I enjoyed this episode of Growagreenerworld.com show on sharing garden bounty with the hungry, and from it, I learned of a very nice website where you can find out where the nearest food pantry is to your home that would like to have fresh produce. I found one in a church I drive by quite often -- never knew! And by clicking on that location on the website, I was able to find out what times they accept donations and what times they give out their donations. Cool! Now I just have to grow the stuff.
Here's the episode:
http://www.growingagreenerworld.com/category/episodes/season-two/
And here's the website where you can search for a nearby pantry:
http://ampleharvest.org/food-pantry.php?id=1115
AmpleHarvest
We have been giving our garden excess to a community pantry for several years. It is very much appreciated. If you don't grow enough to share then it is possible to enlist local farmer's mkts. to donate their produce if you pick up at the close of mkt. and deliver to a pantry that will accept fresh produce. We belong to a group that picks up food from vendors, grocers, restaurants, schools, churches and special events and delivers to destinations across the city. Anything you can do to help feed the many hungry people out there today is vitally important. There's plenty of food going to waste out there for lack of volunteers to get it to those in need.
Does sharing my excess bounty with deer count. : )?
LiseP - I watch Growing a greener world, too.
I looked up Ampleharvest, and there is a help center less than three miles from my home. I wish I had found them last summer when I had so many vegetables to share. Hopefully I'll have an even better harvest next summer.
Thanks for the link!
Just thought I'd give an update. I'm finally producing more than I can eat or give away of certain things, so decided to revisit my intention to donate to a local food pantry (using AmpleHarvest as the site that locates such pantries).
I called the pantry closest to my place. They said they would love to have the produce (they do already get some produce from a local grocery, I think). But they said that in the two years since they listed their pantry online, I'm the first local gardener to take them up on it.
That is sad!! Anyway, headed over there in a few minutes with several veggies (lots of greens, mostly) and hope to make it a regular habit.
(And I'll tell you what finally pushed me off my butt to do this -- I found out via Facebook that an old high school chum ( a LUNCH buddy, there's some irony), runs a charity that has donated millions of dollars over the last ten years to fight world hunger. Pretty awesome dude.
You're welcome. I did my errand today, and it was easy and they seemed happy to have the stuff. The pantry there is only open a couple times per week for people to come get food, but when it is, he says the line is often pretty long and they have to stay open longer than they planned just to let everyone in. Hard to believe that people are hungry in this society and in this day and age and right in my own neck of the woods. I am more jazzed than ever to plant a row for the hungry.
cocoa_lulu, you're welcome and thanks for spreading the word.
You are giving a great gift to those in need. Our garden is not up and going but is the week we pick up from grocery stores and markets and deliver to area shelters and pantries. We brought in almost nine hundred pounds of food from three stores. It took us about three hours to pick up, weigh and deliver all the food.
Wow, MaypopLaurel, that is fantastic. Glad there are people like you, giving of their time to those in need. You rock!
LiseP, I have talked about this on another forum. The topic came up again in my post on Feb. 22 http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/1241095/ You'd be surprised how amenable store managers are to putting baskets aside for donation. They pull near date foods, blemished produce and day old baked goods. Some stores donate prepared meals. There is no liability because of the Good Samaritan laws. Some stores donate meats, etc. and others will only donate non-perishable items.
Good to know. I know that the guy that runs the particular food pantry I visited does take a trip over to the large city food bank, where he is allowed to choose a certain amount of fresh produce that is collected from various stores or maybe restaurants, and bring it over to this smaller food bank. I wasn't there on the right day to get a look at what gets brought over, but I'm really glad to know that folks do have some access to fresh produce.
When we're wrapping up markets in Louisville on Saturday the Wayside Christian Mission comes by and takes anything the vendors want to donate and in Lexington at the Sunday market an group called Faith Feeds takes all donations. It helps me out because sometimes I'll have a good collection of baked goods that's still very good but needs to be eaten in the next couple of days. And I SURE don't need it on my hips. LOL!!
What a good idea. I'll bet a lot of people would prefer to see their perishable goods go to the needy rather than just be thrown away (or applied to hips!).