First, I want to apologize for slacking in the blogging sphere. Life has been intensely busy for us…especially for me. I have been in my studies of pursuing my Doula certification! I am so excited about it. I have had such a fascination with natural birth ever since I had a natural water birth with my son. I feel called to help other women who are pursuing the same kind of birth. I am a massage therapist already and am eager to add Doula training to that!
Anyways, I would like to share something that has been on my mind for years but wondering if there, actually, is a solution to the problem.
Let’s talk about food pantries…
Food pantries give food to the homeless and needy. They are set up by churches and non-profit organizations and we donate to them. We clean out all our old canned food, you know the “pre-Paleo” food that we don’t eat anymore, and give it to our church’s food pantry. I am so torn by this. Would you feed your kids food from a food pantry? I know we all would if we were starving and homeless. But I mean RIGHT NOW…if you had the choice, would you feed your kids that food?
I’m sorry…but they are getting our leftovers. I just feel it is wrong. They are getting junk food, processed garbage, and nothing to nourish their tired bodies. I just think we could do better than this! Couldn’t we? Isn’t there something more we could do to get REAL, whole food to the homeless and needy?
Are there any projects set up that do this? I am searching and searching and haven’t found any. This weighs my heart heavily. My passion and dream would be to one day have a community vegetable garden and real food pantry. I would work with local farms and local hobby farmers that have the same heart and would be willing to donate fresh eggs, meat, milk, veggies, and fruit. I would also buy beans and rice in bulk and separate them in gallon-sized baggies for each person.
However, I realize that when you are used to just opening a can and heating it up, then some education might need to happen. So, I plan on writing out meal plans and instructions to go in each bag!
Can you do this too? Talk with you pastor or find a needy family. Prepare a bag of fresh food with a simple meal plan included and give it to a single, working mother! Let’s try to help the needy a little bit better by not serving them our leftovers and unused, almost expired canned goods! I know we can do better!!!
A woman at my church has actually started growing plants and giving those out to people. Mainly stuff that will produce quickly like tomatoes. She plants them in buckets and gives them out. It has been a big hit! Just another idea to give families good, nutritious food!
That is a wonderful idea!!!! Thank you for sharing!
Kitchen Stewardship has a blog post on how you can include recipes with what you donate. Her recipes aren’t paleo, but it is probably better than most things that are donated!
https://www.kitchenstewardship.com/2012/04/02/monday-mission-give-real-food-to-those-in-need/
What an amazing idea… I would love to be a part of this. Any projects you starts please include me as I have a passion to help people as well. Love reading your blog.
It’s a wonderful idea to grow food for homeless or low income, but I see a big problem with lack of education for many of these people on nutrition and how to cook for themselves. My son goes to school with a lot of low-income kids. The school has a free food program every Thursday where they set out tables and local businesses (including a number of nearby organic farms) set out extra food that familes can take for free. The “junk food” like bagels, chips, bags of instant whatever, get snatched up immediately and what’s usually left are piles of lovely organic produce. Even though my family is financially comfortable and we don’t need free food, if I show up on Thursday to pick up my kiddo and there are huge piles of organic produce, I often take a few because I hate to see it go to waste. I think there is a tremendous need to educate folks on how to feed themselves healthfully and how to cook. It won’t do any good to give these things to homeless or low-income folks if they don’t know what to do with it and won’t eat it any way.
In Vermont, there are some programs where volunteers glean fields/orchards for farmers. Basically, they go through by hand and pick the odd bits missed by machinery or busy workers and then donate the proceeds to food pantries. There are also programs where people “Grow A Row”– they plant an extra row of whatever they’re growing in their garden and donate the fresh produce.
You’ve already addressed one of the big challenges though– teaching people how to cook and eat fresh produce. I’ve heard time and again from food pantry workers that beautiful donated fruits and veggies go to waste there because the clients don’t want them (probably (hopefully) because they don’t know what to do with them).
Here in Sonoma County, we have quite a few “fresh to low-income” food providers and distribution points. It’s a place that is brimming in the summer with fresh fruits and veggies (especially zucchini)…but lettuces, peppers and most all of it, organic. This is a great community for sharing our bounty, not just old cans of yuck…
I love this, I have been reading more and more stories from mothers who have had to use food pantries and how they are not complaining but are having difficulties because they receive boxes of foods that can’t be prepared together to even make a meal, let alone a healthy one. I know that the pantries are just working off of donations and are giving what they have to work with. Food drives seem to be based around asking for canned goods which generally results in the exact scenario you described above.
I had also thought that a community garden for low income families and homeless would be AMAZING, I think it could go one step further where the families that are in need could actually spend some time to work with other volunteers in the garden. They could learn about growing the vegetables, perhaps some of the low income families that are in need could be given some containers, soil, or seed in addition to whole foods so they could in turn continue to grow some of their own vegetables at home (items that are high yield and easy to grow in a container, there are so many)
I wish I still lived in your area, I would love to work on this. When I was in the area I attended a church that has an amazing homeless outreach that my brother is still involved in. They provide transportation, clothing, showers, and prepare meals there for the homeless community. I am going to mention these ideas to him too and see if he can spark something in his church along these lines.
I would love to work on something in my community as well, I am going to look into it!
I agree on them helping tend the garden. My idea of a community garden for the needy would be to give each of the needy families a square. In that square, they can plant and tend to whatever veggies they would like!
There was a short time frame when I had to receive assistance from a local church and I cringed at some of the things we received. Obviously I took what was offered but every time they had fresh anything I would go straight for it. Even if the tomatoes or whatever were not great they were better than some of the other stuff. Thank goodness it was before I knew of any of my dietary restrictions or I would have been SOL. It is sad that it is like this and I wish I knew how to help change it.
Hey Jackie, this is actually quite common up here in Michigan. Many churches have very large gardens that the church members maintain and all of the food that is grown is given to the homeless or needy families in our community. It is, of course, seasonal here in Michigan so many can their own vegetables and fruits from the gardens to give to the community throughout the winter months. Midland, where we live, is quite a health concious city compared to the rest of Michigan so this is common practice here. I think it’s a great idea!
What a great idea, Jackie! My mom and our church have actually been serving the homeless (150-250 people!) on a rotation, downtown. They were made aware that many organizations serve crap so they’ve been working to offer fresh fruits and veggies! Apparently they now serve the best food, LOL! =) I am hoping to take the triplets out soon!!
My mother-in-law had too much beef liver at one point and offered it to a men’s shelter and they were over the moon about receiving it. Grass-fed, on top of it all! We also are getting behind with eating the offal parts of the animals we get and are going to look into that here in Arizona. This all comes down to the issues about food in our society. What is really food? and what is NOT? If you are needing any food, beans and rice are better than nothing, but I now have no qualms about throwing away candy (like at Halloween, or sugary cereals, etc.) because they are not food.
Just appreciate those who do make donations! And remember to thank them. People who donate food may be struggling themselves with money. Don’t assume they are rich and that they are donating their cast off food and laughing about it.
Perhaps recipes and meal ideas should be also handed out at food banks, along with some basic cooking utensils.