Nourish Your Neighbor on for Aug.10

"Nourish your Neighbor," the vegetable-growing group harvest planned by Friends of theLoop, will take place August 10.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The effort was the idea of Larchmont resident Edward Merians, which was quickly given a green thumb’s up by theLoop, Farm Share , Sheldrake Environmental Center and dozens of local residents…all planning to contribute their own harvest of produce to the Larchmont-Mamaroneck Food Pantry .

On August 10, please drop whatever you were able to grow at the Merians home , 13A Country Club Lane, Larchmont, or at the CAP Center , 134 Center Avenue, Mamaroneck.

Many Farm Share participants will donate one week of their vegetable deliveries (and Farm Share will give them each a $25 rebate for doing so) and the Sheldrake Environmental Center, which we learned has been growing veggies for the Food Pantry for some time, will donate produce and has made colorful bins to collect others’. (see photos)

If you have any questions, please email us.

Our story: One tomato, a cucumber, some lettuce and maybe a pepper and some celery makes a healthy salad for a family of four. "Vegetables are expensive," says Merians, and "for the families that need our food pantry, fresh produce may be out of reach."

More than 500 families in the area live below the poverty line.

So Merians had an idea. He is asking each of us to grow a tomato plant, a cucumber, peppers, string beans, whatever we can. We will then meet up in late August to pool our produce and feed many hungry people. The time and place will be announced here. 

We are calling it "Nourish Your Neighbor."

"No meetings. We don’t need a new not- for-profit. No web site. Let’s just cooperate," Merians says.

Merians, who is Chairman of the Westchester Chapter of the American Red Cross, is not doing this in any official capacity, but, he says, as a neighbor.

"As chair of the Red Cross in Westchester, I am seeing too much hunger in our community. It’s a growing problem. There are children in Larchmont (and from New Rochelle to Port Chester) who go to school hungry not because they have an eating disorder but because there is nothing on the table. I just can’t sleep well at night knowing that there may be one more thing I can do. 

 

 

 

 

 

The food pantry welcomes you any time, particularly if your vegetables aren’t on the same schedule as Nourish Your Neighbor. More information below:

 

Volunteering at the Food Pantry: