What happens in Orlando if you go against the city ordinance against feeding more than twenty-five homeless people at a time in a public park?

You go to jail. Go directly to jail, do not pass “Go,” do not collect two hundred dollars.

What do I think about this state of affairs?

I think that this law, and others like it are not only unjust, but immoral and downright un-American.

I’m also damned glad I don’t live in Florida, where it’s not only illegal to feed the poor, but whose governor just signed the most ridiculous law in the world, which bans wearing of baggy pants that show your underwear in public schools. You know, if I lived in Florida and was in the government, I might be more worried about the 10.8 percent unemployment rate and might be looking at legislation on a local and state level to do something about that instead of punishing altruism toward the impoverished and kids wearing baggy pants. But you see why I’m not a public official–I’m a compassionate, logical person who understands that it’s more important for people to have food in their bellies and jobs than pants that are pulled up to their armpits.

Yeah, get ready folks, I’m on a tear here. If you can’t abide a liberal looking at injustice and crying foul, then I highly suggest you just skip today’s post, because I am gonna call out the truth on people who pass laws like this. And it just might get you a little steamed.

So consider yourselves given fair warning.

So, what’s gotten me all riled up then?

Well, it seems that several cities around our once fair nation, confronted by the results of our flailing economy, which includes an influx of jobless and homeless people, have decided to wage war not only on these relatively helpless individuals, but also on those who would extend charity to them.

According to a report from CBS news in 2007, cities such as Dallas, Texas, Fort Myers, Fla., Gainesville, Fla., Wilmington, N.C., and Atlanta, George all have passed laws restricting or outright prohibiting the feeding of the homeless. Another law in Fairfax County, Va., prohibits the distribution of homemade meals and meals made in church kitchens to the homeless unless first approved by the county. This insidious law is said to be “protecting the homeless” from unsafe food, but really, it is restricting a citizen’s right to care for other citizens.

Las Vegas went even further by banning the giving of food to even ONE indigent person in any city park!

As you can see from the date of the above cited report, this war against the homeless in the US is not new. It’s been going on for years now, so why am I just now getting hot under the collar?

Because I just happened to read this news story published yesterday about three members of Food Not Bombs arrested in Orlando yesterday for violating the unjust law banning the feeding of over 25 homeless people at a time in the city park without a permit. Permits are only given to any group for two feeding days a year. TWO feeding days a year.

So, I guess for the rest of the 363 days, those homeless folks can just go eat cake or some such nonsense?

This law is unjust. This law goes against our rights to peacefully assemble, of free speech and freedom of religion.

This law is not only unjust it is downright immoral, and not just from a Christian perspective. It is immoral from a Buddhist, Muslim, Jewish, B’hai, Hindu and Neo Pagan perspective. It is immoral from a humanist perspective. It is immoral from a just plain old human rights perspective.

Oh, hell, I’m just going to spit it out–it’s evil, plain and simple.

Punishing people for being homeless is evil, pure and simple. Sure, some people might choose to be homeless or poor, (I generally do not believe this, but there are some studies that show that some mentally ill homeless people do not accept help even when offered) but in this economy, the vast majority of people who are hungry and homeless today are because of circumstances beyond their control. Penalizing them for trying to get by the best that they can is inhumane.

Penalizing citizens who would lend a helping hand to their fellow citizens is just as shamefully cruel, unjust and goes against what I believe to be the spirit of America.

What do I think should be done about laws like this?

In addition to challenging these laws in court the way that various groups such as the ACLU is doing, I think that a tactic that was used during the Civil Rights Movement should be employed.

Have you ever heard of the Freedom Riders? They were a group of black and white men and women, primarily college students, though there were ministers and older people involved as well, who challenged segregation in public interstate bus terminals which had been outlawed in the 1960 US Supreme Court decision Boynton vs. Virginia. Even though state laws that allowed segregation of these facilities had been outlawed by this ruling, in 1961, many southern states still enforced segregation in interstate bus facilities, going against federal mandate.

On May 4, 1961, the first Freedom Ride left Washington DC and was to arrive in New Orleans by May 17th. That first group of riders never did make it to their intended destination, because in Anniston, Alabama, on May 14th, Mother’s Day, the bus was attacked by a mob. Tires were slashed, and later, the bus was firebombed. When the Freedom Riders fled the burning bus, they were physically attacked and beaten, some with pipes and cudgels. The police did nothing to stop the mob, and in fact, did not arrive–just as they had conspired with the mob–until the mob had dispersed.

More violence came in Alabama, so the original Freedom Riders stopped their action and returned home. In response, new Freedom Riders, many of them from Nashville, Tennesse and led by a young woman named Diane Nash, started another freedom ride on May 17th. More violence occurred–obviously, I am condensing the events for brevity–and in Mississippi, the Freedom Riders were arrested and jailed at the Mississippi State Penitentiary, known as “Parchman Farm.”

The response among Civil Rights activists around the country was electric.

They began coming from all across the country, riding down to Mississippi in order to be arrested for violating an unjust and illegal law. They intended to, and did, fill all the local jails in Jackson, Mississippi, and Parchman Farm, and they did, thus bringing great visibility to their cause, and eliciting public support for the Civil Rights Movement.

What I propose to the moral citizens, and especially the Christians of Orlando Florida is this–violate this unjust law, and be arrested. Fill up the jails and gum up the judicial system until the city sees how worthless their law is. Cause unrest until the law is rescinded.

Engage in civil disobedience, just like the folks from Food Not Bombs have; it worked in the past and it can work in this case.

Kudos to Food Not Bombs for their resolve to continue to violate this law, and I hope and pray that others in Orlando demonstrate the same courage and charity you show.

I don’t think I have to worry about such a ridiculous and immoral law being passed here in Athens, but if it did, I know that I would be ready, willing and able to be arrested to stop injustice from being allowed in my home city. And I know for a fact that I would not be the only one to be lining up to fill the jail and courthouse in protest of such a law. Lots of folks here in Athens would do the same, and I believe that there are lots of people in Orlando Florida who know in their hearts that this is a terrible law, and one that is beneath them as human beings, and I trust that these moral citizens will arise and fight injustice in any ways, large or small, that they can.

Maybe I’m much too trusting of humanity’s good nature in this case, but I hope not. I hope that others are just as outraged by these laws as I am, and I hope more than just a handful of activists step up to the plate to get these laws changed.

I know I just wrote about soup.

Actually, I wrote about a specific soup, and gave a recipe.

Now, I am just writing about soup in general, because in one of the comments about the Broccoli-Cheese and Kale Soup, a reader told me about something a cookbook author said that just got me all riled up and gave me the twitches.I could feel the indignant Depression-era farm wife who was my Grandma rising up from the grave and urging me to write a harangue worthy of Gram, my city-dwelling other grandmother, whose razor-edged tongue was known to often wither any damned fool ignoramus who dared utter a silly idea in her presence.

In other words, my grandmothers, if they were alive to hear such a thing would be set off on a tizzy of combined laughter and scorn such that I feel moved to speak for them, and stand up for the ideals which I was taught in childhood, ideals which could serve many people well in this desperate economy. Ideals that have made me loathe to throw any morsel of edible food away, because I was raised by people who lived through the Great Depression, and who worked with their hands to grow and produce the food they ate. Such folk do not look too kindly upon the waste of food. Rather, these folk tend to see it as sacrilege, and I most heartily agree.

So, what got me all het up?

Laura said, “I am glad to hear you say all that about older veggies and aromatics. One of my cookbooks, which I like otherwise, makes this big deal about how it is passe or some such nonsense to make soup out of anything less than perfect onions, etc, and every time I throw an older onion into a soup (there’s one in the chicken stock simmering away for the soup I am cooking right now with the older sweet potato) I think well good lord if I listened to that book I’d be throwing away a perfectly edible onion. After all before mass transit those onions would be looking pretty sad by now in the north but people still used them!”

I hear you, sister! Preach on, can I get an amen?

Amen.

Passe?

Since when is frugality passe? I mean, really. That is just such utter nonsense, I am half-tempted to just guffaw and walk away, but no, I think that opinions like this need to be confronted and answered because they are so wrong it isn’t even funny.

I mean, I once had a commenter on one of my recipes where I had used dried thyme leaves say, and I am not making this up, “No one uses dried herbs anymore–it is just so passe.”

Well pardon me, Mr. Passepants. That is what I wanted to say, but I refrained, since it was a cheap shot, and I didn’t feel like being a twitchy twit that day. But now, I will say it, not just to that guy, but to the unknown cookbook author and to the one chef in culinary school who saw me use a rubbery carrot to flavor and color a court bouillon for poaching salmon and said, “Garbage in, garbage out.”

(What is it about American’s quest for “the perfect—-fill in the blank with the name of a fruit or vegetable?” This quest for perfect produce is what has led us to beautiful but tasteless Red Delicious apples, huge, perfectly smooth skinned pumpkins with watery, tasteless flesh and giant, sweet-smelling strawberries that taste like styrofoam. It is all a passel of aberrant behavior on the part of food marketers and people who eat with their eyes, not their mouths–in other words, they want food that is pretty rather than food that tastes good.)

So, here I am, saying it, loud and proud–Pardon me, all you passepants-wearing elitist food snobs in the world, but when you go on about how using less than perfectly fresh vegetables and herbs in food is passe, you are making asses of yourselves and are just showing the rest of us how out of touch you are with the fact that food is not just art–it is meant to satisfy and sustain the souls and bodies of human beings.

And lots of those human beings whose souls and bodies need sustenance just as much as the passeposse cannot afford to just use the freshest and best of every little thing in every little dish they cook.

But that doesn’t mean that their food is less able to incite gustatory delight as the food made by the “food is art” nose-in-the-air crowd.

Oh, no, no, no.

In fact, I will tell you that I -know- for a fact that food made with less than perfect vegetables and dried herbs can knock the socks off of any diner, and contains just as much soul-stirring goodness as the rarefied tidbits eaten by the trend-setting wealthy folks. In fact, I might have to say that the food of the proletariat, made from humble ingredients, prepared in a frugal manner might just have a bit more soul in them than the finest dishes from the most fancified restaurants in the world.

And frankly, having dined on both, I have to admit that I prefer the foods of the peasantry to the foods of kings.

So, now you know where I stand on the issue.

Now that we have the rant out of the way, I can take a breath and talk about what this post is really about–avoiding food waste, and making something amazingly delicious out of truly humble ingredients–meaning lesser cuts of meat, dried beans and herbs and vegetables that are a bit past their prime.

And this is a great time of year to talk about it, because we are at the end of winter and the beginning of spring, which is prime soup making season, not just because we have warm days with still cool to cold nights, but because all of the vegetables that have been in storage all winter are starting to show their age a bit. Even the ones from the grocery stores, which have been in climate-controlled facilities for months, where ethylene gas is vented away, and the humidity and temperature are controlled perfectly, are starting to succumb to the hand of time and are losing their crisp nature.

The cabbages are starting to wilt.

The carrots, parsnips and turnips are turning a bit rubbery.

And the potatoes, once crisp and snappy, all know ’tis the season to sprout, so they are getting soft as they start sending forth long-tentacle-like shoots which make me think of B-movie science fiction monsters from the outer darkness of the space-time continuum.

(The onions and the garlic are in the same boat with the potatoes. They know it is time they got planted, so they are going soft and sending out green shoots in an attempt to propagate themselves right there in your pantry.)

What is a poor, frugal householder to do when faced with a bin full of guishy potatoes, pathetic onions, flubbery carrots, rubbery rutabagas, wizened beets and flaccid cabbages?

You all know what I am going to say, so why not join in?

Make soup!

Make soup with a glad heart, because the truth is this–once you have simmered your vegetables for hours, perhaps with some dried herbs–which by the way, have a more concentrated flavor because the water, which dilutes flavor, is removed–(this is only true if your dried herbs have not been handed down from the time of Moses–if they are that old, please compost them) and some old, tough cuts of meat or maybe some bones left over from a roast–you will neither know or care what condition they were in before they were cooked. Their texture will not suffer, nor will their flavor. You may have lost some nutritive value, but not that much, really.

What you have done, however, by using these unfortunate foundlings of your pantry, however, is saved yourself some money by not throwing them out and buying new stuff all over again. You have saved money, you have helped out the environment by not wasting all of the resources that were used to grow them in the first place, and you made something delicious and nutritious to eat.

How can that be a bad thing?

Now, here are a few pointers on how to determine which vegetables are safe to use because they are just a little bedraggled and which ones are just plain old nasty and need to go very far away from your kitchen.

One: Follow your nose–it always knows.

If it smells bad, throw it out. If it makes you gag after one tentative sniff, then it has gone well beyond past its prime and travelled into the realm of “Oh, dear God, no!” Once it stinks, it is a candidate only for a toss into the compost pile.

Two: Let your fingers do the walking.

Your less than optimal, yet still usable vegetables will be softer than perfect vegetables, but, they should not give way under a nice, firm squeeze. If this happens, and your fingers sink into vegetative flesh that has deliquesced into primordial ooze, then bury the slimy remnants of a once proud foodstuff into the compost heap at the back of your garden. Say a few nice words over it and move along to washing your hands. The texture of a properly useful yet less than fresh vegetable is lightly soft, perhaps somewhat spongy, but the integrity of the skin should hold. You may find some bruised spots, and those can be cut away and composted, while the rest of the vegetable is then a candidate for the soup-pot, but overall, the flesh should be firmish, yet yielding. Trust me–your fingers will know that texture when they feel it.

Three: Seeing is believing.

Your eyes can finish telling you what your nose and fingers cannot. They will tell you if the onion is spotted with powdery black mildew, or if the wizened skin of a moldy potato has cracked and let the rotting agent inside the flesh. Surface mold and mildew can be cut away–in the case of the powdery black stuff on onions, it is usually only skin deep, and can be removed with the papery skin and perhaps one layer of flesh which has started to go slimy. Those bits, just like a moldy bit of potato, go into the compost, while the rest can be saved, rinsed and used. Your eyes will also warn you of potatoes what have been exposed to the light and have gone green–those can be used, but the green parts need to be completely removed and discarded, because they contain a mild alkaloid which will make you sick if you eat it. (The green part also tastes bitter–which is your tongues way of telling you not to eat something.)

Which brings us to–

Four: Taste the difference.

Yes, give your subjects a cautious taste. You will find that sometimes rubbery carrots have gone a bit bitter, or mushy apples taste a little alcoholic. (That would be because they are fermenting in their skins a bit. That won’t hurt you if you cook the apples, the alcohol will be boiled off, but still it is nice to know.) Sometimes the taste is too radically icky to be useful and away the comestible in question goes, but sometimes, you may find that there is just a slight to no discernible flavor difference between the perfectly fresh specimens and the ones you are trying to save from the landfill. Often, the only difference is in texture, not flavor.

So you see that your senses, paired with a bit of common sense from your brain, can combine to tell you which vegetables are safe to eat but less than pretty, and which ones are possibly hazardous to your health and should be discarded. The only sense left out is your sense of hearing, which is because it is pretty worthless in this exercise. So as to keep your ears from feeling left out, how about putting on some nice music while you engage in your pantry-gleaning, vegetable-saving and soup-making?

For more tips on keeping food waste down in your kitchen, take a look at these posts from Jonathan Bloom’s excellent blog, Wasted Food.

And please, whatever you do, don’t tell him, or me, for that matter, that worrying about wasting food is passe.

Because it bloody well isn’t.

And I suspect that the folks who thought it was passe a few years ago to use less than splendid carrots in a soup may just be changing their tunes in the coming months, and perhaps people will return to an appreciation for the frugal ways of the plebeian kitchen.

The recession is deepening, and as more and more people lose their jobs, demand for social services, especially food stamps, is rising.

All across the country, families, including those with small children and infants, are going hungry.

And the stimulus package, which every Republican in the House of Representatives, refused to vote for, allocates 30 percent of its total spending on expanding programs that directly help the unemployed, the hungry and families in need.

Bill O’Reilly claims that this spending will not help the United States Economy recover.

In the January 28th edition of The O’Reilly Factor, O’Reilly claimed, “”increased food stamps have nothing to do with stimulating the economy.” Earlier on his radio show, he said similarly that increasing food stamp benefits would do absolutely nothing to stimulate the economy.

That is so easy for a well-fed and well-paid employed pundit to say, especially since he doesn’t bother to check in with experts in the field of economics to see if his opinions might hold some validity.

Because the fact is, he is not just obnoxious and hateful in this opinion, and uncaring toward the plight of his fellow Americans, he is just plain WRONG.

Economists such as Douglas W. Elmendorf, who is the director of the bi-partisan Congressional Budget Office, stated in testimony before Congress on January 27th–the day before Bill O’Reilly once again stuck his big, fat, well-fed foot in his mouth–Transfers to persons (for example, unemployment insurance and nutrition assistance) would also have a significant impact on GDP. Because a large amount of such spending can occur quickly, transfers would have a significant impact on GDP by early 2010. Transfers also include refundable tax credits, which have an impact similar to that of a temporary tax cut.”

So, uh, who are you going to believe? O’Reilly, or a real, live economic expert?

If you don’t want to listen to one economist, how about listening to two–including a bona fide fiscal conservative?

Mark Zandi of Moody’s Economy.Com told Congressional leaders that the fastest and most cost-effective form of government spending to jumpstart the economy was “extending unemployment insurance benefits, expanding the food stamp program and increasing aid to hard-pressed state and local governments.”

So, what gives with the Republican claims that foodstamp programs don’t stimulate the economy?

I mean, think about it–if people are using food stamps, they are buying FOOD. And if they are buying food using food stamps, then whatever other money they have can be spent on OTHER GOODS. I mean, mind you I am quoting two leading economists in the US who have come to these conclusions, but the truth is it doesn’t take a degree to figure that out.

If people are buying food and other goods, that creates more demand for goods, which stimulates the economy by putting people to work. Supermarkets, purveyors of other consumer goods, trucking companies, wholesalers, farmers, and factories all then have a reason to retain and pay employees–because their is a demand for their goods and services.

So, why exactly do Republicans object to food stamps?

I’m not really sure.

Americans need to go back to the land.

I don’t mean this in a 1960′s, leaving the city for a commune in the country, complete with goat milk, wheat grass and sprouted lentil loaves, kind of way.

I think we all need to get back to the land wherever we are.

We need to touch whatever bit of earth we have at our disposal, whether that means a planter on the deck, a grassy front yard, or an empty lot at the end of the block. We need to do more than touch that earth–we need to till it, plant seeds, tend them and watch them grow into food for ourselves, our families and our neighbors.

America used to be a nation of farmers, and we need to remember that and return to our roots.

Why?

Because of rising food prices, and looming threats of food shortages.

Because of lack of availability of fresh vegetables and fruits among the urban poor.

Because of soaring obesity rates, and lowered nutrition among the country’s poor.

Because eating locally is good for us and the environment, and our local economy.

And because we need to remember who we are, as a nation.

Gandhi once said, “To forget how to dig the earth and to tend the soil is to forget ourselves,” and he is right. As Americans have turned away from the land, as we have allowed farms to be turned into strip malls and condominiums, as we have turned away from self-reliance and embraced consumerism as a lifestyle, we have forgotten the soul of our nation. We have forgotten what once made us strong, and that was a deep connection to the earth, to our homes, to our neighbors.

We need to rebuild that connection, and in doing so, we will be better able to weather the coming economic recession, high food prices and possible food shortages which loom over our future lives.

And the thing is–gardening and growing at least some of our vegetables and fruits–can be accomplished anywhere. You don’t have to have forty acres and a mule, or even one acre and a rototiller. A small urban yard will do, or a series of containers on a rooftop or balcony or a vacant lot.

Urban agriculture is finally coming back into its own in the US, after last being seen as a real movement during WWII with the “Victory Garden” campaign when rooftops and backyards were planted in cities and larger gardens were dug in the country by people from all walks of life.

The New York Times features an article on the growing trend of urban farming in the US where individuals not only grow food for their families on vacant lots, but also grow enough vegetables to sell to their neighbors. Not only does this bring in extra cash for people in poor neighborhoods, it also brings much appreciated fresh food to people who have little choice in where to shop.

The Times reports that co-ops have been formed, CSA;s have gone urban and restaurants have taken to buying produce grown within their own cities.

Of course, none of this is new–there have always been urban farmers. What is new is the idea that urban farming in the US could help to substantially feed citizens while also boosting local income and microeconomic systems. (Cities in the UK and other countries are also embracing urban agriculture as well, but I am primarily talking about the US for now.)

For proof that city-based agricultural ventures, from backyard gardens to community gardens to full-fledged urban market farms, can produce a significant amount of food in modern times, we need to look beyond the US, however. We need to examine the current urban agricultural system of Cuba.

Cuba’s successful experiment in urban agriculture started as a means to feed Cuba without relying on food imports after trade embargoes caused food shortages. Currently, urban farms occupy around 86,000 acres, and in the past few years, these farms have produced 3.4 million tons of food annually. Urban farms grow 90 percent of the fresh vegetables for the city of Havana alone.

Considering that these government-led and supported urban agriculture programs only started a few decades ago, their success is astonishing, and to me, enticing.

Just think of what Americans could do with our abundance of land, in comparison to the smaller acreage available to Cuba.

Why don’t we do it then? Why don’t we all start planting our own “Victory Gardens” again, and take the time to learn how to grow our own food, and take back a measure of self-reliance once more? Why don’t we claim our own victories–against poverty, against processed foods, against corporate control, against our own complacency–and relearn what we have forgotten: how to dig the earth and tend the soil.

Let’s join other Americans and do it, in big ways and small ways.

Let’s remember ourselves.

Author’s Note: Our backyard is finally being terraced this year, and the first things we will plant in it will be asparagus crowns, strawberries and a bunch of annual vegetables. The ornamentals–the flowers and shrubs, and hopefully fruit trees–will wait for next year. The food comes first.

There are a lot of reasons behind the colossal waste of food that goes on in the restaurant industry, but I would say that one of the largest causes has to do
with corporate restaurant policy regarding the treatment of leftovers.

When I say leftovers, I am not talking about what comes back on diner’s plates at the end of the meal–that is a separate issue which I will discuss in a little bit. I am talking about corporate chain restaurant policy regarding the disposal of food that is left on the steam table, in the display rack or in
the warming oven at the end of the night shift. The food that can be reheated one more time without bacterial contamination risk or loss of food quality is always saved, cooled properly and refrigerated to be rewarmed the next day, but what about the rest of the food that is quite often still good to eat, but will suffer in looks or taste if it is warmed over the next day. (Most corporate restaurants lack the flexibility in menu that independent restaurants have, so it is not often that you will see a leftover from one day transformed into something else as a dinner special the next day. Consistency is one of the watchwords of the corporate food world, and in the name of the “C-word,” a lot of edible food is thrown away.)

You would think that restaurants would give this food to their employees, or better yet, donate it to a local food bank, food pantry or church soup kitchen to be served to the homeless and impoverished people for whom hunger is a daily reality.

But, alas, that is most often not the case.

Most corporate chain restaurants, coffee shops, bakeries and the like have a very strict policy of dumping this perfectly good food out into the dumpster, which is often locked and behind enclosures in order to keep enterprising individuals from “harvesting” or saving this food. (If these enclosed or locked bins tampered with, even by a hungry person, they can then be arrested and charged not with just vandalism for breaking the locks, but for breaking and entering and theft. Imagine being charged with stealing garbage–the whole point of garbage is that the former owner of it no longer wants it, so why is it illegal for someone else to take it before it is heaped into a landfill?) Employees who are caught taking food of this kind home or eating it, or donating it are treated as thieves and are often fired.

Why are such draconian and ridiculously wasteful policies the norm in the corporate food industry?

There are two reasons. One has to do with the fear of food loss through employee theft. Yes, that is right–corporations are so afraid of losing money through employee theft that they waste just as much, if not more, money throwing away imperfect, but still edible food. The reasoning behind this somewhat obtuse concept is that if you have day old muffins that must go out, and fresh muffins, and if you give the employees the day old–still palatable, but not quite the best–to employees to eat or take home, then you would have no way of knowing if they were taking the day old muffins which you were going to throw away or the fresh ones.

The reason why food is not donated to hunger relief organizations has to do with the fear of being legally liable if, due to improper storage or reheating after the food is released into the hands of whatever individuals or organizations to which it is donated, someone or a group of persons fall ill from food borne disease.

That sounds like a reasonable fear, unless one knows about the federal law which protects organizations, corporations and individuals who donate food in good faith to non-profit organizations for the relief of hunger, from legal liability in the unlikely case of illness related to the food donation.

This law, called The Federal Bill Emerson Good Samaritan Food Donation Act, came into effect in 1996, so there is really no excuse for corporate restaurant chains to -not- donate their food to the needy through non-profit organizations.

It is possible that many corporate policy makers do not know about the law, which is where employees and consumers can step up to the plate and attempt to make a change in the rules that allow so much edible food to be thrown away from corporate kitchens. Ask managers of individual restaurants what their policy is for donating leftovers, and if they cite liability, inform them of this law, and then call a corporate hotline, email the headquarters, or even better, write them a letter, telling them about the law and asking them to change their policies regarding food donation. Whichever course of action you take, get your friends on board, and if you work in a corporate chain restaurant, talk to your managers and see if you can get them to talk to their managers. Send letters to the board of directors or the president of the company. You may be surprised at how effective such communication can be–corporations will not change their policies if there is no complaints, but a volley of complaints, especially those in writing, tend to get the attention of those who are high enough in the hierarchy to do something about it.

You can also work with America’s Second Harvest on these issues, and try and get your local restaurants, both independent and corporate chains, to try and cut down rampant food waste by donating unused food to food pantries, soup kitchens and homeless shelters.

In contrast, most independent restaurants do not have such unreasonable policies regarding the disposal of unused, unsellable, but still edible food. Every independent restaurant where I have worked has either given such food to employees, or sold it to them at a very low cost, in the interest of both feeding their employees and not wasting food. Many of the independents where I have worked also donated food to homeless shelters and food banks quite generously, even before the Good Samaritan law was in effect. Many other independent restaurants will donate food to various groups for free–for example, at Salaam, we donated lots of uneaten dinner and lunch specials which were still great that day, but wouldn’t be good the next day to the Obama campaign workers who had come to town during the Ohio primary. These folks appreciated the hot food and salads, and we appreciated being able to offer support that wasn’t monetary, but was still necessary and meaningful.

One other reason there is so much food waste in American restaurants, especially in chain restaurants, is the gargantuan portion sizes that have become the norm. Some chain restaurants, like The Cheesecake Factory, have portion sizes so ridiculously large, they don’t serve their entrees on plates, they serve them on oval platters, or as Zak quipped the one time we ate there as his dinner was set before him, “Here comes the trough!” Apparently, frequent diners at such restaurants take their uneaten food home, but when we were there, our table only sent back what we couldn’t eat on our dirty plates, and we saw many diners do the same. Some tables sent away so much food that another three or four people could have been fed on what was wasted. (This is one of the reasons I try to give only sensible portions at Salaam–I hate to see unusable food returned to the kitchen–although in small, independent restaurants, you will often see workers setting aside unusable food as compost or in rural areas as animal fodder. To my mind, that certainly beats sending it to the landfill.)

Of course, when you have restaurants sending food home with individuals who may or may not follow safe storage and reheating procedures, it begs the question as to why they will not donate edible but unsellable food because of liability issues.

I think that in the coming months and years as food prices rise precipitously due to the sharp rise in oil prices, we may see this wasteful attitude toward food in corporate restaurants start to change. We may see a more frugal philosophy of food once more arise in the restaurant industry.

Let us just hope that it is also a more ethical and compassionate philosophy as well. The amount of food that is wasted in American restaurants could easily go towards relieving a significant portion of the hunger problem in our country, and I would like to see more restaurants get behind efforts to feed the needy by participating in programs such as America’s Second Harvest and Share Our Strength. Ask the servers and managers at your favorite restaurants if they participate in food reclamation projects, and see what you can do to foster such efforts in your neighborhood. Everyone who joins in the effort to end food waste and hunger in America and does their own small share is building the momentum of a movement that is not only ecologically sound, but compassionate as well.

Author’s Note: I would like to thank Jonathan Bloom, author of the blog, Wasted Food, for putting the idea for this series of posts in my head.