While Manna Food Center’s Community Food Rescue (CFR) operations focus on the day-to-day work of providing food recovery to serve Montgomery County, it’s always a good idea to stop and take stock of what’s happening with federal legislation to reduce food waste. A new report, “Opportunities to Reduce Food Waste in the 2023 Farm Bill,” articulates and recommends specific legislation to strengthen current efforts throughout the U.S.  Co-authors,
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What started as a student-led environmental initiative to reduce food waste in Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) has grown into the Coalition to ReImagine School Waste. Building on an initial pilot program, the effort is poised to expand to all MCPS schools and has the potential to reach all public schools in Maryland. Students from Bethesda-Chevy Chase and Richard Montgomery High Schools started
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We are delighted to welcome Annarose Kennedy, Community Food Rescue’s new coordinator. She will work closely with Cheryl Kollin, CFR’s Program Director. Here’s a little intro about Annarose in her own words: Hello everyone! My name is Annarose Kennedy, and I have recently started working for Manna Food Center as the new Community Food Rescue
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We bid a fond farewell to our colleague and friend Susan Wexler, CFR outreach coordinator, who finished her work with Community Food Rescue on Nov. 30th. Susan joined CFR in 2016 to help expand the CFR network of food donor businesses, food assistance organizations, and volunteer food runners. With her help, CFR has grown from
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The Montgomery County Farm to Food Bank program , born last year at the height of the global pandemic to help both farmers and people who are food insecure, was an idea that continues to flourish. Thanks to Montgomery County and Greater Washington Community Foundation , Manna Food Center received a grant to purchase freshly harvested produce, eggs, and meat from local farms. These products are then donated to
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By Cheryl Kollin, Program Director, Community Food Rescue   The one-year anniversary of the COVID-19 pandemic provides a point in time to reflect on how this global crisis has jolted each of us personally and drastically affected our community.  In her article for Food Tank, Food (In)Security and Waste: Lessons Learned from the Pandemic , author Marie Mourad, PhD, offers insightful observations about the
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Last fall we met over lunch to get acquainted and by the time the check came, we had joined forces to solve our two organizations’ needs. Amelia Kalant, Director of STEP , (Service Workers Training & Education Partnership), a small non-profit training program for cooks and other hospitality workers, needed a licensed commercial kitchen to train
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