Breakin' the Law, Breakin' the (Food) Law

One of the rules of the Hunger Challenge is that you can't use food you already own. I get the point of this -- you're not supposed to buy 10 pizzas on Sunday night at 11:56 p.m. and then eat that pizza for free all week.

But I take some issue with this. Let's say you did buy those 10 pizzas and you counted them into your daily and weekly budget for the week. That seems fine to me. Just because you bought the food in advance doesn't seem to be a problem -- it's the "cheating" factor of calling it "free food" that is the problem.

Also, the rule doesn't take into account how people actually live -- we accumulate as we go. Even people I know who eat on severely limited budgets have told me how they buy in bulk (rice, pasta, flour, etc.) because it is cheaper and will last a month.

Additionally, wasting food seems to be the antithesis of the Challenge, as well as not in the spirit of the food bank. We had guests with us over a 4-day weekend. When they left Monday morning, we still had a 1/2 gallon of organic milk, some cheese, and lettuce. Those products will spoil by next week. Our neighbors wouldn't take the extra.

I am still using those products, so I count it into my budget. So I take what I paid for the milk, and figured out that every serving is $0.28. I count the overall price of a 1/2 gallon of milk into my $35/week budget.

I don't want to waste good food! I wonder what the United Way thinks of this.

BUDGET:

So there are two budgets to keep track of: (1) the overall 6-day challenge budget (Monday-Saturday, don't spend more than $42/week) and (2) don't use more than $7 worth of that food per day. There is the daily count and the overall weekly count.

If you had just taken the $42 and purchased everything for the week, I wouldn't have to think about what to eat -- it would all be in the house. But due to our schedules and meetings and needing some flexibility, that is not really a great option. So I spent about half the budget, and left the other half open. So I keep track of the overall and the daily, with the $42 and $7 firmly in mind.

It's complicated.

PEA SOUP:

What is not complicated is that I made pea soup for the guests at our Marketing Committee meeting last night, and, with crackers, each serving came to $1.25/person. Pretty good! The soup is filling, nutritious, tasty and healthy. Here is an easy recipe.

onions

broth (chicken or veggie)

frozen peas

mint

Cook the onions in oil or butter, add broth and stalks for mint, add frozen peas (they taste great!) and cook. Remove the mint, then blend remaining ingredients together (I use a hand blender in the pot). You can add cream or milk to it at the end for more flavor and texture.