Cooking Matters at Manna

When you head to the grocery store, does it often feel like you have to choose between healthy food and affordable food? We all face that dilemma, and especially those of us who may be stretching family income in many facets of our lives. Share Our Strength developed a wonderful program called Cooking Matters at the Store, designed precisely to help people shop smart and make eating healthy fit in a budget. This program seemed like a great fit for our clients, who often express their delight in the seasonal produce we offer. I regularly talk to clients interested in cooking fresh, healthy meals for their families. These “store tours” are really interactive Nutrition lessons teaching skills such as unit price comparison, identifying whole grains, and reading Nutrition Fact labels.

We’re striving to reach 400 participants by December, that’s 40 grocery store tours in just a matter of weeks! Thankfully, wonderful dietitians and Nutrition graduate students throughout Montgomery County have volunteered their time to help me lead tours throughout the county. We have clients on WIC, clients learning English, mothers’ groups, and clients with disabilities all enjoying these interactive lessons on  healthy eating.

Manna Food Center strives to eliminate hunger in Montgomery County through food distribution, education, and advocacy. This is an exciting new way we are helping promote self-sufficiency. Just another awesome assignment for Manna’s Nutrition Education department!

About Lindsey Seegers

Lindsey Seegers is the Program Manager of Nutrition Education at Manna Food Center. Her background is in Social Work and Nutrition; her passion is cooking food always delicious and nutritious. She teaches cooking and nutrition classes, and leads grocery store tours around Montgomery County about affordable and do-able healthy cooking. Since 1983, Manna has been feeding Montgomery County’s food insecure residents. In our 30 years of service Manna has served nearly 3 million people, 668,527 households, and distributed 45 million pounds of food. As the designated food bank for Montgomery County we are the main resource people turn to when they find themselves in need of food assistance. Manna delivers emergency food assistance through its three main programs: Food for Families, Smart Sacks, and Agency Food Distribution.

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