September is Hunger Awareness Month so stay tuned for posts about food insecurity and inequality in the coming weeks. The Northern Nevada Food Bank is my favorite charity. I feel strongly that we have a civil responsibility to feed our citizens. The Food Bank supplies assistance to seniors, children, poor college students, and many of our neighbors who we would never know are often hungry. If you live in Nevada here is a link to the food bank. You can help by donating time or money to feed Nevadans. If you don’t live in Nevada then Google “food banks” in your community. Consider dedicating one blog post this month to highlight hunger in your community. Together we can make a difference.
Many of us have blogged about being inundated with bushels of fresh fruits and vegetables at this time of year. I have been brainstorming how we might distribute garden surplus to our neighbors in need of healthy produce. I stumbled upon, literally, an idea while I was walking the little man in my own neighborhood. I had to step over perfectly ripe fruit falling unclaimed onto the sidewalk.
There are at least two plum trees and two apple trees with overripe fruit begging to be picked and eaten. It bothers me to see fresh fruit go to waste when there are families in every community who do not have access to enough food to feel secure.
I asked one neighbor if I could pick a few apples for a pie. She was clearly overwhelmed by the bounty and grateful to share her Granny Smiths.
Wouldn’t it be great if every community had a system of volunteers who would pick up your excess fresh produce and distribute it to those in need? Do you have a similar project in your community or do you have a teen that would like to organize a produce collection project? Tell us about it.
Enjoy a slice of pie while you brainstorm a plan to reduce food waste in your community.
I shared my pie with Nancy Miller of Hologram fame. You can see her racy blog and her novel here.
Apple Almond Crumb Pie
Ingredients:
• 1 pie crust, I used Trader Joes frozen pie crust sheet
• 6 cups of peeled and sliced apples
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• 2 teaspoons cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon cloves
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup almond flour
• 1/2 cup oatmeal
• 1/2 brown sugar
• 3 tablespoons butter
• 1/3 cup almonds sliced
Directions
Pre-heat oven to 400 F
1. Thaw pie crust to room temperature or make your favorite dough. Press rolled dough into a tart or pie pan.
2. Peel and slice apples. Add sugar, spices and salt. Let sit while the oven heats.
3. Combine almond flour through butter. Set aside for the topping.
4. Fill pie shell with apples and top with almond and oats mixture. Sprinkle almond slices over the top.
5. Bake for 50 minutes. Check pie at 35 minutes and cover with foil if browning too quickly.
What's for dinner, Doc? 
What a wonderful idea. You are so right that there are many people that can’t afford to send their kids to school with a piece of fresh fruit yet here we are (almost) com paining about having too much.
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Yes, Stacey I worry about hungry kids the most. It just isn’t right when food is rotting on the vine. I saw a program in Oakland that gathers food but also teaches community urban farming to kids. I bet you have something similar in the Northwest. Nevada is always last in social support services but perhaps private organizations would be willing to help. It’s worth talking about.
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Hey Tracey, well you beat me to it. I was noticing the exact same thing – all the wasted fruit. There’s some apple trees right down by the river on “public land” that I picked apples from and made apple sauce a couple of weeks ago. (By the way, apple sauce is super easy to make and you don’t have to add any sugar! A little cinnamon and then it’s really special.) There are a couple of community websites that you can log onto and folks will come and harvest your fruit. If you don’t want folks in your yard, you can pick it and then leave it out to be gathered. Northern Nevada has hardly any locations listed! One of the sites is fallenfruit.org. I had big ideas about a month ago and envisioned starting a seasonal “charity drive” and organizing a crew to pick the fruit and then donate to food banks in our area. The farthest I got was to call the local St. Vincent’s food bank to see if they needed fresh apples, no one returned my call. And then I emailed. And no return email. However, someone that get’s their meals from the kitchen said they had fresh apples there for them. I’m willing to be part of something bigger next harvest season.
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We should plant the seed with the Boy Scouts next door. Doesn’t it sound like a great community serve project for a badge! Let’s brainstorm it over apple pie. Oops. I just ate the last delicious piece.
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Great idea, what a shame to see fruit that could feed the hungry rotting and going to waste. We really don’t have fruit tree’s here in Brooklyn but there is still plenty of food waste and my neighborhood organization should get together food for the local food bank.
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OMG, this was so good I ate it all . . . 1st and 2nd’s!
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This cause is very near and dear to my heart. In one week I talked to a man that spend $1000 on dinner and another man that was asking for change so that he could have dinner. Your pie looks beautiful!
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