Thank you for writing this.

I serve in the church in an impoverished neighborhood in Indianapolis. We offer a weekly food pantry. I’m not crazy about the food we offer, because it is mostly junk. Hamburger helper, canned ravioli, stuff like that. But the people who use our food pantry seem grateful for it.

Once in a while, we get carrots or potatoes or even apples. And people don’t take this food. Even when we try to hand it to them, they just say no thanks.

Our church is near the site of a former state mental institution that is slowly being converted to housing. It has a large grounds, on which is a very large garden plot. Last year, they offered people in our neighborhood the ability to share in the harvest if only they would work eight hours all season helping tend the garden. They simply couldn’t get enough takers.

I don’t know for sure why good, natural food has such a hard time finding takers in our neighborhood. I can make some guesses. One of them is that our neighbors are frankly used to eating canned chili and dollar cheeseburgers from McDonalds. Another is that they may not know what to do with a potato or a carrot – they may not have great cooking skills. Once, a person turned down onions and potatoes from our food pantry saying that they didn’t even own a range. If they couldn’t microwave it, they couldn’t prepare it at home.

Everything I just wrote is anecdotal only. It’s just what I see and hear. But it suggest strongly to me that the problem is not just unavailability of good food.