Pardon the Interruption

I’ve been struggling with words for this post. I don’t want to be self promoting but I want to let people know, if it inspires one person to try to do more or be better to other people, I’ll gladly take some criticisms.

First some history. When I was a young child, probably around 7 or so, my family wasn’t in the best spot financially. My dad was in an industry that was blind to its own end coming and my mom, great as she is, was uneducated and under earning. This led to some periods of food uncertainty and brief periods utilizing some of the benefits that our society has put in place to weather some of these hardships. My family was on food stamps.

I still remember the little booklets that the slips of varying denominations came in. The sounds of pages flapping together when looking for the $25 voucher instead of the $5 one, the pages being torn. I didn’t understand at the time, but I don’t think my dad was very proud of the fact we were reliant on the system for some of our sustenance, I think he bought into the idea that people that are rescued by society’s safety nets are somehow lesser or unworthy of respect.

I hate to admit for quite a while of my life I think I had a similar view that even extended to unemployment, so much so that when I had the opportunity to claim it after a layoff in 2010, I didn’t. But I think people are capable of change, I know I have. 

What does this all have to do with anything?

If we know one another in any capacity, then you know I’m fond of food and also crowd funding platforms, mainly Kickstarter. These intersect more than one might imagine. I’ve backed food trucks, restaurants, kitchen gadgets, and numerous other food related projects, including cookbooks. 

One of the cookbooks I backed on Kickstarter is titled Good and Cheap: Eat Well on $4/Day. The author designed this for families that are low income and/or receiving Food Stamps, the PDF is free, but if you buy a printed book, they’ll give away a printed book to a family that can use it, very similar to the Toms Shoes model. $4 was picked because that’s typically the amount of benefits per person per day.

Again, what does this all have to do with anything?

If you’ve followed my Instagram, Twitter, or Facebook, you know that I really enjoy food and a lot of it isn’t the cheapest, again not trying to self promote, just acknowledging truth, so my food budget is much higher than those that utilize the help that I’m glad is available to them. 

After a few great experiences volunteering there with Surly Gives a Damn, I’ve been delivering meals with Open Arms of Minnesota for a couple of months now and every time I do it I’m made to think. I know I’m helping, but I wonder if there’s something more I can be doing, because when it comes to helping others, more can always be done.

Another important organization that I’ve become aware of due to interactions on Twitter and attending some of their events is No Kid Hungry.

Having a conversation with a coworker, it dawned on me that I was going to be spending a fair amount of money on food one week, then I realized that it ends up being most weeks. It dawned on me. I’m a good cook, I could eat at home more often and then donate the money I saved to Open Arms and No Kid Hungry. Then I figured, if I was going to be doing this anyway, why not try to do it all the way, and unlike the celebs who I assume are genuine when they try, do it the right way. Luckily I have a book that will help guide me.

So that means if I do it for a month, 30 days, that will be about $120 in food. If my food budget was let’s say $620 then that would mean I’d be donating $500. My employer has a great policy in that they will match employee contributions to charitable organizations up to $1000 per employee per year. So in my example above, that $500 becomes $1000, if it was $1000 it will become $2000.

So, that’s what I’m doing. Using Good and Cheap as a guide, for the month of October, I’m going to do my best to keep my daily food spending at or below $4. There are a few days that I have already agreed upon engagements for at least one meal those days, but I will pay for them outside of my normal food budget and not decrease the available pool for donations.

So that’s my plan. I’ll be trying to do a post a day. If I make any pretty food I’ll post the pictures. Regardless I’ll report how much I’ve spent that day and the running total.

(I’m also keeping track of calories to make sure I’m getting close to what the recommended amount is, I might post those in the future.)

Day 1: $6.45 (I didn’t realize how much my free SweeTango apples were worth)
Day 2: $3.71

Total: $10.16
Average: $5.58 (I’ll try to get this down under $4 as time goes on)