Market to HOPE offers sustenance, opportunity to volunteer

 

Market to HOPE (Help Other People Eat) has been making an impact. I’ve heard volunteers share their experiences and organizers speak on how groups around Southeast Texas donate, collect, distribute and accept food for those who need it.

I finally got my chance to serve for a bit of time when my church group had an early Saturday shift. I was impressed with the set up, the offerings and mission of this Catholic Charities project. Miranda Creech, program coordinator, said Port Arthur residents are among those who can fill out paperwork to see if they qualify for this assistance. Sometimes people come in and “shop” through the space, set up a like a store on the grounds of Our Mother of Mercy Catholic Church, 3390 Sarah Street in Beaumont. In addition to produce and canned foods, there were sundries from spices to diapers.

It was drive-through service the morning Ladies of St. Jude served. I had cart duty. Cars were lined around the block and volunteers simply loaded food from the carts that continuously rolled out to the sidewalk. Those accepting the food, who had their paperwork handy, didn’t even have to get out of the car.

I got the perfect assignment on a day I had my step counter on. We’d get a little shopping cart and roll it through stations in the store. When I got there the first stop was milk, then a few feet later bags of bread were hooked onto the cart’s side, then came bags of apples, then a roll to peaches. Next came a bag of frozen meat and I’d take the cart to the sidewalk. More boxes of fruit followed and then we lined up for people to unload into cars and trucks. I’d steer the empty cart back and start all over. The supplies would change as, for instance, milk or watermelon would run out and be replaced by something else, like raisins galore or some new surprise.

               Creech says to call her for your chance to volunteer, or if you need food! She’s at (409) 924-4435, mcreech@ccsetx.org

Food Triggers - While I love the notion of generations of women bonding over kitchen experimentation and family recipes, there are other aspects to the love of food. How did you feel about eating as a child? Did anyone try to change your relationship with food? Does food ever make you feel unhappy? These are journal prompts in a new book by Leslie and Lindsey Glass, a mom and daughter who were not in contact for a long stretch. Imagine turning that around in a way that allows a book collaboration to benefit other. Good job. "The Mother-Daughter Relationship Makeover: 4 Steps to Bring Back the Love" covers a variety of topics and situations we've all experienced, in addition to the food thing. It's good to heal at the table. 

Darragh Doiron is a Port Arthur area foodie ready to hit all the summer grills. Share your crazy ideas with her at darraghcastillo@icloud.com

Squirrel away some snacks

Squirrely Shirley is what I’ve been calling our nightly visitor. You might hear a leaf rustle as she pokes around a flower pot, or catch movement above if she approaching from the awning. Then comes that look. “What have you got for me tonight?” Cute as can be, I made a platform for her with a little half brick as a step. No steps needed, she’s a leaper. If I can get her to nibble at a raw nut from the flat piece of marble, it’s like her stage. Hey, if I’m providing snacks, no fair if you haul them off to enjoy. I’d like to have a little cuteness show. I’ve really come to anticipate her antics, but my husband draws the line at her hopping up onto the metal swinger while he’s sitting right there. A little “shoo” gets her back on the ground and inquiring about the next handout.

We like our snacks, too. Our friend is careful to give squirrels on his walk unsalted, raw peanuts. Too bad humans tend to reach for more sugary, fatty goodies. But I’ve heard of “ingredients-only households” as a term. This means your pantry doesn’t have bags of chips and boxes of cupcakes ready to rip open and devour. You have to work for your snacks a little, such as: open a jar of nut butter and spread some on an apple you had to cut up. Or shred some cheese and melt it onto a tortilla. This isn’t too much extra work in my thought, but just way too difficult for some snackers. A note is that healthy options are often more expensive and less accessible to those in a food desert.

What are your snacks? – As a kid, I’d never have guessed celery and hummus would be a favorite. Hated the stuff in my youth. Popcorn is a snack, or a dinner. Fruit is the tops. If you figure that some snacks make you more healthy and others drag you down, it gets easier. Readers, share what you go to. Here’s an example, below:

Snack Attack - I met a man eating from a beat up bag that looked bleached by sunlight as though it was in the far corner of a parking lot the past decade. I wondered if it was actually "chew" the way he was moving his jaws. Fascinated, this foodie had to ask. He willingly held out a hand of what looked like super-coarse sand, or cornmeal. Well, it was nearly cornmeal. Turns out he's “addicted” to corn nuts and his dentures can't deal with it. He says he tapes up bags of his fave snack and takes a sledgehammer to them, pounding those corns into near dust. Could I make this up? Foodies are everywhere!

Darragh Doiron is a Port Arthur area foodie headed for “ingredients.” It’s snack time. Got snack ideas? Share them to darraghcastillo@icloud.com