Steady rain didn’t deter local gardeners from dropping off a portion of their harvest to a fresh food drive for the Cambridge Self-Help Food Bank earlier this week.
Hosted by rare Charitable Research Reserve, in partnership with the Preston Idea Exchange, the food bank and Seeds of Diversity Canada, the Wednesday event collected 191 pounds of fresh produce donated from people’s gardens and those generous enough to purchase it from a grocery store.
The amount of donations collected during the last food drive of the season nearly matched the amount of fresh food collected every Wednesday since early August.
Local food coordinator with the food bank Fig Grevers says the produce baskets the donations helped fill are distributed at six different locations throughout the city.
Over the summer, the mobile food market program has distributed an average of 250 baskets a week at a cost of $5 per basket.
While geared toward families in need, the market is open to anyone who would benefit from getting more access to fresh, healthy food at an affordable cost.
Grevers estimates each basket contains about $30 worth of fresh vegetables, some non-perishables and sometimes a takeout meal.
The baskets also include recipe cards that explain how to cook certain types of produce handed out in the markets, which might be eggplants one week, Napa cabbage the next.
Seed kits put together by the Preston Idea Exchange and distributed through community centres, schools and the mobile market encourage people to “grow a row, give a row,” with some of that harvest coming back to the food bank.
Grevers said it also promotes the development of local food systems by getting youth involved.
Based on feedback from the 1,600 Cambridge households accessing the food bank each month, Grevers said the demand is there for a lot more fresh food.
Community growing partners supply about 10,000 pounds of food a year to the food bank, Grevers said.
A big part of the program going forward will be connecting with local farmers who can contribute produce, eggs and meat.
The food bank is in the process of securing a refrigerated van for the mobile market.
Although the food drives are over, it doesn’t mark the end of the mobile market with many gardens still at the height of harvest.
Squash, root vegetables and cool-weather crops like spinach will make up the hundreds of pounds still to be harvested, Grevers said.
