Food Quality and Dignity

At the beginning of the crisis, food pantries and other relief efforts were focused on providing shelf-stable calories so that people did not go hungry.  But with food insecurity persisting, the food relief system needs to transition to providing nutritious meals and a dignified customer experience.

One senior, Nicole, is unable to leave her home due to her health. She relies on different pantries and community organizations to bring her food. While Nicole is grateful for the food she receives, she said that more thought could go into its preparation. She said:

“I’ve never seen somewhere where they give and distribute food without condiments. They serve you a hot dog with no ketchup, a salad with no dressing, french fries with no ketchup...There is an inconsideration in making it.”

Nicole receives lunch and dinner delivered by a community organization. Sometimes deliveries are delayed and do not occur until 8 pm, so she eats her first meal of the day at 8 pm.  Once the meals finally arrive, she is so hungry that she eats both the lunch and dinner at the same time. At other times, food runs out before she gets her delivery, and she goes hungry for the entire day. She said that community organizations were “not looking at the whole picture” because they were not prioritizing seniors and people with disability. She said: 

“I am 62 years old. If you come to bring me lunch and dinner at 8 pm at night, we [seniors] are people with underlying conditions - diabetes, high blood pressure. You can’t just feed us whenever you are ready to. Maybe you should consider whether I’m a diabetic...Would you feed your grandmother at 8 pm?”

Both Lily and April have found it difficult to make complete meals from food pantries. Lily is unable to eat certain ingredients, such as onion and tomatoes. At one food pantry, she was unable to make a complete meal so she needed to find another food pantry.  Similarly, April can’t make a meal that is appropriate for her son from the food banks because of his allergies. She keeps telling the school that they are delivering food to her son that he can’t eat, but they keep providing the same food. 

Some people also need to do multiple pickups from food pantries to make a complete meal. At the food pantry that April volunteers at, they are handing out different supplies on certain days, giving out pre-made sandwiches and vegetables on Tuesdays and meats on Wednesday. While this allows them to give more people food, it means that families cannot make a complete meal unless they come on multiple days. 

Four of our respondents raised the issue of receiving expired food from food pantries.  One example is when Mayte went to the food pantry at the church. She liked that she could choose the items that she wanted, but she noticed after she went home that the bread and canned goods were expired. She hasn’t been back since that happened. Another respondent had a similar experience at a different community organization. She said:

“The bread was so hard I could knock someone out with it.”

Another participant, Golden, has a daughter at a public school. She visits a lot of different meal sites, and noticed that not everyone has access to the same quality of food. At a charter school meal site, she noticed that the fruit selection for children was much better: healthier selection of fruit, cut into pieces, and thoughtfully wrapped. They were also more likely to have hot meals which she prefers. Her impression has been that charter schools care more about their students than public schools, and she was grateful her daughter had the opportunity to “eat like she would if she was in a charter school.”

Another Boston parent, Eric, is frustrated that donated foods often lack enough protein for kids to eat:

“Meats - red meat, chicken, fish - that isn’t included in the donations and it’s what the kids eat most. There are things that don’t come in the donations that are used a lot like milk, for example. Eggs...we go through the eggs very quickly and there aren’t always eggs in the donations but sometimes there are.” 

[“Lo que son carnes -  carne roja, pollo, pescado - estos no vienen incluidos en la donación y es lo que más comen los niños. Hay cosas que no vienen en las donaciones como que se usan mucho por ejemplo la leche. Los huevos...los huevos se acaban muy rápido y no siempre vienen en las donaciones pero a veces vienen.” ]

Names and some details changed to protect confidentiality.