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2008 Year in Review: Food, poverty, hunger, waste - the One Dollar Diet Project
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Zimbabweans buy 10 kilogram bags of corn meal at
$US8 dollars per bag in Harare, Monday, Dec. 22, 2008.
With runaway inflation the majority of Zimbabweans
cannot afford luxuries over the festive season and when
they can find the basic food essentials, most stores are
charged in foreign currency.
One US dollar will buy 1.5 billion Zimbabwean dollars. (AP Photo)
You've seen the books and the television shows: Frommer's Australia from $50 a day among others and Rachel Ray's $40 a day on the Food Network. It turns out that, according to NetAid, more than 1 billion people (that's 1 in 6 people around the world) live in extreme poverty. Extreme poverty is defined as living on less than $1 a day. In reaction to this, among other things, two social justice teachers started their experiment. Christopher Greenslate and Kerri Leonard decided to eat on a dollar a day for one month and they document it clearly and in detail in their blog One Dollar Diet Project.
In this country we waste so much of probably everything we consume, but food in particular. The portions we get in restaurants could easily feed two to four people. The food our children throw out, I see it at the end of the day every day when I empty my daughter's lunch box and I do it myself after trying to get them to eat a decent meal. Just thinking about the project and browsing the blog will affect how I shop for food and serve to my family. With kids there is always that delicate balance (at least with mine) of getting the right food for them so they will eat well and encouraging them to try new things. I always said that I would never prepare separate meals for the children. That is rarely the case for two reasons: the children eat before we do, and although they'll try new foods (well one of them will and the other will if the stars are aligned right), they won't necessarily eat them.
The first recipe I saw on the One Dollar Diet Project, was from one of my favourite college recipe books. I still use it today. In college my roomates and I ate very well for very little because I shopped at the markets and local grocery store Warshaw's (no longer around). The recipe is Chana Masala. One of my favourite. As a child, my mom cooked a lot of vegetarian Indian food because it was cheap and it was tasty. In college I did the same. Having read the blog, I am more aware of how I shop and eat. I only wish that my caution would provide food for others.
Bon appetit. Appreciate what you have and take care of those who don't. ttyl your BFF (Boston Family Foodie)
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