Menu for Hope

During the holidays, when our lives are filled with joy and our bellies with seasonal delicacies, most of us also remember those in the world who are less fortunate.

This year, I hope you will join me and donate to Menu for Hope by buying raffle tickets online for a wide range of food-related prizes.

Menu for Hope unites food writers, bloggers, and readers from all over the world to raise money for those whose survival depends on food donations from the UN World Food Program (WFP). This year, funds raised by the 2007 Menu for Hope campaign will be earmarked for a school food program in Lesotho, a tiny country entirely surrounded by the Republic of South Africa, where one out of twelve kids die before the age of five and 56% of the population live on less than $2 per day.

For see the faces of people in Lesotho who will be helped by Menu for Hope donations, go here: http://www.chezpim.com/blogs/2007/12/faces-from-leso.html

I donated one of the prizes being raffled. If you want to bid on my prize, designate prize UW05 when you donate to Menu for Hope. Because my prize contains food, I can only ship it to the United States or Canada.

My prize is a package including (1) wild oregano hand-picked from the salt-sprayed hills of a Greek island in the North Aegean Sea, (2) hand-crafted sheep cheese still showing the imprint of the reed basket in which it was made, (3) hilopites (egg noodles) made with indigenous Greek wheat flour, free-range chicken eggs, and fresh sheep milk, and (4) an autographed copy of Tastes Like Home: Mediterranean Cooking in Alaska. (To see the hilopites being made, go here: http://medcookingalaska.blogspot.com/2007/11/opening-lessons-with-recipes-for.html) .

For more information about Menu for Hope, go to Chez Pim: http://www.chezpim.com/blogs/2007/12/what-is-menu-fo.html#more

To see the Menu for Hope prizes from the West Coast of the US, go to Rasa Malaysia: http://www.rasamalaysia.com/2007/12/menu-for-hope-4-complete-west-coast_10.html

To see the full list of Menu for Hope prizes, go to Chez Pim: http://www.chezpim.com/blogs/2007/12/menu-for-hope-4.html#more

To donate to Menu for Hope, go here: http://www.firstgiving.com/menuforhope4

How does it work?
Food bloggers from all over the world are offering food-related prizes for the Menu for Hope raffle. Anyone can buy raffle tickets online (through a site called Firstgiving) to bid on these prizes. For every $10 donated, you earn one virtual raffle ticket to bid on a prize of your choice. This year bidding on prizes will take place from December 10 through 21. At the end of the two-weeks, the raffle tickets are drawn and the results announced on the Chez Pim blog. For more information about Firstgiving, go here: http://www.firstgiving.com/Design/1/about_us.asp

Donation instructions:

1. Choose a prize or prizes of your choice from US west coast donors at http://www.rasamalaysia.com/2007/12/menu-for-hope-4-complete-west-coast_10.html or from the complete prize list at http://www.chezpim.com/blogs/2007/12/menu-for-hope-4.html#more .

2. Go to the donation site at http://www.firstgiving.com/menuforhope4 and make a donation.

3. Specify the prize you would like to bid for in the 'Personal Message' section in the donation form. Each $10 donated will get one raffle ticket toward a prize. For example, a donation of $50 can be 2 tickets for UW01 and 3 tickets for UW05. Please write 2xUW01, 3xUW05.

Thank you so much for any donations you are able to make to Menu for Hope and for taking the time to read this post. If you know anyone who might be interested in donating to Menu for Hope, please send them the above information.

Happy Holidays, Laurie