Requests for holiday food triple--please Give $10 Tell 10

We heard this week that calls to the 2-1-1 helpline for food over the holidays are triple what they were last year—824 in the past 6 weeks, with 300 people on the waiting list for a food basket from our local food bank.

Obviously, for some, the season is less merry and bright.


Requests for help* 2008 2009

Holiday Food requests 229 824
Holiday Gift requests 978 1,234

*from November through the first two weeks of December


I’m not trying to guilt anyone to action—just sharing information. You may also want to share it with family, friends or colleagues. Many people are wondering how they can help and/or what resources are available. If you or someone you know is in the position to provide help this holiday season, here are some thoughts:

• GIVE. Through December 21, all donations made through Give $10 Tell 10 will go directly to the Holiday Basket program, Snohomish County Food Bank Coalition (19 food banks throughout the county) and The Salvation Army food bank. Please see Give $10 Tell 10 on our website to donate.

The Give $10 campaign has generated thousands of click-throughs, tweets and retweets, downloads. But it hasn’t raised much money (only $400 here so far, more in King where donations replaced food stolen from a food bank). Maybe now that we’re sending all the money right away to these three nonprofits, people will see how much good their small gift can do.

It can do a lot. $10 will feed 5 people at The Salvation Army. $31 will buy a complete food basket for a whole family, and there are still 300 on the waiting list. So please think about giving $10 and, as importantly, passing the word along.

• ADVOCATE. Pass along this list of resources related to holiday help compiled by The Herald. The Herald also did a story on the calls from 2-1-1. Read it here.

• VOLUNTEER: United Way’s website offers an easy way to research volunteer opportunities. This is updated as local agencies provide information that volunteers are needed. Please visit The Volunteer Center

Perhaps you’ve found other ways to respond. Whatever you do, or don’t, with the information above, take care and have a wonderful holiday season.

Deborah Squires

I couldn't make it either. I blew it on my daughter's birthday.

So, what did we learn? That it's hard to be poor and hungry and live on $7 and day. So, what will we do about it? That's the real question, isn't it?

In our community, thousands of people are going to food banks -- for the first time in their lives. They used to donate. Now they need it to get by. What do we do about it?

In my office today sat a man, Randy, who is about to lose his house. He had a good-paying job with a "large aerospace manufacturer" and was laid off. He's playing by the system: collecting unemployment, getting resume help, applying for everything he can. He can't find anything. He's frustrated. He came to United Way for help.

United Way doesn't just hand out money to people who drop in. (Our process for distributing donations is both more complex and far more effective.) But I could listen and offer what help I had (call our 2-1-1 helpline; mortgage assistance is really tight--call on the first hour of the first day of the month.) I can also volunteer. I volunteer at our free tax preparation centers for low income people. It feels great to help people save money and get refunds that are more than they hoped for. It goes a long way to putting groceries on their tables. (www.uwsc.org click on Volunteer.) Mostly, I can give money.

This week I gave someone $20 so he could get his birth certificate to apply for a job. Right! I knew even as I did it I was a sucker. But actually, he brought me the receipt from the Health District--$20 to pull his record and make a copy. If the Green River floods, he's got a job.

Still, I don't usually do that. I know there are smarter ways to give, because United Way and the programs it funds can make the most of my gift. They really stretch it at the food bank and shelters. It's needed now.

So what do we do?

I invite you to Give $10 and Tell 10. (It's easy, I tried it.) $10 or $2o is a small gift, but those who ate on $7 a day know what it can do. Go to www.unitedwaypugetsound.org and you can give to any United Way in Puget Sound. Mostly, tell 10 friends what you did. Ask them to give $10 too, and tell their friends. Imagine, if we all did, what amazing things could happen for people who don't get to quit when Hunger Challenge Week ends.

Deborah Squires

Got Soup? - Final

Better late than never... I wanted to jot a few notes about the final days of the challenge.

I play in a racquetball league and had our season ending pizza party on Thursday evening. Thankfully I had some soup before the party and as I passed up the pizza and drinks it opened conversation with people at my table as to why I would choose to do the challenge. Lots of interesting conversation...

Going into my last day - Saturday - I was feeling a bit hungry and ready to return to my regular cooking choices. I had chosen quality over quantity with my coffee and suffered Saturday with multiple coffee withdrawal headaches. I was so very tired of eggs for breakfast that I chose rice instead. Not bad and adding the rest of the rice to the leftover soup was a pretty good and filling idea. Too bad I was soo tired of the soup that I couldn't finish it for lunch or face it for dinner. I kept thinking about the lack of choices and was not dealing with it well.

Dinner needed to be anything but soup and I had $1.96 burning a hole in my wallet. I opted to freeze the remainder of the soup and vowed to remember this week when I thaw it out for lunch in a couple of weeks. I recalled buying risotto at the liquidator store in Everett a couple weeks ago and headed there in route to dinner at a friends house. I figured if I could spend $.75 on the risotto I could spring for a red pepper and stuff it with the risotto and complete the week happy and on budget. As Saturday's luck would have it, there was no risotto to be found. I wandered the grocery section hoping for something cheap and filling to jump off the shelves.

My friend called wanting to know what was keeping me. I explained my delimma and she congratulated my on 6 2/3 days of the challenge and asked when it would be done. I told her it was done at midnight. Her response was "get over here, it twelve o'clock somewhere!" I laughed heartily and hung up. I set to rationalizing that if I shared my food, I could spend a bit more. I grabbed a can of Spam and a can of pork and beans and headed to the check register!

Overall, the week has been quite eye opening. In my history, walking in someone else's shoes always is. At our outreach meals I will strive to offer more choices, offer advice for shopping and food prep, and provide more fresh fruits and vegetables (which I ended up craving by the end of the week). I'm looking forward to the second annual challenge next year - well maybe not quite looking forward to it as much as looking forward to making even more people aware of the situation many people in our community do not live in for a week but for years.

Chris Frizzell - Everett First Baptist "Got Soup?"

Thoughts from a challenge slacker

I have a confession: we didn't do the challenge. I totally meant to. I had planned out a scrumptious yet frugal week thanks to the new Cooking Light "Enlightened Chef" column, and had threatened my husband with dire consequences if he threw us off track. But then...life happened. I had some emergency I can't even recall occur on Sunday when I had planned to go grocery shopping. And then I worked late on Monday. And like that...the challenge was over for us.

As others have noted, the key to making the challenge happen is planning. I would add that a second key is the willingness to cook things from scratch. My downfall was relying on frozen, prepared food when I was tired or rushed or just grumpy. And that's an option that many other families just don't have. Convenience is expensive.

Now all that being said, I did get around to cooking 2 of the 4 meals that I had planned for last week. Both the "Beef and Barley stew" and the "Chicken and Dumplings" were delicious, but they both took hours to cook, which took some interesting juggling while I was also watching my 13 month old daughter. I am lucky - I have family close by and a husband who is willing to help share her care. But I know that isn't an option for many low income families, and let's face it, child care is EXPENSIVE and hard to find. It's a good thing we're not trying a childcare challenge too.

So yes, I wussed out. But I all the posts I have read have really inspired me to think about my grocery habits as well as what I can do for my neighbors here in Snohomish County. Congratulations to all of you who made it through. I remain in awe of your achievement and of the incredible budget juggling that families on food stamps do every month.

- Maya Hemachandra
Manager of Individual Giving

Mmmm. Peanut Butter.

Wow, was not accepting handouts the toughest part of the Hunger Challenge for me. In the fall, there's always so much free food around United Way's office. During the past couple of weeks, we have been gearing up for our internal, staff fundraising campaign. As they have the last few years, staff members have been cooking incredible lunches (and sometimes afternoon or morning snacks) and selling portions to other employees at a reasonable prices. 100% of the money used to purchase these meals has benefitted United Way. And it has been so easy! Someone has sent out an email advertising what the lunch (e.g. soup, salad + cookie) will be and how much it will cost, and there have been emails leading up to lunch enticing everyone to come to the lunch room and eat. No lunch planning involved. Usually, the meals have been around five bucks. Because of the Hunger Challenge, though, these meals were only $2.50 last week. Yet, I have been eating my own lunches in the lunch room--next to everyone eating the home cooked meals. Chicken curry soup, lasagna, chili, etc. That was tough. But I just knew that there was no way that I'd normally get such a meal for only $2.50. And if I ate it, I wouldn't know what it was *really* like to live on just $7/day. So I opted out.

Peanut butter saved my snack life during the Hunger Challenge. Since I bought the store brand that was full of sugar and pre-mixed with honey, it tasted *just* like the inside of Reese's Pieces (not as intensely flavored as Reese's peanut butter cups). Yum. Not only did it taste good on my bread for breakfast, but I also started bringing the whole jar with me to work for me to eat spoonfuls from when I got hungry for an afternoon snack. Yup.

Oh, and I "broke the rules" again. Months ago, I signed up for a UW Experimental College class, "Healthy Eating on the Run." In the class, we learned how to cook healthy meals (not out of a box) in twenty minutes or less. Part of the class involved testing and tasting recipes (which were *delicious*, btw). I must say that the foods that were recommended to us in the healthy eating classes were quite different from the foods I'd purchased with my $49. However, the common component in eating healthy and eating inexpensively was advance planning. Absolute minimal preparation usually means that your meal will be both overpriced and unhealthy. More incentive to practice cooking and think ahead!

In closing, I just wanted to say how much I've appreciated the Hunger Challenge. I'm proud to work at an organization that encourages people to participate in such eye-opening activities. Thanks, United Way! And thank you, SO MUCH, to all of those who participated in the challenge--blogging about it, or participating silently. Thank you.

Sara McArdle
Graphic Designer

Final thoughts about this challenge

It's over, for now, for us. We can go back to our old ways, eating what we want when we want. We can buy brand names without clipping coupons, shopping for sales, or just plain doing without.

Sure it's over for us, but for thousands of people in the state of Washington, perhaps even our neighbors, the challenge goes on. For them, this wasn't a one week challenge. No, for them this is reality. A life we have only visited.

For me, at least in the back of my mind, I knew that today Sunday, I could eat and even over-indulge. To not have to count pennies, to stretch limited resources for one more meal. That knowledge somehow made it seem fun at times. It was a game, a game to be won. It involved strategy (planning), execution (shopping & cooking), and perserverance (eating only what we purchased, and nothing else. Unfortunately for those living this life, it isn't a game. It isn't fun.

The best part of this challenge was the interest of people I spoke with about it. "Can it be done?" was the first question asked, followed by, "what did you have to give up?" This line of thinking could open a book on social thought surrounding food in our culture, not the fodder for a blog like this. But my own questions follow a different path: Why don't more people try to challenge themselves? Why don't more feel compassion to others in need?

I may never have the answer to those questions; though I do know that I will remember this past week. I will never question my ability to live on $7.00 per day of food. Yes it can be done. For the week, I kept $2.95 in my pocket (I skipped the steak and baked potato, and opted for Rotisserie chicken with mashed potato and squash, though did break into my security for a bottle of economical wonderful wine (I won't share the name as I like that it's unknown and cheap :) )) As to what did I give up; Coffee every day, gourmet tea, Steak (though I could've had it), many spices that I normally use. Are these things I could do without. Maybe. But realistically, I could probably save some money and only have them occasionally.

I learned a lot about myself, my family, my neighbors and my community this week. I wouldn't trade any of it. I loved reading everyone's posts, I found humor, insight, caring and an open honesty. Thank you all.

Adam Davies

Friday

What was once a day of OMG, I'm tired from a week at work, let's order pizza! Has now become, how to make the last of the money stretch. Potato's are a god-send, they are economical and can be cooked up into 101 delicous meals. Tonight, though to break through the end of the week tiredness, I needed to come up with a delightfully un-repettitive meal.

I had mashed potato leftover from earlier in the week, so tonight would be gnochi:

1 cup of mashed potato

1 cup of flour

1 egg

Mix it all together into a dough, roll portions out into a log, and cut into 1 inch pieces. Boil in salted water until they float. Drain on paper towel. Fry up in a little butter just to brown a bit.

I used a can of tomato sauce I had purchased thinking spaghetti, and mixed in some garlic, and diced italian tomatos. This went over the gnochi, and while it was missing parmagiano reggiano, and a nice merlot; it was better than most of the meals I've eaten this week.

I still have $11.00 of my security money left over. Tomorrow night I plan to buy a small steak, and have baked potato with it. It should blow the last of the $49.00, but it will be worth it.

I just want to thank the United Way for proposing this challenge. I have learned so much about the way I spend on food, the challenge our low income neighbors face, what it's like to be really hungry...and not have any option to change that. My eyes have been opened. And I will take with me lessons learned.

Adam Davies