The Good Food Box
By imsilver
@imsilver (1665)
Canada
February 21, 2007 4:20pm CST
A few of the community groups in our town, as well as our local Overwaitea, have started a new program to help low income families. I've been hearing about it for a few months now but haven't really bothered to check it out. A friend of a friend ordered one last month and raved so I decided to try it out this month for myself.
For $20 you get a box with:
5lbs apples
1 cauliflower
1/8lbs broccoli
5lbs oranges
2.5lbs onions
5lbs potatoes
5lbs carrots
1 celery stalk
1 cabbage
1 romaine lettuce (my favorite! I love ceasar salad!)
2lbs bananas
and whole wheat bread
Or you can order a 1/2 box for $10, which is what I did. I figure if it's not enough I'll just order the full box next month.
The program is opened to families who receive Child tax credits, single-parent families, students living alone and seniors.
I get to pick my 1/2 box up on March 12th. I'll repost then and let you know how it all turns out.
Does your city offer the same kind of thing?
1 person likes this
2 responses
@RobinJ (2501)
• Canada
21 Feb 07
There are several types of this sort of service. I helped run what we called a garden box, this was a box or bag of fresh fruits and vegetables, we sold it for $5,oo and they got 8-10 dollars worth, we had made arrangements with a local market to buy all our produce from them so we usually got it at cost. we were a small service with only 25-35 clients, all low income and could not afford fresh fruits and vegetables. It was eventually taken over by the food bank. and I am not sure if it is still available. There was one other service that I thought was excellent, if was a small course offered by the Salvation Army for street people or those that live in one room. it was called electric fry pay cooking. and they taught the people to prepare a full meal in an electric fry pan, and each participant was given an electric fry pan and lid with the course, as a lot of fry pans are donated to the Salvation army store, The course also prepared meals using the food that was distributed by the food bank , It was an excellent program and is still ongoing as far as I know.
1 person likes this
@highflyingxangel (9225)
• United States
12 Mar 07
Just about every town around here offers some sort of assistance to low income or single parent families. Most of the churches around here offer help. Sometimes, if you are really down and out, you can get a box of food free. Other times you just have to pay a pretty small fee, and you can fill up a box with as much as it can hold.
When I was younger, my mom and her husband (thankfully now her ex) were really having a lot of issues with money. There was a church not too far from their house that offered a $10 fee for a food box. You went in and in this little pantry they had shelves set up with labels. You could take so many items from one shelf, and some many from the next and that continued until you had made your way around the pantry and back out the door. They even offered cosemetics to women and some other toiletries. It was a pretty good program.
