Growing generosity
By Catherine Edman Daily Herald Staff Writer

Not even for a nanosecond.

Sure, what do you want? he responded. How many? What kind?

In short order, Pesche potted 150 patio tomatoes and earmarked them for families in need.

"People just need a chance, and if we can help give them that chance, that’s great," the nursery owner said.

The thriving little tomato plants will go to clients who visit the Self Help Closet & Food Pantry in Des Plaines during July to get canned vegetables and dry goods that help them put food on the table for another month.

And while they’re at the pantry, they’ll likely walk away with fresh tomatoes, cucumbers, lettuce or squash grown and donated by local gardeners.

That’s the very sort of generosity permeating the Daily Herald’s second Plant a Row for the Hungry campaign.

Girl Scout and Boy Scout troops are planting gardens chock full of vegetables, garden centers are donating plants, food pantries are planting their own gardens. And readers, still motivated after last year’s campaign, planted extra for the sole purpose of donating the results.

At its heart, Plant a Row for the Hungry is basic: it harnesses the best of what gardeners have to offer — their generosity and their harvest — and delivers it to people who need it most.

Just as with last year’s campaign, which raised nearly 18,000 pounds of fresh fruits and vegetables, the recipients again are food pantries, soup kitchens and other social service agencies in Cook, DuPage, Kane, Lake and McHenry counties.

In 2000, though, we’re bumping up the goal.

Readers and gardeners across the suburban area did such a stellar job last year we’re issuing a new challenge. This summer, we want to collect at least 25,000 pounds of produce through the program organized nationally by the Garden Writers Association of America and funded, in large part, by HGTV.

Starting today and continuing through Sept. 30, readers can drop off produce at sites set up in conjunction with Northern Illinois Food Bank, formerly Bethlehem Center Food bank.

Each week, we’ll tell you how pounds readers delivered to neighbors in need.

We’ll also share with you updates from folks on the front lines, whether they’re gardeners growing and harvesting or agencies receiving and distributing the nutrition-packed food.

It’s those tales that speak to the heart of the program.

"People who come in and need assistance with food don’t normally get fresh produce," Lisle Township caseworker Valerie McKenna said. "It is so expensive."

Yet every week last summer, the food pantry in Lisle had tomatoes, cucumbers or lettuce to give out in addition to the two bags of food each client can receive per month.

"It is such a nice treat, it’s something different they can have. They mention what recipes they plan to cook with it that night," McKenna said.

Last year, as well as this summer, someone donated tomato and pepper plants to hand out to clients, as well. Those who were recipients were transformed into donors by season’s end.

"You could just tell they had some success and wanted to share," she said.

Pantry workers created their own little garden outside the township offices this summer so they, too, could Plant a Row.

For years, children who worked in the Shiney Garden in Vernon Hills learned about patience, planting techniques and harvest times.

They also learned about eating well. When the crops came in, vegetables went home and on the dinner table.

Garden founder Betty Houbion changed that a bit last year by asking the children to give half of what they grew to the Plant a Row program.

They supplied at least 50 pounds of tomatoes to a day-care facility with many low-income families.

"It doesn’t seem to weigh that much, but I kept taking bags and bags of tomatoes," Houbion jokes now.

Every Saturday, up to 15 children work in the plot donated by the Vernon Hills Park District, doing whatever needs to be done. Weeding, planting, snipping. They all take a turn.

"Every year we try to add more vegetables," explained a three-year veteran, Anahit Gomtsian, 13, of Vernon Hills. The children themselves get to help decide what will become of the fruit and vegetables.

It was their choice, as well, to continuing the donations. They’re learning about waste — and how to reduce it.

"Usually the stuff people don’t take just rots in the garden," she said, adding she’s rather more people enjoyed the Shiney Garden.

That’s a common dilemma.

Gardeners usually have friends who also garden.

"So they can’t give their vegetables away!" said Lisa Anderson of the Self Help Closet & Food Pantry in Des Plaines. "You just hate to throw it away, but you can only use so much."

Anderson sees nearly 200 families every month of the year who need help acquiring the most basic needs.

The donations of garden-fresh vegetables were a big hit last year with the clients, a true treat for those whose diet consists primarily of canned or frozen foods, she said.

"We have elderly clients who weren’t born here, like some from Russia, who are retired and receive an income of slightly under $500 per month.

"Certainly they do not have the luxury of going to the farmers markets and buying fresh produce," she said.

This year they’ll also have the chance to grow their own patio tomatoes right outside their door courtesy of the 150 prepotted tomato plants donated by Pesche’s Garden Center.

"If they had to go buy the pots, buy the dirt and buy the plants," Anderson said, "it wouldn’t be affordable for them."