Posted on 09/23/2013 1:20:00 PM PDT by wbill
In my work, I see more people who want to focus on losing weight rather than gaining weight, so I don’t often stop to think about the problem of hunger.
It’s easy to overlook the fact that hunger is still a big problem in in the United States. According to statistics from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, in 2011 about 50 million Americans were living with food insecurity — 33.5 million adults and 16.7 million children.
What is food insecurity? It’s the inability to provide adequate food on a consistent basis. For adults, not getting enough food can have harmful effects, but it can be especially harmful for children who need adequate nutrients for proper growth and development.
I’m familiar with the Good Shepherd Food Bank so I know hunger exists in Maine, but to what extent? Maine ranks 18th in the nation and second in New England in terms of food insecurity. Since 2004, the number of Mainers facing hunger has increased 50 percent.
The population of Maine is about 1,328,371 — the food insecurity rate is 14.7 percent of households, or 200,000 people.
Food insecurity can lead to nutrient deficiencies, delayed cognitive development, asthma, decreased immune system function and increased fatigue. A contributing factor to childhood obesity is the lack of access to healthy foods for children living in food-insecure homes.
My office is situated such that I have a big window facing the drive-thru of a fast-food restaurant. There is a pretty steady line of cars going through on a daily basis. Fast food once in awhile isn’t a big concern, but eating a quick meal from a fast-food restaurant or a convenience store on a regular basis is expensive and the food is usually higher in fat and sodium and lower in vitamins and minerals. If you were to price the items out compared to what you could purchase at a grocery store, it wouldn’t be such a deal.
When grocery shopping, nutrient-rich staples such as whole-wheat bread, brown rice, steel-cut oats, corn tortillas, dried beans and peanut butter are good choices. Fresh fruits and vegetables are healthy choices but can be expensive if not on sale. Canned fruit packed in its own juice or frozen fruit or vegetables are great choices. If you buy canned vegetables, drain and rinse them to remove sodium before consuming.
If you are affected by food insecurity, there are many resources available to help. One way to find them is to dial 211 and ask for resources in your area. Food banks, soup kitchens, etc., are located in communities throughout the state, usually staffed by volunteers. If you don’t live with food insecurity but want to help others who do, perhaps volunteering your time at a food kitchen or donating money or food to these organizations would be within your means. Every little bit helps.
SNAP is the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program previously called the food stamp program. SNAP provides $5 a day to help those unable to purchase food. To see what it is like, try to eat off of $5 a day. You’ll get a little more perspective on how difficult it can be for some families in America and right in your home town. Remember that $5 has to include your morning coffee.
Want to do more? The Good Shepherd Food Bank has a calendar showing 30 Ways in 30 Days to help solve hunger. Some of the suggestions include: » Volunteer at a local food pantry or meal site. » Watch the films “A Place at the Table” or “30 Days on Minimum Wage.” » View poverty statistics for your county by googling “Map the Meal Gap.” » Make a financial contribution to the food bank.
For information on the Good Shepherd Food Bank go to www.gsfb.org. For information on food insecurity in the U.S., check out www.feedingamerica.org.
Georgia Clark-Albert is a registered dietitian nutritionist and certified diabetes educator at Penobscot Community Health Care in Bangor. She provides nutrition consultant services through Mainely Nutrition in Athens. Read her columns and post questions at bangordailynews.com or email her at GeorgiaMaineMSRDCDE@gmail.com.
What spoilage? I just freeze leftovers in small, 1 meal/2 serving containers. When times are really tough, I throw away nothing. Leftover salad, veggies, the water from canned veggies, any scraps the dog doesn’t eat, all go into my soup makings tub in the freezer to be added to whatever poultry carcasses I have accumulated. Usually makes 1 gallon of soup a month, usually with added rice or barley.
Just use the Green Bags for produce and when you are down to just a bit of this and that, freeze it for later use in soup or broth.
Any prepared dishes that manage to have leftovers too small for lunch or a snack, get added to the dog’s food.
If I open a can of something that might spoil before being used up, I freeze it in small containers, label them and find a use for them in the future. Family-sized packages either get broken down and frozen separately or cooked up once, then packaged for later meals and frozen. A Foodsaver is a good investment.
A lot of non-edibles like ziplocks and aluminum foil can be washed/rinsed and reused. Paper towels can be wrung out in water and reused for something non-food-surface related.
I shop and cook just like most of the posters here. Look at how many of us do this as a matter of course. At $5/day/person, that is $300-$310 for two people for a month. If I watch the specials, we also have steak once a week. We eat really well.
In my area, a couple gets $350/month in SNAP. That is a lot of food and they get it in one monthly chunk, not in one $5 bill/person/day. That makes it really easy to take advantage of bulk sales and specials.
Food insecurity means having the extra-large basket on your Wal-Mart electric buggy. I have never met a starving person in the United States. Go look at some pictures of people in the third world - that’s starving. Here? Not so much.
Are you joking?
It is $6 for 32 oz. .19/oz.
My mother can cook but it’s not edible. OTOH, my grandma could put out a spread! As soon as I’d learned from her, I was the cook at home out of necessity. When we had kids, I was teaching them when they were in diapers. When we went to the store, they picked out the produce and they learned math from the unit prices. Lil’ miss was using a real kitchen knife at age 3 to slice cucumbers for home canned pickles. She never nipped a finger - I can’t say the same. When she was in 4th grade, she entered a cooking contest with crepes and the judges swore she hadn’t made them herself (grrr). The year she was in 6th grade, I was sick and couldn’t get out of bed to make the Thanksgiving Dinner. She made everything herself from the pies to the turkey to the dressing and it was delicious. The only help she asked for was for hubby to get the 20+ lb turkey out of the oven. Now in college, she lived in the country for a while and the first thing she did before unpacking was to start a garden. Even though we’re the most stupid parents to ever walk the earth, I think we got them started off well.
I pass a pasture on my commute to work. Oftentimes, I'll see the horses literally hanging over the fence to get at the kudzu to nibble on.
They haven't figured out that if they just wait a day or so, it'll come to them. :-) The kudzu down here grows fast enough to catch and eat slower animals.
I suspect that with your couponing skills, eating on $5 a week wouldn't be much of a challenge.
A piece of fruit for lunch will not be enough to get most people through the day.
Shift some of the calories from the Erving meal to the night. Etching all of that starch and fat later in the day is not very efficient.
That, and it sounds really boring. (I know, we were not going for tasty :-)
a banana and a glass of milk is a good meal anytime
Exactly what I had for breakfast!
On Thursday and Friday, the stores will be paying ME about a hundred bucks to eat while giving me about a thousand bucks worth of FREE air freshener refills, many of which will be traded for liquid food aka vodka. Coupons.
Yes. $3.99 for a loooooooooong time, then briefly $4.99 and has been $5.99 for a few years. Still, that is less (a bit over 50%) than 2# of real cheese. It makes good, quick grilled cheese sandwiches and most people we know make mac’n’cheese w/half real cheese, half Velveeta.
IMO, it’s right up there w/PB for an iconic American foodstuff.
Yes. $3.99 for a loooooooooong time, then briefly $4.99 and has been $5.99 for a few years. Still, that is less (a bit over 50%) than 2# of real cheese. It makes good, quick grilled cheese sandwiches and most people we know make mac’n’cheese w/half real cheese, half Velveeta.
IMO, it’s right up there w/PB for an iconic American foodstuff.
Those of you eating on $5 or less a day, except the rice and beans people, are living off packaged things that are full of poison. Mono sodium glutamate is a neurotoxin and most of you had it at least double in your meals. I know a lot about it because I am deathly sensitive to it so I have to avoid it. I can’t eat packaged food, and must seek out or make my own special seasonings or sauces.
And if you seek to avoid the problems to the immune system from modern “wheat,” and the inflammation from rancid seed oils (all are), you cannot eat commercial food. You must seek fresh meat, dairy, and produce. That gets harder to do cheaply.
The truth is, if you wanted to eat fresh and healthy, and cheap, you’d have to source cheap pastured eggs and meat, healthy cow dairy, veggies and fruit, and fill in with potatoes and white rice. Depending on how close you are to farms, you could do it, especially with a freezer, for a reasonable amount. Maybe not $5 a day. Though adults off sugar and grains can skip a meal because their blood sugar doesn’t go low very soon.
It makes me sad to think freepers think packaged food is food. Most of that crap in the middle of the store has almost NOTHING your body could ever use to replenish and heal. And it DOES contain toxins that continue any ongoing destruction, from cancer to other chronic conditions. So while your stomach and mouth are fooled into thinking you are “satisfied,” inside you are malnourished. You guys GET IT with the way the libs fool us, and the media too. But some of you don’t get it re “food business.” If you get the chance, read up on paleo (robb wolf, paleohacks.com, etc) or Weston a. Price, or any real food websites or books.
I always try to do my shopping by avoiding the middle aisles of a grocery store. The more you stay away from the processed foods the better off you are.
But you always need some variety.
Wow! Thanks for that. I didn't think anybody remembered that old book anymore. I should read it again myself someday! Probably forgot most of my own jokes.
Being a little older, I decided to look up the date of introduction for Hamburger Helper (little trivia there). Never cared much for it. But I didn’t see it, until I worked for a living.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamburger_Helper
GREAT BIG SMILE !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Not here. I can't afford packaged things. Yesterday, my breakfast was an apple (.65) and lunch was ham, cheese and onions (<$2). Family dinner for four for about $2.50 a plate was a 2 lb pork loin ($4), canned peas (.50), fresh carrots (.39) and homemade fresh rhubard pie ($6). I finished off the pie for breakfast today, yum. BTW, most beverages are well water.
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