Posted on 02/01/2009 5:26:12 PM PST by Libloather
For anyone who is hungry or eating poorly, I have a secret to share.
Here is some advice for those who are hungry:
My partner and I don't have enough money to eat well and neither do our friends. But we have a little secret I'd like to share with you--on one condition--you have to share the food you find with others and also use good judgment. This works best if you live in a suburb or a small city. (Those in NYC and LA might want to ignore this advice.) I live in a city of about a million people.
Find the area-wide warehouse distribution center for any of the national upscale grocery stores in your region. (I'd rather not name names, but I think you can figure out which ones I'm talking about). There will be an area where trucks are loading massive amounts of new food into the warehouse. Because these stores cater to upscale clientele, they will throw out pallets of food if some items have superficial packaging imperfections (i.e. dented but intact hard plastic, etc.) Because sales are low, they are also throwing out food that is 'less new' but perfectly edible. For example: if new produce arrives, unsold produce will be discarded en masse, even if it will stay good for another 10 days.)
Over the past few months, we have found boxes of whole wheat pizzas, boxes filled with organic frozen dinners (we took about 6 boxes containing 200+ dinners, left the rest), bananas, about 300 pounds of soy nuts, enough baby organic spinach to feed hundreds of people, cookie dough, dips and sauces of all sorts (hundreds of containers), hundreds of boxes filled with organic yogurt, expensive sparking water, pounds of nuts, organic baby mixed greens, etc. We feed many families with what we find.
Here are some tips:
1) Go after 10pm and before 3am.
2) Don't go to STORES themselves, they tend to throw garbage on top of their dumpsters and may even throw poisons on top to keep animals away. You're only likely to find a few busted yogurts with paper and coffee grinds thrown on top of them. Only hit the distribution centers.
3) You will be more successful at high-end stores with a picky clientele. At the regular store they can sell foods in dented packages at a discount. They won't do that at stores that have the aura of health and purity.
4) Use good judgment when dealing with unpackaged and unboxed food. Most of what I find is double and triple boxed food (food in plastic, in a box, in a larger box, inside a huge box all still sealed).
5) Use good judgment in dealing with expired foods. If it is straight out of deep freeze, we've found the "best if used by" dates to be pretty irrelevant. My entire community of friends has eaten on frozen food even 2 months past the "best if used by" date. If the crates of food are still hard-frozen, you're very likely to be AOK. Open one item and do a smell test. Throw away anything that doesn't pass your muster. Use common sense.
6) Always read up on massive recalls of a type of food. If the gov't is saying some tomatoes have salmonella, you might want to think twice about tomatoes.
7) Be careful with children, the elderly, and the immuno-compromised. Have the healthy people eat first as a precaution.
8) Wear comfortable shoes, protective clothing and bring a flashlight.
9) Be aware that your attempt to feed yourself may be trespassing or even illegal. Or it may not be a big deal. Our theory is that upscale 'holistic' stores are less likely to be brutal to foragers because it wouldn't be good advertising to refuse poor people your garbage (or advertise how much they waste.)
10) I'm personally most suspicious of dairy items. Toss anything that doesn't taste PERFECT. But don't worry, you'll find a hell of a lot of perfect tasting food.
11. Share.
If you're germ-o-phobic think of it this way: people touch your prepared foods at restaurants all the time.
Good luck. Please kick this if you think it will help someone.
I don’t know that recipe but my mother made a delicious chocolate pudding using cornstarch, not flour. You could probably get the recipe online.
Be careful with that. Remember Elizabeth Smart. She was the young girl kidnapped by a handyman her father had given work to.
This isn't like the Depression - many out of work people are out of work for a reason.
My local food bank works with the local grocery stores to process imperfect and near-expired food in a more orderly fashion than at 2:00am with flashlights.
http://www.angelfoodministries.com/
Angel Food Ministries
You can get a box of groceries to feed a family of 4 for a week for 30.00. They buy in such volume that they can provide about 65.00 worth of food for the 30.00 price. A friend of ours who volunteers there says there are no applications or checks, anyone can purchase. She said many of the members of her church buy from the ministry and use the savings to help others. They donate the money they save to other outreach ministries.
There's another good one my son loves - use macaroni. He used to call the chopped up hamburger "little meatballs." Garlic salt and salted butter is the key. Unfortunately, I am salt-restricted now.
We live too far from everything. It would cost a lot to drive down to Phoenix - I don't particularly care for Sam's Club.
If you have a sunny window, you can grow tomatoes inside. Kind of messy but... I've also grown beets in the house during the wintertime.
The things that really are wasted, just in the U.S.-yikes!”
If you really want to get mad- volunteer to work in your area school cafeteria.
The kids eligible for a free breakfast are very wasteful, and the lunch program is equally wasted. Local schools here in Reno area are supposedly even “sending home 2 bagged lunches” for kids the teachers and staff deem to be “not getting decent food at home”. I say take the kids away or re-hab the parents, or take steps to stop the mothers from having more who will end up in the same status.
No evidence if this food really gets eaten, but there are more of your tax dollars flying away.
This is your brain on drugs-—the aftermath.
Sunday Chocolate Pudding Cake
Cook Time: 40 minutes
Ingredients:
1 cup flour
3/4 cup granulated sugar
3 tablespoons cocoa
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup milk
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla
3/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup cocoa
1 3/4 cups boiling water
Preparation:
Directions for chocolate Pudding Cake
Heat oven to 350°. In a mixing bowl, stir together flour, sugar, 3 tablespoons cocoa, baking powder and salt. With a fork, mix in milk, oil and vanilla. Spread the batter evenly in a lightly buttered 9-inch square baking pan. Combine brown sugar and 1/4 cup cocoa; sprinkle over the batter. Slowly pour boiling hot water over the batter and brown sugar-cocoa mixture. Bake chocolate pudding cake for 40 minutes. Let chocolate pudding cake stand for 5 minutes. Spoon into dessert dishes or cut into squares. Top chocolate pudding cake with ice cream or whipped topping.
Years ago, the Imperial Valley lettuce fields had a bumper crop. Good news for consumers? Not hardly.
The DISTRIBUTOR owners of the crop, since these crops are already sold before planting, were ‘harvesting’ every third head initially; that was later changed to every fourth head.
The farmer was still paid the contracted prices, and the produce companies stil owned what was left in the fields. Not even the farmer was legally allowed to pick a single head for their own kitchen use.
It all had to do with optimal control of price. Pick “too much”, and the income from those “extra” heads would drop the price just enough to not increase profit. Pick “too little”, and the false scarcity would drive prices too high to sell at an increased profit.
They have professionals who calculate this optimal profit/harvest down to the last pound practically, and that much and no more is picked; the rest is left to rot or to be plowed under; sometimes entire fields or orchards...but the farmer was still paid his base payment.
Same with any produce, be it onions, potatoes, or berries, or orchard fruits and nuts.
OTOH, small farmers, who do not deal with the major packers, have to sell any and all to whatever markets are available to them.
Don't you remember me? I was the one who challenged Jolly Green and Sherlock, among others. Neth Moul, the garageman, lied for law enforcement and Chief Dense finally, in the end, admitted it.
We NEVER heard Ed's 911 call. Quite unlike the Anthony case - over and over and over.
There are many long time (10+ years) widows in this community. Their families and the churches seem to be doing the right thing here.
And this kind of thing continuously happens all over the world. Now, how can any to all of world politics ever successfully become non-wasteful at any given point in the future, when everything else in the world that can possibly be wasted far to often is? “Do onto others as you want done onto you.” But, if an individual seriously has wasteful personal habits and yet seriously also wants all politicians to shrink the size of government, cut taxes, eliminate taxes, fully privatize everything involving the government, fully practice free market reforms on a variety of issues, etc., how can worldwide conservatism ever actually completely succeed at any given point in the future? The existence of socialism, communism, and all other forms of leftist politics also far too often successfully suppresses people from greatly improving upon their own government.
There actually used to be a mix for this at the grocery store. It was called Chocolate Pudding Cake. They also had a Lemon Pudding Cake. I once had the recipe for a good one, but just now I googled Chocolate Pudding Cake boiling water and several recipes came up. Here is a link to one version:
http://southernfood.about.com/od/chocolatecakes/r/bl30202a.htm
This is so good warm with vanilla ice cream.
Dry beans and cornbread, my friends, Dry beans and cornbread..
I'm not Catholic but I certainly support them.
There is so much we can gain from sharing - look on these troubled times as a blessing. I try.
Oh gad! My husband’s favorite meal.
Need to call it a night. God Bless
I have to get back to Alamo-Girl and betty boops books.
LOL! it’s a main staple for surviving...
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