We learned that Panera gives their bread away each night to charities who feed people, so we called our local store manager and asked how to get set up to pick up bread for our outreach. The manager told us she’d put us on the schedule for Friday nights. We have been picking up bread every Friday night since August, and delivering it to needy families each Saturday.
We learned two weeks ago that the manager is GONE, and she didn’t have the authority to the schedule, the NWLA Food Bank does. The Food Bank didn’t know about us and scheduled another charity who feeds people to pick up on Fridays.
We called the Food Bank and explained the situation. The Food Bank is allowing us to continue picking up bread but our day is now Monday. This presents a huge problem:
Because Panera is awesome – there are NO preservatives in their bread, so it is all spoiled before Saturday. We need a large, upright freezer so that we can store the bread from Monday to Saturday.
Without the freezer – we have to stop. The charity who is now picking up on Fridays can’t pick up on Mondays, and when it comes to feeding people, it’s not “us or them”.
Because our outreach is on Saturday and we were picking up bread on Friday night.
Why can’t we do our outreach on Tuesday?
I work full time and am taking college classes. We gladly gave up our Friday nights and weekends to feed people, but we are not able to keep the Friday night pickup.
Why don’t you just stop doing this?
1 in 6 people in our country isn’t getting enough to eat. There is enough food wasted in this country to feed way more than 1 in 6 people but it takes effort from people like me and you to make sure that everyone gets to eat. There should NEVER be anyone going hungry, it does not have to be this way.
Bossier City, Louisiana schools art programs have been cut back to near-nothing. The budget is $1.00 PER STUDENT. That is not enough to do even ONE art project, much less an entire year of instruction.
Check out this article written by the Bossier Arts Council for the details.
Please, read the article and give whatever you can spare, even if it’s only $5.00.
Donate to Bossier Arts Council via PayPal. Important: When you get to the “Review your donation” screen, click the Special Instructions link and put “for Project Art Supplies” in the box so the BAC will know how to apply your donation.
September is “National Preparedness Month” – You can be the hero!
Being prepared for emergencies doesn’t have to cost a lot of money.
For most of us it just takes some planning and slow-and-steady commitment to follow through. Check out my article Basic Preparedness for a list of essential items to have in your emergency supplies kit.
Plan
Beyond the emergency supplies (food, water, first aid supplies), you need to have a plan in place. Talk with your family about the kinds of disasters and hazards that can happen in your area, and have a designated meeting place near your home, and another one outside of your neighborhood in case it is not possible to meet close to home.
Gather
Make sure you have updated contact information for family, friends, and neighbors on hand. If the power is out, your computer is not a great place to store your contact list.
Gather copies of important paperwork, such as birth certificates, insurance policies and place those in your emergency kit.
Purchase emergency kit supplies whenever you are able to and don’t stop until you have everything you need. Watch for sales, or buy just one extra item at a time.
Check
About once a year, check your emergency kit and update paperwork and contact information. Once a year is also a really good time to rotate your stored food and to check the expiration dates on everything. If you are storing tap water in re-used plastic bottles, you should change out the water a few times each year.
The most important thing you can do to improve your health is to cook your own food.
Prepackaged and processed foods contain lots of chemicals and substances that you will never find in a pantry in someone’s home. Lots of extra chemicals are necessary to keep food looking fresh and recent, but there are serious health concerns about these dyes, flavors, emulsifiers, and preservatives. You are probably already aware of the high levels of salt and fat that comes with mass-produced “corporate cooking” as well.
“I don’t have time to cook!”
Cooking real food does take more time than ripping open a colorful box and throwing it in the microwave, but the perception that cooking takes “too long” is false. A web search for “quick and easy recipes” turned up thousands of recipes that take 30 to 45 minutes to prepare, using fresh un-processed ingredients and very simple steps.
Using an electric pressure cooker, I can prepare a huge pot of black eyed peas and sausage served over rice, in less than 45 minutes, starting with dry peas from my pantry. (Recipe below)
Not only is this healthy and clean food – it is a lot cheaper as well. Recently I made our “Gusto Chow” for a group of ten people, and it cost me $20.00 to make a pot big enough to feed all of us twice.
How Cooking Can Change Your Life The first 7:30 of this video is quite eye-opening.
As Michael Pollan says, cooking is about creativity and control. If you exercise greater control over exactly what goes into your body, you have a much better control over your own health. Pollan also said “Really great cooking comes from care and conviction, not from a complicated recipe or specific methods.
Moxie says: It doesn’t matter if you don’t know how to cook right now. There are thousands of recipe websites with pictures and videos that can teach you how to make anything you want.
Learning how to cook is the easy part. Training yourself to get in the kitchen and DO IT instead of going the “easy route” is the difficult part. I admit, it took me a few years to learn how to cook and to train myself out of the habit of getting “easy” prepackaged food, but these days we happily go several months without any prepackaged meals.
1 lb bag dry black eyed peas
1 package of smoked sausage
1 large onion, diced
4-6 stalks celery, diced
2 cups dry, uncooked rice
Seasonings: minced garlic, salt, pepper, liquid smoke, and herbs
(we use basil, oregano, and marjoram)
Supplies:
Electric pressure cooker
2 quart sauce pan
cutting board and a good knife
Optional: Tea kettle or a second pot for boiling water, if you want to really speed things up!
Directions:
Sort and rinse peas and set them on the stove to boil with enough water to allow the peas to expand. Get the peas to a rolling boil for at least 1 minute, but not longer than 5 minutes. Turn the heat down and let the beans simmer while you do the other steps.
Slice the smoked sausage and brown it in the pressure cooker. Pour off extra fat.
Add the diced onion and celery, and sauté until done.
Drain peas and add them to the pressure cooker, add water to cover.
(Here is where that kettle of boiling water comes in handy!)
Add garlic, herbs, and seasonings to taste.
Attach the pressure cooker lid and set it to cook on High pressure for 30 minutes.
Make rice on the stove while the pressure cooker is doing its thing, and you will likely have 20 minutes to sit down and relax until your home-cooked meal is ready.
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If you don’t have a pressure cooker, you would simmer the black eyed peas and sausage on the stove for 90 minutes. This is perfect for a weekend, but the pressure cooker makes it work on a week night.
But Moxie… an electric pressure cooker costs $80!!Yup, they do. If you just look at the savings of using dry beans over canned, you’re saving $5 or more PER MEAL. Because we can use more dry beans, we are eating a LOT less meat. We are using basic ingredients which are cheaper.My pressure cooker lowered my grocery costs by nearly $100 every month.
Moxie (AKA Paige) is co-founder of the Louisiana Empowerment Initiative, and apparently has a lot to say about cooking and sharing food!
Paige, aka Moxie of the Louisiana Initiative talks about how we work around the “No Loitering” rule in Downtown Shreveport with “flash mob style” outreach.
Hurricane season began on June 1st, and according to NOAA, this season is expected to be “active or extremely active”.
Preparing for severe weather and other disasters isn’t difficult or expensive. If you are as financially-limited as most of us are these days, just build up your disaster supplies over time. Put together whatever you have on hand today and add things one item at a time whenever you can.
Water: 1 gallon per day, per person.
If you have nothing else, have 3 days’ supply of water stored up. If you can’t buy bottled water, fill soft drink bottles with water from your sink, cap them tightly, and store them away from sunlight. Sanitize the bottles, first. Look for the triangle recycling symbol with the number 1 on it. Any other type of bottle might decompose or break. Then, every 6 months, pour the water out and replace it with fresh water. Add a bottle of water to your stash whenever you can and you’ll have what you need pretty fast.
Food: 3 day supply, non-perishable
Store a 3 day supply of food for each person. Canned food is best, but don’t forget to include a manual can opener! Try to avoid dried or salty foods, as you’ll need lots of extra water. If you can’t spend much, buy just one can of food for your disaster supplies whenever you go to the grocery store.
Radio: Hand-crank or battery powered
You will need to stay informed of news and weather reports when the power is out. A quick internet search turns up several used emergency radios for less than $5.00, and new ones for about $15.00. That might seem like a lot for one item, but staying informed can save your life.
First Aid Kit
If you can’t fork out $15 or so for a first aid kit, start with what you have: a zip top bag with some bandages, gauze, medical tape, and alcohol wipes or cotton balls and a bottle of alcohol if that’s what you have. Try to have some triple antibiotic ointment, as well. It is very important that you can clean and bandage small wounds to protect against infection.
Whistle
If you are in serious trouble, yelling won’t last long. Your will only be good for a few shouts before you start to lose your voice. A whistle makes a very loud sound with almost no exertion.
Dust Mask
Protecting your breathing passages from contaminants can be critical to protecting your life. Mold can be a huge problem after a hurricane or flooding.
Don’t forget special-needs items:
Medicine
Supplies for babies: extra formula and diapers, etc.
Supplies for pets: food, liter, extra water
Other items which are good to have in your disaster kit:
Plastic garbage bags
zip-top bags
liquid household bleach
wet-wipes
duct tape
plastic sheeting
extra clothes and shoes
sleeping bags or blankets
games and toys
candy and comfort foods
Sprouting is something that everyone can do to grow fresh nutritious food for very little cost. For about five years, the Gustos have been growing our own sprouts and eating them every day.
At this point, we have developed our own method of sprouting, which is what I am going to show you.
To start things off, we’ll focus on lentils.
What’s a Lentil?
Lentils are a small brownish green legume found with the dry beans and rice. The store brand usually costs about $1.40 per pound.
Note: You can sprout several different types of dry beans, but some of them are poisonous, so make sure you choose something you can safely sprout! Example: NEVER eat sprouted kidney beans.
What do I need to start sprouting lentils?
A bag of dried lentils
A wide-mouth glass jar
A lid and a screen
Metal ring lids that come with a canning jar (they rust, only use them once or twice).
Plastic lid, cut with a hole-saw
Metal screen from hardware store, cut with heavy duty shears. You need this for sprouting small seeds.
Plastic screen, cut from craft store “Plastic Canvas”. Large holes, lots of air-flow
If you don’t have any of that stuff, a rubber band and some window screen works pretty well, too!
Getting Started:
Prepare your materials
Wash and sanitize the jar, lid, and screen to prevent the growth of bacteria and mold. Do this before each new sprouting “crop”
Wash in hot water by hand or in a dish washer.
Rinse in a light vinegar or bleach solution.
Start with about 1/4 cup of dry lentils.
Pick through them and remove any small stones and debris, and rinse well with cool water. Note: I used a half cup for this tutorial – it was way too much!
Soak
Cover lentils with water and soak for 8 – 12 hours.
Leave lots of room for lentils to expand.
Rinse and Drain
Drain and rinse your lentils well with cool, clean water. They will have doubled in size.
Rinse and drain lentils every 8 – 12 hours.
Place jar upside down in a bowl or rack at an angle steep enough to prevent water from pooling. Ensure there is plenty of air-flow through the lid. We keep our sprouting jars in a dish drying rack with a drainboard that drains into the sink.
Photo below – Left: Lentils Right: Black Eyed Peas.
We have switched to all plastic lids now, this photo is a few years old.
At approximately 24 hours, the lentils are beginning to sprout.
If you are going to cook them, you could stop here. I like to sprout them a lot longer so that I can eat them raw.
Sprouted lentils after 36 hours:
Sprouts are Ready to Eat!
At 3 days, (below), the sprouts can be eaten raw.
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At 3 to 3.5 days, the sprouts begin growing little leaves.
That is when we start eating them!
Five Days
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Stopping the Sprouting Process and Storing your Sprouts
Refrigerating lentils almost stops the growing process.
Rinse sprouts and drain very well, gently pat dry with a towel.
Store sprouted lentils in a clean, dry jar secured with an airtight lid.
Rinse and drain well once per day.
Eat within a few days.
Lentil sprouts smell heavenly when you lightly saute them, but we usually eat them raw, sprinkled into our salads. We usually have two jars going so that we have a constant supply of fresh sprouts.
Working together with Streets of Charity, the Louisiana Initiative (Moxie, Cognito, and Servo) fed more than 80 people a hearty, nutritious meal.
Sharing food is one of the most basic and powerful ways to help people. Considering that 1 in 6 people in America face hunger, there needs to be more of us feeding those who are struggling. Cooking for 100 people is easier than you might think! Read more about this in Moxie’s article at: STANDSuperhero.com
Sharing food is one of the most basic and powerful ways to help people. Considering that 1 in 6 people in America face hunger, there needs to be more of us feeding those who are struggling. Cooking for 100 people is easier than you might think!
Every Saturday in Downtown Shreveport a group of people gathers in an empty lot, just before 5:00pm. They set up folding tables and serve a meal for 50 to 100 people and then clean up, break down, and vanish leaving no traces that they were ever there, all within a single hour.
This past Saturday it was my turn to cook. Because it is near the end of the month, I was told to expect a lot of people – as many as 100. Normally I cook for three people so this undertaking seemed like a big task. It really wasn’t.
Cooking for a large group is not difficult at all; it just requires some planning and forethought, plus a little extra equipment. If (when?) you decide to do something like this, be sure to tell all of your friends and family what you are planning. My mother-in-law happily donated her 3-gallon (12 quart) and 4.5 gallon (18 quart) stock pots to the cause, along with two pounds of frozen meat. A coworker donated a bag of chicken, which meant I didn’t have to purchase any meat at all. We picked up 4-gallon (16 quart) stockpots at a popular discount store for $12.00 each. As long as you’re making stews or other foods with a lot of liquid and keep the heat fairly low, the cheap stockpots will do just fine.
I only spent about an hour researching “Cooking for 100 people” before I had a good understanding of how much food I needed to make. It takes about 6.5 gallons to serve one cup of food to 100 people, so I decided to make 8 gallons of stew and 10 lbs of rice to serve with it. The last thing in the world I wanted was to run out of food before everyone got to eat. I have included my recipe below, including all of the day-before preparations and some advice to help you avoid my mistakes.
Here is a slide-show that I prepared from photos taken along the way. In the past I have been against posting photos of good deeds, but I’ve since discovered that this is an EXCELLENT way to let friends and coworkers know what I’m doing – and hopefully – inspire them to pitch in and help! After sharing this around a little bit, I already have several people lined up to help me next month. It is hard to argue with what works.
Hearty Bean Stew for 100 People
15 lbs of dry beans, any kind. I used a mix of kidney, pinto, black, navy.
2 lbs pork tenderloin
6 lbs of chicken breast
1 lb pork sausage
3 bunches of celery, chopped
4 lbs of onion, chopped
chicken broth (I had homemade bone broth)
few teaspoons of liquid smoke
few scoops of minced garlic
Tony Cachere’s – green can
Oregano, salt, pepper
6 – 7 lbs of white rice (I cooked 10 lbs – way too much!)
The day before:
Rinse and soak beans for a minimum of 8 hours.
Boil and shred the meat. Save the broth.
The day of:
Drain the beans and use fresh water and the broth from boiling the meat. Boil the beans hard for about 10 minutes. Add a mountain of chopped onion and celery. Add the meat, garlic and seasonings then reduce heat to low for about 3 hours.
I cooked 10 lbs of rice but 6 or 7 lbs would have been plenty. The best way to cook large quantities of rice is in steam table pans in the oven, but if you don’t have those just cook it in several smaller batches. I used a large stockpot which produced very mushy rice. It wasn’t a big deal this time since the rice was being mixed with stew.
The pots stayed very hot wrapped in blankets, and the baskets made it all easy to carry. We didn’t have to worry about spilling in the car.
‘Trust Yourself’ is a phrase we like to use, both in encouraging other people and in encouraging ourselves. It seems so simple but it really isn’t, is it? I can’t count how many times in the last year or so I’ve looked myself in the eye and said it right out loud so I could hear it: “Come on, Moxie… Trust Yourself.” Where does that Trust come from? It’s hard to Trust Yourself if you don’t first LOVE yourself.
I do pretty well with loving who I am, but it can be hard work sometimes. It has helped that I don’t have a TV, and I never, EVER read those poisonous womens’ magazines. You know the ones….. they tell us how we should look, what we should buy, and who we want to be like. The central message is this: “You need to change everything about yourself. Nothing about you is good enough.”
Take a very close look at the women on the covers. Not only do the magazines feature women of only ONE body type, those shots are heavily altered. There are websites out there devoted to spotting altered photos and exposing them for the fakes they are. Now that I’m hip to it, those cover models look like aliens with their over-sized heads and digitally sculpted waistlines. I was in the grocery checkout line recently, eyeing a magazine cover featuring a photo story about “Hollywood Stars’ Bad Beach Bodies”. After I finished snickering at the digitally added fat rolls and fake stretch marks, I got angry at the message being broadcast there.
How dare these women be comfortable in their own skin? How dare we eat when we are hungry? You should conquer that hunger because it is wrong! How dare we mothers allow our stretch-marks to show in public? How dare Demi Moore go to the store without makeup? She can’t do that!
Guess what? She can. And so can you.
You all like to post photos of yourselves on FaceBook, so I know what I’m talking about when I say: You Are Beautiful. You were beautiful when you woke up this morning. You are beautiful without your makeup. I know that I am! Don’t get me wrong – If you like to wear makeup, DO IT! You should do whatever you like to do, whatever makes YOU happy and forget what the magazines and commercials tell you. Listen to what your own heart tells you. It will tell you what I have told you: You are Beautiful, and there is so much to love about YOU.
I’d like to thank Temper for turning me on to this particular video from Laci Green. Laci hit the nail on the head when she talks about feeling as if “I’ve got the wrong boobs!”
At first, I had a difficult time believing that a woman SO gorgeous and perfect (hah!) ever struggled to love herself, but she has been subjected to the same marketing and societal pressures as the rest of us. We are not so different after all.
Do you make New Year’s Resolutions? The number one New Year’s Resolution is eating healthier. The most important thing is to get started – but where do you start? Breakfast is very important, so begin each day with some clean, healthy food.
Granola is incredibly easy to make and if you vary the ingredients, you’ll never get tired of it. Once you try home made granola – you may never buy boxed cereal again.
Skillet Granola – simple version
2 Tablespoons honey 2 Tablespoons real butter 1 cup of old fashioned oats (NOT quick cooking!)
In a large skillet, melt the butter over medium heat. Slowly stir in honey until combined. Add the oats and cook about 4 minutes, continuing to stir. Granola is done when the oats are a golden brown.
Spread granola on a sheet of foil to cool. It will crisp up as it cools.
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Or if you want something more complex:
Skillet Granola – ‘to die for’ version
2 Tablespoons honey 2 Tablespoons real butter 1 cup of old fashioned oats (NOT quick cooking!) 1/4 cup of sunflower seeds, added just before the oats. 1/2 cup dried fruit added just as the granola begins turning golden brown.
In a large skillet, melt the butter over medium heat. Slowly stir in honey until combined. Add sesame/sunflower seeds and cook for about two minutes, stirring constantly. Add the oats and cook about 4 minutes, continuing to stir. Add dried fruit just as the oats start to brown. Granola is done when the oats are a golden brown.
Spread granola on a sheet of foil to cool. It will crisp up as it cools.
Something really cool happened this year. I had a successful coat drive, but it wasn’t because I put in a lot of effort. I just wasn’t able to this year. Life happens, you know?
Rather than beat myself up about what I couldn’t do, I will rejoice in the fact that my coat drive happened almost WITHOUT ME!
Everyone who knows me, is aware that I do this every year. People were bringing me an item or two all through the year. My “donations corner” slowly filled up. About a month before I planned to post flyers and start advertising, a coworker gave me two huge bags full of stuff she had been saving for me. This is now something I am known for – and hopefully next year I will have time and energy to accomplish something big. If not, I’m still going to be happy that everyone in my life is thinking about donating coats and clothes all the time.
In a way, I’ve already accomplished something big!
It’s hard to tell from the photo below, but this is a giant box for shipping a dishwasher.
Moxie is co-Founder of the Louisiana Initiative, and a regular contributor for S.T.A.N.D.
Since the world ended yesterday (12/21/12), we are now all living in a brand new world.
That made me start thinking about things that matter:
* Having clean water to drink
* Having enough food to eat
* Having someone to love and love you back.
* Having some place safe to sleep
* Having a purpose to your days.
Eat. Drink. Love. Sleep. Have purpose. Let everything else go.
Welcome to a new world.
♥ – Moxie Gusto
Moxie is co-Founder of the Louisiana Initiative, and a regular contributor for S.T.A.N.D.
The myth that eating healthy is expensive – is false!
Simple, nutritious and low-fat food is actually some of the cheapest food out there. Brown Rice and dry beans are about $1.50 per pound. A pound of dry beans cooks up about six cups of beans, equal to five cans.
Brown rice is packed with nutrition, and cheap. It goes well with practically anything and I think brown rice tastes a lot better than white rice. I make big batches and keep it in the fridge for quick meals.
Learning to cook brown rice is easy. You just need the patience to leave it alone and resist temptation to lift the lid and stir it. For me, this was not easy!
Cooking Brown Rice
Brown Rice Method one:
Pour 2 cups of water in a medium sauce pan, heat to boiling.
Measure and rinse 1 cup of uncooked brown rice, add it to the water.
Stir and cover with a lid.
Turn heat down to low, and set a timer for 45 minutes.
Remove from heat, uncover.
Drain off any excess liquid and fluff with a fork.
Do not lift the lid, not even once until 45 Minutes are up!
Brown Rice Method two:
Pre-soaking brown rice cuts the cooking time in half!
Measure and thoroughly rinse 1 cup of uncooked brown rice.
Soak the rice in a bowl of cool water for two hours, then drain.
Pour 2 cups of water in a medium sauce pan and heat to boiling
Drain the soaked rice and add it to the boiling water.
Stir and cover with a lid.
Turn the heat down to low, set a timer for 20 minutes.
Remove from heat, uncover.
Drain any excess liquid and fluff with a fork.
Do not lift the lid, not even once until 20 minutes are up!
If you’re not sure how to use brown rice, here are some recipes to get you started:
My first coat drive in 2010 was a great experience. With very little planning and no experience, I collected 25 warm coats in 5 days. I only visited the offices within the same building where I work. That was nice, but I had an entire year to plan my next coat drive. This year I enlisted Cognito and Servo to help.
Because this was my second coat drive, everyone I know was already familiar with what I was doing, and donations came from every direction. We had to devote a 4′ X 4′ area in our house to hold donations throughout the year.
I learned of a huge rummage sale happening at a church near my house. I asked the organizers if I could have the coats, clothes, and blankets that were left over for my coat drive – and they were GLAD to let me haul off anything I wanted to take. WONDERFUL!! You never know, until you ask.
Behold:
It took Cognito and Servo two trips with our truck to get all of this stuff to the rescue mission. I had some more last minute donations that are not in this photo, so it was a total of 18 bags of quality coats, clothes, and shoes in all sizes. The “donations corner” in my house was finally empty, but it never stays that way for long.
Moxie is co-Founder of the Louisiana Initiative, and a regular contributor for S.T.A.N.D.
In December of 2010, I held my first coat drive. I was inspired by people in my life who were very quick to help anyone in need, and I want to be one of those people It was a very long time ago, but I know what it is like to have to be outside in cold weather without proper warm clothing.
For anyone just starting out, www.OneWarmCoat.org is a fantastic resource! You will find all kinds of advice tol help you plan and conduct a successful drive. You can also advertise your coat drive on their website, and at the end they will send you a cute certificate to recognize your efforts.
It doesn’t matter what you do, or how much you can help – what matters is that you find a way to help, and get started! Do what you can, when you can.
Moxie’s first coat drive, 2010
Moxie is co-Founder of the Louisiana Initiative, and a regular contributor for S.T.A.N.D.
Step Up Louisiana 