Posts Tagged ‘Food for Others’
Artsy Food Drive Shakes Things Up
Posted by Lorin Drinkard / Tuesday, January 24th, 2012
Where creativity and benevolence meet. / Photo courtesy of: Workhouse Arts
We’ve all seen the signs – a large, often unmarked cardboard box rests next to a beige hallway wall, wrinkly CVS bags stuffed with oversized cans threatening to pull a Jenga and topple over with a “Donations Needed” message scrawled onto posterboard . These telltale images practically scream “food drive up ahead.”
Workhouse Studio 4 doesn’t play that game.
With a little imagination and originality at work, the Lorton studio’s latest project aims to collect loads of nonperishable goods for the Northern Virginia community members in need, while giving it an artistic flair. As donations are collected, Studio 4 artists Mary Gallagher Stout, John Gascot, Lynn Goldstein and Joan Yi will begin the transformation process from a pile of generic canned food items to intriguing art installation.
Food for Others, the biggest distributor of free food assistance in NoVA, will be receiving all the goods when the installment comes to a close.
By incorporating several art mediums and forms of expression, the Have A Heart project will tackle topics like hunger, health and consumption – from both the artists’ and community’s perspectives. Canned food and nonperishable contributions will be accepted all month long through the installment’s run on Feb. 11th from 6 to 9 pm.
Donations can be dropped off during the following days/times:
- Wednesday through Saturday, 11 am to 7 pm
- Sunday, noon to 5 pm
Studio 4 has put together an intro video about Have A Heart, which will be filmmaker Makeda Thomas’s theme for her upcoming documentary. Check it out below.
– Lorin Drinkard
McLean Philanthropist’s Donation Means Respite from Produce Fee
Posted by The Editorial Desk / Thursday, August 25th, 2011
Thanks to McLean philanthropist William E. Conway Jr. of the Carlyle Group, area food pantries will cease paying a 10 -cent-per-pound fee on fresh produce. Hundreds of pantries and non-profit organizations had begun paying the fee July 1 to the Capital Area Food Bank, the region’s primary supplier of food for the poor. CAFB was forced to introduce the fee in order to cover its own skyrocketing transportation and food costs.
The $1 million gift was announced on Tuesday at the construction site of CAFB’s 4900 Puerto Rico Avenue facility, a project that Conway jump-started with a previous donation of $5 million.”[Fresh produce] is a luxury for some people,” Conway told the Washington Post. “I wanted to try to help.”
Fresh fruits and vegetables account for 46%, or greater than 13 million pounds, of the 30 million pounds of food distributed by the Capital Area Food Bank this fiscal year.
Conway’s latest donation will not only buy food pantries a year without the produce fee; it is also enough to reimburse all produce fees paid since July 1. In the meantime, area pantries will continue to look for creative solutions to reduce costs associated with the provision of fresh fruits and vegetables.
And speaking of other solutions, you can help Food for Others feed more Northern Virginians by volunteering for the Harvest for the Hungry Project. Volunteers will harvest crops from the USDA Agricultural Research Center’s 3,000-acre farm in Beltsville, MD, which are then transported to a warehouse for distribution. Both children and adults are welcome. The project is still seeking volunteers for the upcoming dates:
- Sunday, August 28
- Wednesday, August 31
- Wednesday, September 7
- Wednesday, September 14
- Wednesday, September 28
- Wednesday, October 5
- Wednesday, October 12
To register for one of the above dates, email harvest@foodforothers.org. For additional information, click here.
Food for Others
2938 Prosperity Avenue
Fairfax, VA 22031
(703) 207-9173
-Johnisha M. Levi
Food Pantries Pinched by New Produce Fee
Posted by The Editorial Desk / Tuesday, June 28th, 2011
Although workers in Arlington and Fairfax Counties may have the the second and tenth highest average salaries in the country, the region’s food pantries are being forced to swallow a bitterly expensive pill.
Beginning July 1, hundreds of area agencies will pay 10 cents per pound for fresh fruit and vegetables to the Capital Area Food Bank, the region’s primary supplier of food for the poor. The Capital Area Food Bank is imposing the fee in order to cover its own skyrocketing transportation and food costs (to the tune of more than $1 million in unanticipated expenditures). It is projected that U.S. food costs will increase between 3-4 percent by the end of the year.
For Northern Virgina’s Food for Others pantry in Fairfax, the produce fee will add an additional $40,000 in expenses, a sum equal to a quarter of FFO’s food budget. As the Washington Post reports, area food banks are now seeking creative solutions to offset higher food costs, including ”harvest parties” (scavenging fruit from trees in public spaces and private backyards) and “urban gleaning” (gathering fruit from the city tree canopies). In a related story, NPR recently spotlighted food bank efforts to salvage normally discarded canned foods and billions of pounds of wasted farm produce.
To help the FFO, consider volunteering for the Harvest for the Hungry Project. Volunteers will harvest crops from the USDA Agricultural Research Center’s 3,000-acre farm in Beltsville, MD, which are then transported to a warehouse for distribution. Both children and adults are welcome. The 2011 Harvesting Schedule for the summer months is as follows:
Wednesday, July 13
Wednesday, July 20
Wednesday, July 27
Wednesday, August 3
Wednesday, August 10
Wednesday, August 17
Wednesday, August 24
Wednesday, August 31
To register for one of the above dates, email harvest@foodforothers.org. For additional dates and more information, click here.
Food for Others
2938 Prosperity Avenue
Fairfax, VA 22031
(703) 207-9173
-Johnisha M. Levi
Posted by The Editorial Desk / Wednesday, October 6th, 2010
It’s getting chilly out, and I am working on getting my soup shelf stocked. On a cold day, soup is a welcome cozy meal that is light but filling. It can contain veggies, grains, meats, and even dairy. Soup is a meal in itself.
My favorite soup is French Onion. I love the crusty bread and the melted cheese on top. I also love tomato soup with goldfish crackers or chicken noodle soup when I am sick. Chicken noodle soup has been said to even help rid a cold. Not sure if it is a scientific fact or not, but it at least temporarily makes you feel better- like a cup of hot tea.
You can do many things with soup- stir in a ton of your own veggies, add pasta of any shape, and even put it into a bread bowl like at Quizno’s. Soup also freezes easily, so homemade soup can be made into batches and simply placed on the stove when desired.
(Image: Agoosa)
You can get really creative with soup. You can add almost anything you want to it, or mix it with other things to make a more filling dish. My boyfriend recently told me that he and his coworkers have made a quick and easy meal out of soup that was amazingly delicious. It seems like he eats it everyday now. I was skeptical at first, but the idea is actually simple and tastes good.
He gets a can of Campbell’s Chicken and Sausage Gumbo and dumps it over heated rice. Not complicated, but certainly something I would have never thought of. This turns it from a soup into a version of Jambalaya. I like it because all I have to do is buy the soup and he gets a decent meal that isn’t from the drive-through.
(Image: Viewpoints)
While we are talking about soup and the chilly weather, please keep in mind that not everyone is fortunate enough to have a bowl of soup at their fingertips, so please donate to Food for Others this fall. Food for Others distributes food directly to Northern Virginia residents in need and would love to take canned goods and soups among other items off your hands. Clean out your cupboard and give to a good cause.
-Liz Stevenson
Move over, Georgetown Cupcakes and Easy-Bake Ovens
Posted by The Editorial Desk / Tuesday, August 24th, 2010
Granted. Nothing can truly replace the delight of an Easy-Bake Oven, but you can nurture your young culinary prodigies with a few early cooking lessons. If you train them well enough in the foodie ways, they may soon consider it a privilege to prepare a fancy dinner for mum and pop…
Wildfire Executive Chef Steven Lukis and WUSA9 Reporter Jessica Doyle host a hands-on class to learn all about baking and frosting cupcakes. The workshop will be held at Wildfire (3rd Floor) in Tyson’s Galleria of McLean on Saturday, September 25 from 11:30a.m. to 12:30p.m. Tickets are $20 to cover one parent and up to two children. Call Michelle Bringham for reservations at 703-442-9110.
(photo: Wildfire)
Proceeds from the event will benefit Food for Others, a Fairfax-based nonprofit organization which provides food directly to the low-income families of Northern Virginia.
-Jamel Daugherty