$29.07 Worth of Healthy Groceries

Can we truly gain something from hunger?  Perhaps we gain an appreciation or an understanding of the situation of those who do not get enough to eat.  Perhaps we acquire sensitivity to those who live at or below the poverty level.  Perhaps we learn how best to relate to our impoverished neighbors and fellow human beings.  May our gains be for good!

In this photo above there is actually $29.12 worth of groceries.  And I hasten to add, “healthy groceries,” because this is what two people, spending an hour and a half with a calculator, thinking about healthy alternatives for $29.07, bought last week at Woodman’s supermarket on the West side of Madison.

This photo includes:
18 eggs
two pounds non-fat plain yogurt
one-half gallon skim milk
two cans chunk light tuna fish
a one pound bottle of ‘natural’ peanut butter
three pounds of potatoes
one pound of unpeeled carrots
one head of romaine lettuce
one cucumber
four apples
four oranges
a cantaloupe
a two-pound bag of store brand plain spaghetti
two 28 ounce cans of marinara sauce
two pounds of brown rice
one pound of lentil beans
one pound of black beans. 

Now, although this is a suggestion for what participants in the SNAP/Food Stamp Challenge could buy for their weekly allotment of $29.07, this is really a misleading example.  And here is why:

People who receive nutrition assistance are unable to shop at a supermarket: They may not have one locally available to them.  You see, many nutrition assistance recipients live in “food deserts,” areas where the local grocery store or supermarket has closed down, and people without basic transportation are relegated to buy groceries at convenience stores which rarely have the kind of nutritious foods that the human body needs.

Further, notice that this assortment of groceries includes foods that take a lot of preparation time.  Black beans require both overnight soaking and a few hours of cooking to produce edible meals.  Those in poverty often are single parents, or may have two jobs, and they would not be able to set aside this prep time for their meals.

See here both beans and rice.  Many do not know that these kinds of foods need to be eaten in specific combinations with oneother to help produce a better kind of protein.  If one is not aware of this "protein complimentarity," s/he will not consume a nutritious protein for maintaining their minds and muscles.

Finally, you see yogurt here, which contains high quality protein and good bacteria for the digestive tract.  However, many people do not enjoy the taste of yogurt, making it a less-than-appealing alternative.  People will not eat what they don’t like, even if they are hungry from an insufficient diet.

I cannot say I look forward to the Food Stamp Challenge, but I know that my experience will sensitize me to the needs of the hungry in our country.

More Preparation: The Second Harvest Food Bank: A Partner in the Food Stamp Challenge

Can we truly gain something from hunger?  Perhaps we gain an appreciation or an understanding of the situation of those who do not get enough to eat.  Perhaps we acquire sensitivity to those who live at or below the poverty level.  Perhaps we learn how best to relate to our impoverished neighbors and fellow human beings.  May our gains be for good!

This morning, my wife Rabbi Bonnie Margulis, president of the Wisconsin Faith Voices for Justice; my daughter Samantha; and I visited the Second Harvest Foodbank of Southern Wisconsin which is a nonprofit organization dedicated to ending hunger in southwestern Wisconsin.  Through their community partnerships in 16 counties (from Dane County west to the Minnesota border and south to Illinois), they serve nearly 141,000 people each year.

We went to Second Harvest because they service the food needs of those living in poverty, and are an essential part of helping raise the dignity, not to mention the nutrition levels, of those who don't always have enough money to put food on the table.

Second Harvest is a massive beehive of activity, in a warehouse facility on the East Side of Madison.  Built in stages, its storage capacity houses and processes fresh foods, canned goods and other staples, breads and sweets, cereals, and the like, acquired through food donations by local and regional retailers, and through monetary donations from individuals and groups in the south central Wisconsin region.  There are large refrigerated areas; a gigantic deep freezer for frozen foods; a “clean room” for properly processing donations of eggs, cheeses, and meats; and an administrative suite where the activities of the food bank are managed.

A few fascinating bits of information:
1.  Second Harvest receives no government funds to acquire the food they distribute.  The entire budget for food procurement – over and above the food donations from retailers, processors and farmers – comes from private donations, large and small.
2.  Second Harvest runs an outreach program to senior adults to promote the availability of supplemental nutrition funds.  Senior adults may not be aware that they might qualify for this “Food Share Program” (that which was formerly known as food stamps), and Second Harvest helps to inform them.  This is a program for which Second Harvest receives a government grant.
3.  Second Harvest runs a “gleaning” program, where following a harvesting of food in a field, other harvesters (connected to the food) back come back through and take whatever was left over from the more mechanized harvest.
4.  Second Harvest specializes in food, though there are “personal essentials pantries” that provide non-food items, such as hygiene products, cleaning essentials, and the like.

In its drive to help eliminate hunger and to give food to all, Second Harvest acts as a wholesaler, distributing food to many food pantries over the sixteen counties of south central and southwestern Wisconsin.  There are, in our state, food pantries that might serve only 12 families, or food pantries that serve hundreds.  The Second Harvest Foodbank sends food out to pantries large and small, in order to raise the nutritional needs of everyone.

For more information about Second Harvest, you can click here!