Tuna Helper

Son -"Mom, what's for dinner?"

Me -"We don't have much here... I can make Tuna Helper."

Son -"It's better than nothing."

Food Pantry Fixin's were very slim this week. Between the two pantries I go to I received five boxes of Tuna Helper but no cans of tuna! I had one can left of my own that I could use. Added to that we had the one can of vegetables I received from this week's pantry visits - a can of cut green beans. Again, between both pantries, I only received one can of vegetables! We had toast with our meal - a nice loaf of wheat whole grain bread, which along with a loaf of raisin bread were the best items I took home from the pantries.

It is funny, but this is one of the exact meals I'd make anyway, regardless of our living under financial distress - Tuna Helper, beans (although usually frozen) and toast. I've been making it for years.

Anyway, the point of this post is that food pantries serve a short-term purpose, to get a family or individual through a month or two of crisis. They're not set up to provide for people who can't find work and need to rely on them for months at a time.

For one thing, the food provided is not nutritious, fresh or enough of a variety. It is the same limited selection of food each visit - rice, pasta, mac n' cheese, soup (tomato and chicken noodle), a small can of spaghetti sauce, pancake mix and peanut butter and jelly. You can only eat so much of those items without never ever wanting to look at another box of mac n' cheese!

The only way I continue to be able to come up with halfway decent meals is relying on the ethnic grocery store that I found sells big assorted packages of slightly bruised fruit for either 99 cents or $1.29. But it is hit or miss going in there. I wanted bananas yesterday, which they didn't have. But they did have a great package of smaller and fresh apples that I snapped up, perfect for the boys' lunches.

Sadly, they got a new butcher at the other grocery store I go to for 99 cent meat specials and he has cut down on the offerings there. I am still able to find a few once in awhile but not to the extent that I used to. He will give me a discount if I find a package of meat that is up for code that day, but again it is a hit or miss process. Some days I'm lucky and strike some deals, most other days I'm not.

Last night, I made a big pot of vegetarian chili soup from two dry mixes from ALDI. I served it over spaghetti AND rice topped with cheddar cheese (from a prior pantry visit). There is a ton left for this weekend! Filling and tasty. The same ethnic grocery store also sells special bakery items for $1.29 a package and I've been able to get some donuts and cookies for the boys, which is a nice treat. The donuts I got with the apples had Halloween sprinkles on them, and my younger son is very fond of that type. Nice to get something seasonal and fun.

I just continue to find that so much of my focus revolves around food and my fantasy wish is to be able to go into ALDI and spend $100.00 without having to count up all the items in my head. The way I shop now is to go in more frequently to try and find deals - it takes up extra time and energy to have to hunt down milk deals or to scope around in the sale bins.

I have to keep telling myself that we do have food and with my resourcefulness, probably eating better than others. But it is a daily challenge and worrisome. And I don't like that my thoughts are so consumed and focused on food all the time. I do start to crave things and obsess about meals and that can't be good. There are other things I'd rather be concentrating on.

Double Edged Sword

I try to be grateful when I visit the food pantry but there are times that I leave discouraged because the pickings are so slim. It is clear that the food given is only meant to supplement one's groceries or pantry staples. But that is a problem when you don't have the money to shop for milk, meat, eggs, cheese and fresh fruits and vegetables. So you get some spaghetti noodles but don't have sauce or meat to go with it. Likewise, a package of hamburger helper. The items you walk out with are supplemental and not worth much on their own. Thank goodness we have not yet reached the point of having to eat a can of black beans on their own for a meal.

Here is the list of items from today's excursion to one of the local food pantries. By this time of the month my refrigerator is bare but I do have pantry items remaining such as spaghetti sauce, although it is canned and God awful - the worst I've ever tasted. Luckily, I have a few dollars left from the sale of some gold jewelry that I took to the pawn shop so I will be able to add to these items ground turkey, turkey sausage and turkey burger patties, all purchased at the end of code date and with coupons besides so I am paying at most for a package of meat, $1.50. I will go to the ethnic grocery store for a few packages of fresh fruit that they sell in packages for $1.29. This should hold us until I can write a check at the grocery store for some real food, Sept. 28th. That is two days before payday so the check shouldn't bounce and we'll have better food in the house.

Bread Items
- Package of 4 Starbucks Pumpkin Cream Cheese Muffins (The local Starbucks donates its bakery items at or near code and going to this pantry on Monday is a perk to be able to pick up a Starbucks treat. I remember the distant days when I'd often pop into a Starbucks for a hot tea and pastry. Now the only way we enjoy these treats is one some are available at the pantry. But it is still a treat!
- Starbucks Apple Fritter - I ate this for breakfast and was in heaven!
- 2 Starbucks brownies which I took for the boys.
- 2 large bakery loaves of garlic bread. I'd hoped for a loaf of sandwich bread to make the boys' school lunches but there weren't any today - just rolls, and Italian bread.
- Starbucks chocolate cookies (6)

Fresh Items
- 2 lb. chunk of cheddar cheese - no expiration date but it looks ok.
- 1 lb. chub of processed ground turkey - no expiration date. I've never used this turkey before always getting the freshly ground but I suppose I can try it with a meat loaf and see how it turns out.
- 3 small baking potatoes, not the most fresh but I'll bake them and smother with sour cream.
- 3 Blueberry Yoplait yogurts with expiration of 9/5. I am not sure how safe these are to eat. I suppose I can eat them but I'm not keen on giving them to the boys. When I buy dairy it is always the day of the code expiration and not after so this worried me a little.

Pantry Items
- 1 lb. spaghetti noodles
- Riceland Long Grain Brown Rice, no expiration date
- Rice-A-Roni Spanish Rice, expiration date 4/25/10
- Box of Kraft Macaroni & Cheese
- Box of no name brand Mac & Cheese
- Old El Paso hard taco shells
- 1 lb. bag white long grain enriched rice
- Small box Ritz crackers, exp. 8/31/10 - every patron gets a treat of cookies or something and this was ours
- Quaker Cinnamon Oatmeal Squares cereal
- Sun Dried Tomato flavor mashed potato mix
- Herbs de Provence mashed potato mix
- Package of Chili seasoning mix

Canned
- Dark Red Kidney beans (dented and rusted top, dirty/greasy label)
- Campbell's Chunky Clam Chowder soup
- no label, 2 cans diced carrots
- sweet applesauce, exp. 2/9/09 - this would have been so nice to get because usually the applesauce is unsweetened and I don't think I'm going to use it a year past the coded date
- Dark Chocolate Peanut Spread, exp. 5/28/10
- 5 oz. can Chicken of the Sea tuna
- Rotel diced tomatoes & green chilies
- Sloppy Joe sauce
- Black beans
- 2 cans Campbell's Chicken Noodle Soup
- Off brand fruit cocktail
- 24 oz. can of beef stew - we don't eat beef so I redonate this
- individual can of Carnation Instant Breakfast, vanilla flavor

Misc.
- 46 oz. Indian Summer Apple Juice
- 3 tubs of 2 QT. lemonade drink mix

Beauty
- 3 bars of hotel bath soap
- Aim toothpaste
- VO5 Shampoo - discontinued scent so there is no matching conditioner

Comments
So looking over this list of food items, I figure if this were it, all we had to eat, I'd be able to come up with only a few meals and provided that I could get milk, eggs, and regular bread.

Breakfasts = oatmeal squares cereal, pumpkin muffins, home cooked rice pudding & fruit cocktail

Lunches = Mac & cheese, soup w/cheese and crackers, grilled cheeses if I can get load bread

Dinners = Meat load made with the turkey, carrots and baked potatoes
Tuna helper and spaghetti if I could obtain spaghetti sauce, and noodles
Chili and tacos if I could get more ground turkey

Basically the pantry provided enough food for a week of breakfasts if milk could be obtained.
About half a week of lunches, and again only if a loaf of bread could be obtained.
And one dinner, with supplemental meat needed to create three more meals.

Eyeballing the list of food items I estimate the worth of items to be about $50.00 give or take a few dollars. To be able to use it in order to eat for the week I would have to add about $20.00 to pick up extra meat, bread, eggs, milk, noodles, spaghetti sauce and a few other items for lunches and dinners. That is assuming I can find 99 cent meat deals and includes no fresh fruit or vegetables.

Again, I try to be grateful for whatever food I receive but some of it is not what I would ever purchase on my own and there is a sense of feeling degraded at having to take castoffs and expired items. I just will throw them out - they shouldn't even be given away. Some weeks back I got a package of biscuit mix from 2004!

But anyway, it would be far better if there could be some sort of system that allows a store gift card to be presented for $50.00 so I could pick out items my family actually eats. And would allow for the purchase of necessary fresh food items.

I don't have much experience to go on with food pantries. I imagine they are all strapped across the country right now. Are there ones out there that are better or worse? The folks going to this pantry mostly do not qualify for food stamps but they are certainly unable to feed their families and need assistance. I just wish that assistance was better coordinated for those who fall in the sphere of needing but not being able to receive any true benefits and are forced to accept and make due with these hand outs.

Once, as I left the pantry in the winter, a young woman looked over the groceries she was carrying out and commented, "It's not very much, is it?" I was relieved, because I had been feeling guilty for thinking the same and yet trying to be grateful and thankful at the same time.

Bare to the Bone

I am trying to be hopeful and positive but I tell you, it is very difficult for me while I struggle to put food on the table for my boys. I wouldn't really care if it was just me. I figure I can survive on pretty meager portions. I'd probably be able to make it on only $20.00 a week if it came to that. A carton of eggs, a couple cans of baked beans, milk, soup, bread, noodles, a little cheese, tuna, maybe some ground turkey for chili. I'd cook up a pot of split pea or black bean soup and have toast and eggs and parmesan noodles. But the boys need more meat and dairy than I do and fresh fruit and veggies. They also need more of a variety. I can eat peanut butter sandwiches numerous times throughout the week, but they get quickly tired of them.

Sometimes the boys guzzle down a carton of milk in just a day. They are so active in sports, I know they get hungry. The stuff we get at the food pantry is all carbs - rice, noodles, pancake mix, canned fruit - rarely any meat or fresh items. That's what the boys need right now. Sandwiches full of good ham and turkey, cheese, lettuce and tomato instead of off-brand mac & cheese accompanied by canned peaches.

We don't qualify for food stamps - we're only $300.00 above the income requirement. But I still can't afford food, and the food from the pantries I go to doesn't provide enough for us to get through the month. So I don't know what happens to people like us. Food stamps would be such a blessing because I could use that assistance to get the fresh food items not available at the pantries. Even $50.00 for that a month would be a Godsend.

We've cut our budget to the bone. I don't think there is anything left to cut. We don't eat out. The only meat I buy is what is discounted to 99 cents because it is at the end of code. Almost all the milk and dairy products I buy are also discounted because they are at their expiration. I get bread the same way for 50 cents a loaf, although usually I get a couple loaves from the pantries. I've resorted to making off-brand drink mix in place of soda. Once in a while we get a litre because we miss it - we were all heavy diet soda drinkers in the past. ALDI sells soda litres for 59 cents but only have lemon lime in diet. We're diet pepsi lovers.

This summer the boys never had a Gatorade for their many sporting events - just tap water. I felt bad about this because they played football and baseball in some mighty hot and humid weather. And even last summer we were able to afford a few sports drinks during their games. No treats unless we get lucky at the pantry and receive a bag of cookies (usually oatmeal, although we crave chocolate chip).

I have promised myself that when my situation improves I will make donations to the food pantry. But I will donate gift cards for $10-$20 dollars so the recipients can choose their own food. Or I will donate boquets of fresh flowers or bags of M & Ms. Something nice and decedant. So many times this past month I have craved something chocolate and just have that bag of oatmeal cookies to dig into. People struggling need a treat too instead of those blasted boxes of mashed potatoes and big bags of lentil beans. The thought of mac & cheese from a box makes me gag.