MCALLEN – UTRGV Continuing Education and the Food Bank of the Rio Grande Valley are starting the season of giving with a special Healthy Holidays Lunch and Learn fundraiser, to promote healthy eating and making educated food choices throughout the holidays and beyond.
The lunch workshop starts at 11 a.m. Monday, Nov. 21, 2016, at the UTRGV McAllen Teaching Site, 1800 S. Main St., Suite 1100, in McAllen.
Admission will be $10 per person, and a major portion of the proceeds will be donated to the Food Bank of the RGV to help with its operations this holiday season.
While many families will gather for a delicious meal this holiday, others will struggle to make ends meet. As the 36th largest food bank in the nation, and the sixth largest distributor in Texas, the Food Bank of the RGV partners with roughly 250 agencies to help feed some 42,000 people each week across Hidalgo, Cameron and Willacy counties.
Currently, one in two children in the RGV lives at or below the federal poverty level, leaving many families choosing between paying housing, medical, or other bills, and buying nutritious food for the family. The Food Bank works to provide access to community services, educational outreach and organic, nutritious food for families struggling with food insecurity.
The workshop aims to bring attention to the Food Bank’s community garden program, which allows individuals to cultivate a range of organic crops at the garden, and take home their produce during harvest. Any surplus food items from the garden are sold at the weekly Pharrmer’s Market each Thursday from November through April, from 4-7 p.m., at 724 N. Cage Boulevard in Pharr.
During the Lunch and Learn event, participants will learn how to create meals using simple, natural ingredients that are both delicious and nutritious, in addition to sampling hearty and healthy recipes created by chef and sommelier Eva Paschal, manager of Centerplate Operations. Attendees will also take home copies of all recipes used in the cooking demonstration.
For more information or to register for this event, visit www.utrgv.edu/ce or call (956) 665-2071
