Giving 101: Restaurants Serving Slices of the Philanthropy Pie

The latest restaurant trend isn’t family-style dining or cocktail pairings with every course. It’s actually something aimed at helping you be more philanthropic. Restaurants have seized the opportunity to push their favorite charities to diners at the end of a good meal.

I recently spent an evening at Lucques in Los Angeles, and when our bill came, it included a donation card for chef Suzanne Goin's favorite charity, Alex's Lemonade Stand. It was almost like being at a benefit. If we chose to make a donation, there was a blank line to fill in the amount that would be added to our bill. When our server noticed me reading the material, he gave me an additional postcard with more details. Clearly, the staff was prepared. None of this was pushy, however. It was just an option. A way for you to punctuate your evening, if you're interested.

Eat Less, Give More

A new NGO, Go Halfsies, has been brewing up partnerships with restaurants in Austin, Texas and New York City for its pilot launch.

In the organization’s own words, Go Halfsies is “a social initiative offering restaurant-goers a choice that provides a healthier meal portion, reduces food waste, and supports the fight against hunger."

Going “halfsies” makes philanthropy straightforward for even the most passive donor. We all must eat. We all dine in restaurants (some more frequently than others), and in general, Americans are a generous bunch.

As a potential donor myself, I dug through the website and read its materials to learn more about the Halfsies model. I'm sharing my critical thoughts with you to give you an example of how to evaluate a potential giving opportunity.

Click to read more ...

The Food Matters Project: Quinoa Tabbouleh

A holiday weekend always provides extra opportunities to cook and prepare more lavish meals. On Sunday, I paired this side with grass-fed rosemary skirt steak and grilled zucchini, peaches, and Manchego cheese. It felt like a feast, but other than the steak, everything was prepared ahead of time and served at room temperature, just the way I like to eat during the summer.

I've never quite warmed up to bulgur, so I appreciated using the same flavors in classic tabbouleh but using quinoa as the grain instead. One cup of quinoa (simmered with 2 cups of water for 10-12 minutes) was fluffed, then tossed with 8 small Roma tomatoes, 1 small cucumber, some extra-virgin olive oil, and lots of parsley. It will easily feed a crowd, too (6-8 as a side), or provide generous leftovers for a simple lunch salad the next day. Like most of Mark Bittman's recipes, they're mere suggestions. More tomatoes, less cucumber, or whatever suits you will work here, so don't feel confined to specific measurements.

For the original recipe, visit Sara's blog.

The August Food Industry News Digest

Rather than risk obsessive tweeting and Facebook timeline fatigue, I've gathered some of the must-read food industry articles from August into a digestible blog post. Read one or read them all. You're sure to learn something both uplifting and appalling about our food system!

1. Back to School: What Students Can Expect to Eat Under the New Healthy School Lunch Guidelines.

2. Mark Bittman celebrates farmers.

3. If any of these "food" products make your weekly rotation, you could be digesting butane and antifreeze.

4. A win for the animals: A slaughterhouse was closed due to inhumane treatment, and In-N-Out severed ties with beef producer due to undercover video.

5. Humanity might be forced to become vegetarian by 2050.

6. Will California be the first state to label genetically modified food?

7. Drought is one factor of many driving up food prices.

Slave-Free Tomatoes National Day of Action: September 1

What are you doing next weekend? If you don't already have plans to get out of town, consider participating in International Justice Mission's National Day of Action!

Thousands of you have sent letters to supermarket CEOs demanding slave-free tomatoes, and IJM's goal is to reach 15,000 signatures by the end of the holiday weekend. Let's help IJM reach its goal! Here are all the details.

Slave-Free Tomatoes National Day of Action - Sept. 1st

1. DOWNLOAD the petition and the petition guide with step-by-step guidelines for collecting signatures.

2. RSVP on the Facebook page - Share the news that you’re participating and invite your friends and family to do the same! Also check the Facebook page to connect with other activists planning events in your area.

3. CHOOSE and secure your location(s). Think about a place where there will be plenty of foot traffic, so you can collect as many signatures as possible (like your local farmers’ market or set up your own lemonade stand). Think about the space and materials you need, and find out if you need permission for where you plan to gather signatures.

4. SET a goal for how many people you want to sign the petition. 100? 200? 1,000?! Share your goal with on the event page and the Recipe for Change Facebook page!

5. RECRUIT friends and fellow advocates to help you achieve your goal! What about day-of support? (For example, could you ask other booths at the farmers’ market to promote the petition?)

6. PRACTICE your talking points messages (check out our Recipe for Change fact sheet to learn more about the issues). Modify your message so you feel comfortable, then get a friend to practice with you: “Will you join us in calling on Kroger/Publix/Stop & Shop/etc to join the Fair Food Program?” [“What’s that?”] “The Fair Food Program is an initiative designed to secure just working conditions and ensure a zero tolerance for slavery exists in our U.S. off-season tomato industry…”

7. ASK IJM if you have any questions or need help getting started! Contact International Justice Mission at 703.465.5495 or email justicecampaigns@ijm.org.

8. AFTER the National Day of Action, deliver your petition to your local grocery store, showing them that their community wants their supermarket chain to join the Fair Food Program. (Only Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods have signed on so far.) Also, send us a copy of the signatures you collect so we can deliver all of the petitions collected around the country to the corporate headquarters of Ahold (parent company of Giant Food and other major chains), Publix, and Kroger (parent company of Ralph’s and other major chains)! Take a candid photo of this action with your phone, and share it on Twitter @IJMCampaigns, or the Recipe for Change Facebook page!

You don’t have to wait until the National Day of Action to start collecting signatures. And don't forget, you can also submit a letter online and ask your friends and family to do the same!

Book Club: Tomatoland Discussion Questions

The Giving Table Book Club is currently reading Tomatoland by Barry Estabrook. We're close to wrapping up this read, but it's not too late to join. Here are a few discussion questions to consider. Answer one, or all of them, in the comments section below!

• It was encouraging to learn that Lady Moon—an organic tomato grower in South Florida—uses no synthetic chemical fertilizers or pesticides, and is succeeding on a commercial scale. Would you buy this brand of tomatoes if you saw it in a grocery store?

• How have the worker stories transformed your views on tomato farming? Does their exposure to pesticides and other harmful chemicals affect your decision whether or not to buy out-of-season tomatoes?

• If "a 10-foot drop followed by a sixty-mile-per-hour impact with pavement is no big deal to a modern, agribusiness tomato," can these tomatoes even be classified as real food?

• This book isn't an easy read. What makes your most infuriated about the situation of slavery in Florida's tomato fields?

• How empowered (or not), do you feel as a consumer navigating the supermarket shelves when it comes to shopping for tomatoes?