Donation dilemma

(Tanogae) #1

Being a newbie practicing ketoite, I have dutifully removed mostly all non-keto foodstuffs from the kitchen cupboards and packed them in bankers boxes out of sight. Now I was raised in a large economically-challenged family where seconds were rare and wasting anything, especially food, was wrong. So now I face a dilemma. My upbringing tells me not to waste my non-keto food but now, according to Ketogenic principals, I am lead to believe they are not healthy for me or anyone else to consume. Knowing this, would it be unethical of me to donate this food to a food bank? Afterall there are so many who don’t have enough to eat.

(Alec) #2

No. Donate. End of the day, everyone makes their own eating choices… You won’t be force feeding anyone. Their choice. Or if they are really poor, they may have no choice, and you are really helping them.

(Robin) #3

Welcome!
I donate all my extra food items, even thanksgiving leftovers to community fridges we have here. They are always welcome. Food banks may have more rules about opened items, etc.
We also have little neighborhood boxes (like the little libraries) and everything is welcome and gone quickly.

Nutrition is the least of their worries when they are hungry.

(Tanogae) #4

Hi, Thanks for the donation tips. These community kitchens you mentioned - generally speaking who runs them. I’ve got some things that are open but still nearly full and, as you say, food banks and donation boxes at grocery stores don’t take opened products.
Regards

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #5

I agree with Alec; donate the food, because someone will have a use for it. You can’t make their choices for them.

There is a liability issue with accepting products that have been opened. But if you want to find a small community kitchen that might accept open boxes, look for a local Anglican or Catholic parish, as that’s the sort of outreach they tend to do. I’d bet that if you talk to the priest, he or she will know a parish that runs such a thing, even if that particular parish does not.

(Tanogae) #6

Thanks for sharing that info. I should search for a “soup kitchen” type operation, not a food bank if I wish to have any of my opened foods accepted. Reluctance and caution are understandable in this day and age.

(KM) #7

I donated mine. I do draw the line at purchasing and handing out poison, er, candy, for Halloween, which IMO goes beyond not wasting or letting people make choices, and helps support the horrible idea that pounds of processed sugar is a nice reward once in a while. I like Robin’s idea of the ping pong eyeballs available on Amazon.

#8

Nope.

  1. The people in dire need won’t get suddenly wonderful keto items and they wouldn’t necessarily want only them. They would just get less that way (or random food from other sources)…
  2. Carby food isn’t some toxic, harmful, worse than useless substance in general. Even I would eat them, probably, well some and slowly… Definitely not the seed oils or sugary things if you have those…

Thankfully I never had this dilemma. I can’t throw out food, no idea where I could find a way to donate, we just ate everything up but we went gradually to our individual directions… My So is still a high-carber and probably always will be, no problem with it as long as it suits him well.
But almost anything is better than nothing when one is starving. When I was starved, I had my fat storage so I probably could have stayed choosy for a while but if one is less lucky… I don’t even want to think hard about that, I have my own problems. But they surely don’t look at your items the same as you do.

(Tanogae) #9

I hear you. I am aware that I’m being wussy about my confliction but I wanted to hear how other keto converts deal with their old groceries. Chance of hearing an unthought of idea. My heart’s in the right place but the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Anyway, I’ve only been able to find one soup kitchen in a city close by. They have no phone number and are located in a rough part of town. At this point do I want to put my newly improving keto body in harms way?
I wonder why there are so few “soup kitchens” around. Perhaps most would be too proudfull to be patrons.

(Jackie) #10

Broke adult children were very appreciative!

#11

In what reality is donating food (or anything) to those in need “unethical”?

#12

If you are on Facebook, I highly recommend you join a “Buy Nothing” group. They are location-specific so you will need to join one focuses on your geographical area.

The principle is that members offer things for free to other members. It can be anything: clothes, housewares, food, etc.

I have donated even open containers of things like food and vitamins. It’s amazing what people will take.

You generally make an arrangement with the recipient to pick the items up at your home, and you can leave them on the front step if that is easier.

I hate to waste anything useful, food or non-food, and have found this to be a fabulous resource.

(Robin) #13

Our community fridges are the brainchild of a non profit group, but individual business owners have to buy into having a fridge on their premises or in their business.
We can donate money to the business for keeping the fridge stocked or bring food.

(Robin) #14

Cool idea.

#15

Years on, I still have carby dried foods stored.

I’m not a prepper, per se…but if the electricity goes down and I lose my freezer meat stash, I’ll be out in the yard cooking pasta and soup mix.

But yes, I did donate most of the carb stuff when I went keto. I just kept some flour, pasta etc.
I recently put all instant noodles into the donation bin because I realised they would be going out of date soon, and I wouldn’t be eating them even in an emergency.

Not everyone suffers metabolic disease. Waste not, want not.
Donate. If I was hungry and in diffs, I would be glad of it.

#16

It would be legumes and seitan for me… I do need something protein rich and not extremely carby… Tasty, too.
Oh and I would eat up our nuts.
(We have a lot of carbs due to my SO being a high-carber and we both feel more comfortable if we have food for months in the house. I can’t keep carni food for months but I could survive on a higher-carb diet.)

But it’s for the case when we can’t buy anything for a long time and I run out of my animal food. Hopefully it will never happen.

By the way, we had a few hours blackout one day. If we had it longer, I would cook all our meats, my freezer is tiny so it would last only for some days… And I would go buy more afterwards.

(Tanogae) #17

Best not to procrastinate. Will take all the unopened food to my grocer - they have a donation box there. Will deal with the opened stuff later. They are out of sight so I won’t be tempted.
Yes, eating it all first before switching to keto would have solved the donation issue but it would have taken at least 6 months to go through it all. Plus I didn’t plan on going kito and then I got myself all psyched up and motivated. Needed to strike while the iron was hot. Giving up most of your favorite foods is not easy. A life changing event as monumental as ending a long relationship with someone you still love but who’s no good for you. Well, I am over the top now and I don’t plan on going back. The results are amazing, even after such a short time.

#18

Wow, you like to have supplies :smiley:
Of course, it happens that one suddenly starts something… I did it a bit gradually, in a few jump from high-carb to carnivore-ish and I always had off days - not like I am necessarily willing to eat my old dishes then. I really cut ties with a few food groups very suddenly (I don’t even remember what we did then, maybe my SO finished the little flour we still had…? as he stopped eating gluten too for a year or something. but he stayed a high-carber so he kept eating many other high-carb food we still had, only I stopped).

It’s good you get great results, they are the best motivation. I only got some gut feeling from keto, I just knew I go into the right direction and that kept me(!) on track until fat adaptation, the real benefit.

(KM) #19

You could contact your closest church, or maybe a women’s shelter. Even if they don’t do anything like a food drive they can probably direct you or take it off your hands.

And remember, carby food is still better than none at all.