's also really inspiring," said Johnson. "We have such a good community, and you really see the community shine in times of adversity."

They even see a future for the Port & Provisions delivery service beyond the pandemic. In fire season, or any similar catastrophe where the power is out, Johnson says the operation they've built could be used to feed people, while running on generators.

"We are fortunate that we can do something," said Johnson. "A lot of people around us are really hurting, just bleeding money. Everyone's nervous, and no one knows what to do. To be able to throw yourself into a project like this is a blessing."

Contribute to the Port & Provisions "No Neighbor Left Behind" program here.

Madeline Wells is an SFGATE associate digital reporter. Email: madeline.wells@sfgate.com | Twitter: @madwells22