185,000 Meals Packed at Meals from the Heartland

Shanah Tovah!!!

Thanks to the help of hundreds of volunteers who worked for many hours over Labor Day weekend, Project Elijah packaged 185,000 Kosher meals which will be sent to Israel to supply food banks there. Normally, meals packaged stay within the United States and often even within local communities. These particular meals were ordered especially to stock food pantries in Israel. An additional 20,000 meals were packaged in Waterbury, CT this month.

There are upcoming packings at Temple Israel in Minneapolis, MN, in Los Angeles with the help of the Jewish Federation, and in Minnetonka, MN at Bet Shalom Congregation.

Jews of all varieties are finding themselves in need during these trying times.

Below are pictures of the recent packing at Meals from the Heartland in Des Moines, IA.

Spring Packing Season Has Begun!!!

Shalom All,

We just had our first of the Spring Packagings! We packaged meals as part of Washington Hebrew Congregation's Mitzvah Day. Aproximately 90 people including many young children worked from 9:30 to 12:30 yesterday and packaged 11,000 meals for multiple different organizations in the DC Metro Area. Julie and I, aided by Washington Hebrew's fine maintenance staff, now have our equipment headed back to Iowa where we have two packagings on the same day next weekend, one in Des Moines and the other in Iowa City.

I will be in Des Moines coordinating the packing for a Bat Mitzvah social action program and Julie will be in Iowa City for the Mitzvah Day there led by Iowa Hillel an including a number of congregations. I will post pictures and video as soon as I get a chance.

Thank you to all who particpated this weekend and those who will be participating in the weeks ahead. There is no greater mitzvah than saving a life and by feeding the hungry, we are going a long way toward saving many lives.

Watching families working together with determination in their hearts and joy on their faces is truly a moving experience.

Once again, Julie did an unbelievable job getting everything arranged and bringing it all together so that it looked easy on Sunday! No, I'm not just saying that because I'm married to her!

Let all who are hungry come and eat!

-David

NFTY National Convention

Shalom All,

We packaged nearly 40,000 Kosher Meals at NFTY National 2009!!!

On Feb. 15, 2009, more than 700 Reform Jewish high school students from across the United States and Canada spent a Sunday afternoon donning hairnets and plastic gloves as they assembled nearly 40,000 kosher meals to be served to needy Jewish families in New York City. The project was a joint effort of the Union for Reform Judaism, the Project Elijah Foundation and MAZON – A Jewish Response to Hunger.

The teens were gathered in Washington, D.C. for the biennial convention of the North American Federation of Temple Youth (NFTY), the youth branch of the Reform Jewish Movement. On Sunday, convention delegates gathered at Washington Hebrew Congregation, where they assembled packages of Elijah’s Kosher Manna, a nutritious vegetable meal made from soy protein, pasta, dehydrated vegetables and a vitamin/mineral flavoring mix. The packages will be shipped to the Metropolitan Council on Jewish Poverty’s food bank in Brooklyn, New York, where they will be distributed to more than 1400 families a month.

Rabbi Michael Mellen, Director of Youth Programs for the Union for Reform Judaism, said he hopes the students’ experience packaging kosher meals will further inspire them to work toward tikkun olam, the repair of our world.

“These teens are all about making a difference in the world, so this is partly about making a difference in the moment, but its also about carrying this experience and this idea and what it teaches into other places in their lives,” Rabbi Mellen said. “For them to witness the sheer amount of meals they helped to assemble sends a very powerful messages about what each individual is about to do by playing his or her own part. And ultimately, this project falls within the context of Jewish values. It’s not just about feeding somebody; it’s literally about repairing our universe.”

Rabbi Elliott Kleinman, Chief Program Officer of the Union for Reform Judaism, emphasized MAZON’s role in Sunday’s project. “This project wouldn’t have come together without the help and sponsorship of MAZON, which has dedicated itself to fighting hunger across the country,” Rabbi Kleinman said. “MAZON’s participation in today’s project stems not just from a desire feed the hungry but from the important recognition that we must educate people about the root of hunger issues in America.”

Thanks certainly go to the many staff members of NFTY whose efforts over the day of the packing were essential and to Rabbi Kleinman for his leadership and teaching role.

Let me also take a moment to thank someone who could not attend the convention, Dr. H. Eric Schockman, President of Mazon, for his ongoing support of Project Elijah and its efforts. Eric is one of the real menschen in the world and gets far too little credit for all of the work that he does.

This packing also would not have come together without the efforts of Project Elijah's staff and volunteers whose preparations for the event too many weeks of planning and untold hours of physical labor. The staff at Washington Hebrew Congregation cannot be thanked enough for their spectacular efforts. It takes a great team to make a wonderful event happen. In Washington DC, Project Elijah had a great team working together.

I personally, would like to thank my wife, Julie for her months of work, Alan Zuckert and his family for contributions beyond all reasonable generosity to fight hunger both of time and finances, and to those many unnamed volunteers who helped make the NFTY Convention packing an experience to remember for hundreds of now inspired students. As a rabbi, it was truly an inspiration for me to see Jewish students so moved to help others.

We did a great thing, but we have many more mouths to feed.

As Rabbi Tarphon said, "It is not up to you to complete the work, but neither can you abstain from it." We all need to do our part.

-David

Julie's husband,
Rabbinic Liason,
and Rabbi of Temple B'nai Jeshurun in Des Moines, IA.

Project Elijah in Minnetonka, MN

Shalom All,
We just had a fantastic Kosher Manna packing at Bet Shalom Congregation in Minnetonka, Minnesota. We packaged over 19,000 meals in about two hours and numerous volunteers helped out from pre-school age on up.

Project Elijah continues to thrive and over the next year will be conducting packings around the nation and shipping tens of thousands of meals around the nation and the world. Our new product is designed to meet the dietary needs not only of Jews, but also of Muslims and Vegans. It is the only product designed specifically to meet such dietary restrictions in addition to nutritional requirements and it is the only such product designed for a domestic American audience, not only of starving people, but of food insecure people.

For those who do not know, food insecure people are those who can afford food, but need to choose food over other primary necessities in their lives such as rent or medical expenses. Many food insecure people will opt to use their money to buy food rather than to accept food commonly distributed because the latter is not of good enough quality or because it does not meet their religious or ethically based dietary needs. Our new product with its chicken soup flavoring tastes very good and looks like it tastes. Hopefully, it will enable food insecure people to choose to meet their medical needs and provide them a higher quality of life.

Thanks to all those who continue to make Project Eliah and Elijah's Kosher Manna grow in its ability to help those in need. My wife Julie and I look forward to helping other congregations and organizations help more people around our nation and our world. For more information on Project Elijah or the Kosher Manna packing project, please contact my wife Julie, Executive Director of Project Elijah, at jkaufman@projectelijahfoundation.org or visit their website http://www.projectelijahfoundation.org/ .

-David

Nearly 21,000 Meals Packed in Iowa City

From the Daily Iowan

Hillel event preps food for needy.

Nearly 21,000 meals were packaged for needy Jewish people worldwide during an event held at the Hillel Foundation on Sunday (April 13).

The Hillel center worked in conjunction with a Des Moines-based group called the Project Elijah Foundation to prepare food packages for poor Jewish communities in the United States and abroad. The type of food prepared was particularly important because, unlike most other organizations that provide food for people in need, the food was kosher so that it could be enjoyed by everyone, including devout Jews.

"The ultimate thing is to save a life, but we want to get kosher meals to people who need them," said Janice Rosenberg, the executive director of the Project Elijah Foundation.

More than 100 people volunteered, including students from both Alpha Epsilon Pi Fraternity and Alpha Epsilon Phi Sorority, as well as members of the Agudas Achim Synagogue. Each bag, which consisted of rice, soy, dehydrated vegetables, and a high nutrition powder, has the capability of serving six meals.

"The Jewish tradition has a strong focus on helping the poor," said Gerald Sorokin, the director of the Hillel center. "It's not just a nice thing to do - it is obligatory." The meals, called Elijah's Kosher Manna, cost 36 cents per meal to produce, including shipping to the different locations, Rosenberg said. The food program was developed so they could make food for hungry Jews, educate people that there are Jews that need help, and make activists out of all the volunteers, Rosenberg said. Although the meals were directed toward Jewish families, anyone was encouraged to participate in the event. Natalie Blaine, the vice president of recruitment for Alpha Epsilon Phi sorority and a sophomore at the UI, said that while she was not Jewish, she enjoys the activity because "helping people in need is always a good thing."- by Briana Byrd