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Food Charities: Where Can We Give?


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I got turned onto www.freerice.com a couple of months ago, and I spend a half hour playing the game most every day. It's a vocabulary quiz that's mildly addictive, especially for word nerds like me.

Every time you get an answer right, the UN will contribute twenty grains of rice.There's a cool graphic thing that shows you what your contribution looks like in a rice bowl. and trust me, you'll get competitive with your verbal self: miss the definition twice, and you'll remember it the third time!

The eGullet Society is itself a culinary charity, I hasten to add, having awarded $60,000 in scholarships in the past three years. So another way of contributing is to donate to the Society. After that, if your mouse finger is still itchy, have another go at FreeRice.

And tell us what your favorite way of giving is.

Fifteen minutes a day, peeps. If we all have fun it's a whole lotta rice.

Margaret McArthur

"Take it easy, but take it."

Studs Terkel

1912-2008

A sensational tennis blog from freakyfrites

margaretmcarthur.com

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Abra, thanks for doing the background check. I should have made a point in my original post that freerice is on the up and up -- I too vetted it the first time I played.

Margaret McArthur

"Take it easy, but take it."

Studs Terkel

1912-2008

A sensational tennis blog from freakyfrites

margaretmcarthur.com

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Ooh I love FreeRice.com!

I heard about it on our local radio station in Vancouver. They're doing a Free Rice Day on June 10, and encouraging everyone to play Free Rice for 4 minutes at 11am. Check it out...95 Crave FM. :smile:

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. . . . And tell us what your favorite way of giving is.

There are a lot of good food charities out there, freerice.com is one I love and hate. Just when you get a few definitions ahead . . . . $#%$!

I'll be giving to a food charity next month: Farmers Helping Farmers. Here's how they describe themselves:

Farmers Helping Farmers is a nationally recognized, award-winning organization of community-minded people with an agricultural background from Prince Edward Island, Canada. Our goal is to assist Kenyan farmers in becoming more self-reliant in agricultural food production. Together, we develop small-scale, practical agricultural projects, focusing on direct, person-to-person interaction, with little or no government structure.

I wasn't aware of this cause until a friend told me that she's going to raise funds by swimming across the Northumberland Strait and back in around 15 hours. Like freerice, this one is connected to the UN in that she'll also be raising money for the Stephen Lewis Foundation which exists "to ease the pain of HIV/AIDS in Africa at the grassroots level".

My friend's site is http://www.kristinroe.com/.

Peter Gamble aka "Peter the eater"

I just made a cornish game hen with chestnut stuffing. . .

Would you believe a pigeon stuffed with spam? . . .

Would you believe a rat filled with cough drops?

Moe Sizlack

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The Heifer Project is another good way to donate food.

I keep wondering how much 1000 grains of rice weighs, since you know they dont count it out!

"You dont know everything in the world! You just know how to read!" -an ah-hah! moment for 6-yr old Miss O.

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The Heifer Project is another good way to donate food.

I keep wondering how much 1000 grains of rice weighs, since you know they dont count it out!

Freerice say there are about 48 grains per gram. Thus 1000 grains would be 20.8 grams approximately.

Or think of 50,000 grains as roughly a kilogram of rice.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Oh, good grief.

When I got the level up where I liked it, then I kept going to see how well I could do. When I missed a word or two and slipped on the rating, then I couldn't stop until I got the rating back up. It's worse than a poker game.

Thanks for the pointer, I think... :laugh:

Nancy Smith, aka "Smithy"
HosteG Forumsnsmith@egstaff.org

Follow us on social media! Facebook; instagram.com/egulletx; twitter.com/egullet

"Every day should be filled with something delicious, because life is too short not to spoil yourself. " -- Ling (with permission)
"There comes a time in every project when you have to shoot the engineer and start production." -- author unknown

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  • 1 month later...
. . . . And tell us what your favorite way of giving is.

There are a lot of good food charities out there, freerice.com is one I love and hate. Just when you get a few definitions ahead . . . . $#%$!

I'll be giving to a food charity next month: Farmers Helping Farmers. Here's how they describe themselves:

Farmers Helping Farmers is a nationally recognized, award-winning organization of community-minded people with an agricultural background from Prince Edward Island, Canada. Our goal is to assist Kenyan farmers in becoming more self-reliant in agricultural food production. Together, we develop small-scale, practical agricultural projects, focusing on direct, person-to-person interaction, with little or no government structure.

I wasn't aware of this cause until a friend told me that she's going to raise funds by swimming across the Northumberland Strait and back in around 15 hours. Like freerice, this one is connected to the UN in that she'll also be raising money for the Stephen Lewis Foundation which exists "to ease the pain of HIV/AIDS in Africa at the grassroots level".

My friend's site is http://www.kristinroe.com/.

Kristin is in the water right now!

Things are going pretty rough for her, she started at 4 am and got half way by 12:30 pm - hours later than planned. Hopefully the currents will be more favourable on the way back to PEI where lots of people are eagerly awaiting her return.

Peter Gamble aka "Peter the eater"

I just made a cornish game hen with chestnut stuffing. . .

Would you believe a pigeon stuffed with spam? . . .

Would you believe a rat filled with cough drops?

Moe Sizlack

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Go Kristin!

This week I was reminded of the easiest way to help a food charity: contribute to your local Food Bank. You have duplicate canned goods and pasta. Cull them. Go to the supermarket vowing to spend ten bucks a week for folks in your community. If you're a smart eGullet shopper ten bucks can go a long way. Toss in all the hotel toiletries you've collected: shampoo and soap cost money too.

There but for the grace of God ...

Margaret McArthur

"Take it easy, but take it."

Studs Terkel

1912-2008

A sensational tennis blog from freakyfrites

margaretmcarthur.com

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. . . . And tell us what your favorite way of giving is.

There are a lot of good food charities out there, freerice.com is one I love and hate. Just when you get a few definitions ahead . . . . $#%$!

I'll be giving to a food charity next month: Farmers Helping Farmers. Here's how they describe themselves:

Farmers Helping Farmers is a nationally recognized, award-winning organization of community-minded people with an agricultural background from Prince Edward Island, Canada. Our goal is to assist Kenyan farmers in becoming more self-reliant in agricultural food production. Together, we develop small-scale, practical agricultural projects, focusing on direct, person-to-person interaction, with little or no government structure.

I wasn't aware of this cause until a friend told me that she's going to raise funds by swimming across the Northumberland Strait and back in around 15 hours. Like freerice, this one is connected to the UN in that she'll also be raising money for the Stephen Lewis Foundation which exists "to ease the pain of HIV/AIDS in Africa at the grassroots level".

My friend's site is http://www.kristinroe.com/.

Kristin is in the water right now!

Things are going pretty rough for her, she started at 4 am and got half way by 12:30 pm - hours later than planned. Hopefully the currents will be more favourable on the way back to PEI where lots of people are eagerly awaiting her return.

She made it!

Fifteen hours in 19C water - but she's raised $30,000 for the cause, including Farmers Helping Farmers. Story here.

Peter Gamble aka "Peter the eater"

I just made a cornish game hen with chestnut stuffing. . .

Would you believe a pigeon stuffed with spam? . . .

Would you believe a rat filled with cough drops?

Moe Sizlack

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The best way to assist your local food bank is to write them a check for overhead etc.

You are so right. Great idea.

But it's part of my ongoing thinking that most of us can donate about ten bucks a week, be it a check, as you suggest, or chipping out ten bucks a week from your budget for a bag of groceries for a food bank or a donation to the Heifer Project.

I can eat well and still chip off ten bucks a week. I'm pretty sure most of us can.

Margaret McArthur

"Take it easy, but take it."

Studs Terkel

1912-2008

A sensational tennis blog from freakyfrites

margaretmcarthur.com

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I work for a Community Meal program in the Vancouver region. Among the ways to contribute:

(a) cut a cheque to the food sharing program of your choice

(b) contribute part of your garden harvest to the food bank, or a food sharing/gleaning program

© commit to putting items into the Food Bank drop box at your grocery store

(d) ask at your Chamber of Commerce or community bureau about Christmas hampers

(e) if you have a commercial kitchen, make some preserves for Christmas hampers

(f) sell your excess harvest at a local farmers' market or pocket market, and donate the proceeds to a soup kitchen or food sharing project

(g) take toiletries, serviceable towels, and NEW socks to the nearest rescue mission or street kids' shelter

Karen Dar Woon

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I scooped up all of the change on my dresser a few days ago, took it to the bank and got dollar bills, took them to the biggest gas station chain, bought a few gas cards and gave them to meals on wheels. Amazing how those quarters and dimes add up!

(BTW, if you travel and stay in hotels, donate the travel bottles that come with the room to your local food shelf.)

Susan Fahning aka "snowangel"
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