We know food to be a communicative instrument and use its offering as an instrument of community building. The average DTES resident lives with one or more serious health issue, has a compromised immune system and is underhoused. Coupled with material poverty, the lack of adequate housing often renders our neighbours incapable of providing themselves with adequate nutrition. Typical housing quarters provide one small room with no cooking facilities or storage for foodstuffs.
What is lacking in the average DTES diet is local seasonal produce, healthy sweets (bananas/dates/figs), dishes made without additives and refined sugars, gluten and wheat free foods, alternatives to dairy products – generally speaking fresh, identifiable foods. Food is a determinant of health – emotional and mental health included.
Letters of Support from partnering organizations and Testimonials from NH Members testify to the fact that we have been successful in making our Food Philosophy an instrument of change, community building and wellbeing.
When we’re materially poor, the first things we lose are privacy and choice. Offering a choice of the foods is a critical piece of the NH food philosophy. It’s a commonly held myth that those living in material poverty lack nutritional ambitions, expectations and knowledge.
During the summer of 2007 the NH was one of 3 Vancouver organizations which took part in the BC Farmers Market [FM] Coupon Pilot Project. Funded by the provincial government, it provided 35 Vancouver low-income residents [15 of them NH members], $15 worth of FM coupons each week from July through October. The focus of the Pilot Project was on parents of young children and pregnant women, in an evaluated attempt to see if access to local fresh produce increased the health of low-income residents. Indeed it did and participants also used it as a venue to share with one another their pre-existing awareness of the critical importance of fresh foods to their health. The Pilot Project led to the program’s expansion for 2 years, operating across the province until in 2010 the provincial government suspended its funding. The impact on low-income families was deeply felt.
DTES NH Food Philosophy
The nutritional goal of the DTES NH is to prepare healthy whole foods, purchased from local sources (farmers, where art thou?) and from our neighbours at Sunrise Market and in Chinatown.
We shop according to the logic of the season, choosing foods with those who are the most nutritionally vulnerable in mind. We prepare foods remembering what our Japanese neighbours say, that we eat with our eyes before we ever take a bite. We take every modest opportunity to remind DTES residents of our right to quality food. We use the offering of food to reflect back upon our neighbours our inherent dignity, deservedness and welcome. We strive to do our part in raising nutritional standards in the DTES where far too many good people remain nutritionally vulnerable.
DTES NH Food Guidelines
Food allergens, diabetes, Hep C, HIV/AIDS, heart and stroke health are considered in our menu planning. Recipe ingredients are listed. We use only non-toxic cleaning products and purchase Fair Trade coffees and teas. We avoid refined sugars, processed foods, gluten, non-stick cookware, silicone, aluminum foil/pots/pans, plastics for prepping/cooking/ serving/storing foods, Eurocentric menus and soup, as it’s the food relentlessly offered to those living in material poverty. We take responsibility for educating existing and potential food donors about which foodstuffs are the ones on which our neighbours thrive.
