Alissa Vandenbark, Author at MANNA

MANNA takes on D.C. at ACBP ’14

Posted on October 7, 2014 by Alissa Vandenbark

MANNA’s advocacy team – Executive Director, Sue Daugherty, Director of Policy and Institutional Affairs, Ann Hoskins-Brown, and Community Outreach & Advocacy Specialist, Katelyn Baron – attended the 2014 Advocacy Capacity Building Project (ACBP) Symposium September 29-October 1, at NASTAD in Washington D.C. The annual symposium encourages collaboration between “sister” organizations from all over the country, with over 50 attendees from 20 diverse food and nutrition services agencies this year. Each participant had the opportunity to share their best practices and recent advocacy activities; MANNA presented updates on how we are working to leverage our groundbreaking research with targeted advocacy work. Together, we brainstormed and discussed topics including the power of evidence and developing and delivering an impactful message.

The symposium offered several opportunities to participate in advocacy trainings to learn the tools of the trade, helping to facilitate successful interactions with elected officials and academic institutions. This training was crucial for our visits with staff from the offices of Congressman Chaka Fattah, Congressman Bob Brady, Senator Bob Casey and Senator Pat Toomey from Pennsylvania, along with several New Jersey legislators. Our Hill meetings, scheduled for our final day in D.C., provided the opportunity to share our “food is medicine” model and research with policymakers to demonstrate its potential to change healthcare. MANNA’s services save Pennsylvania valuable healthcare dollars and our clients experience improved health outcomes. We believe our meal program should be a reimbursable standard of care and a right to everyone facing a life-threatening illness.

Overall, our time in DC opened our eyes to many new possibilities. There is still much to learn and we are excited to redefine our goals and continue to move forward with our mission. ACBP has empowered us to take on new advocacy goals focused at the state level. It was motivating and refreshing to share and hear new ideas about our unique services. MANNA has many challenges ahead, but we will continue to advocate for the incorporation of nutrition into healthcare.

We want to thank The M•A•C AIDS Fund, The Center for Health Law and Policy Innovation at Harvard Law School, AIDS United, the National AIDS Housing Coalition, Representatives from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), and the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare (CMS) for all of their support. To all of our sister organizations, we thank you for collaborating and learning with us. These organizations include: God’s Love We Deliver, Project Angel Food, Open Hand Atlanta, Project Angel Heart, AIDS Project New Haven, AIDS Services Foundation Orange County, Moveable Feast, Community Servings, Project Open Hand, Bill’s Kitchen, Inc., Heartland Health Outreach, Mama’s Kitchen, Long Island Association for AIDS Care, Food & Friends, The Poverello Center, Lifelong AIDS Alliance and the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.

To see more pictures from our DC visit, see our Facebook album.

Seasonal Vegetarian-Friendly Recipe

Posted on October 2, 2014 by Alissa Vandenbark

In honor of Vegetarian Awareness Month, MANNA would like to share with you a vegetarian friendly recipe that is simple to make and delicious. Reducing your meat intake has a number of health benefits including reducing your risk of hypertension, heart disease and diabetes. There are many ways to get the necessary protein requirements into your diet that do not include animal products. The recipe below features black beans which are a great source of both protein and fiber. In less than 30 minutes you will have a delicious entrée that supports your health and satisfies your taste buds! Smoky_Black_Bean_and_Butternut_Ragout-458x326

Smoky Black Bean and Butternut Ragoût

Ingredients:

1 tsp. fresh lime juice

3 tsp. pure maple syrup, divided

1 Tbs. unsalted butter

2 Tbs. olive oil, divided

1 lb. peeled butternut squash, cut into ½-inch dice (4 cups)

1 small yellow onion, cut into medium dice (½ cup)

2 cloves garlic, minced (2 tsp.)

1 15.5-oz. can black beans, drained and rinsed

2 tsp. adobo sauce from can of chipotles in adobo

⅓ cup crumbled queso fresco or feta cheese

2–3 Tbs. chopped or whole cilantro or mint leaves

¼ cup toasted pepitas or toasted chopped pecans, optional

Preparation:

Combine lime juice and 1 tsp. maple syrup in small bowl. Set aside.
Heat butter and 1 Tbs. oil in large nonstick skillet over medium heat. Add squash, and season with salt, if desired. Cover pan, and cook 8 minutes, stirring occasionally. Uncover pan, add onion, and increase heat to medium-high. Cook 3 to 4 minutes, or until squash is tender and lightly browned. Remove from heat, and gently stir in lime-maple mixture.
Heat remaining 1 Tbs. oil in medium saucepan over medium-low heat. Add garlic, and cook 30 seconds, or until softened and fragrant. Add beans, adobo sauce, remaining 2 tsp. maple syrup, and 1/4 cup water. Bring mixture to a simmer, and cook 5 to 6 minutes, or until liquid is mostly absorbed.
Gently stir together bean mixture and squash. Serve garnished with queso fresco, cilantro, and pepitas (if using).

Source: www.vegetariantimes.com/recipe/smoky-black-bean-and-butternut-ragout/

Food is Medicine Advocacy

Posted on September 26, 2014 by Alissa Vandenbark

Our research shows that people battling life-threatening illnesses who receive MANNA services save healthcare dollars and experience improved health, all while having the quality and stability of their lives enhanced. Our staff, volunteers, donors and clients know that the mission is important and impactful, but it is important that our elected officials understand MANNA’s critical role as well. MANNA’s advocacy committee develops and implements strategies to advocate the “food is medicine” concept and continually works to advance MANNA’s mission.

With crucial support and training from the M·A·C AIDS Fund, our Executive Director, Sue Daugherty, Director of Policy and Institutional Affairs, Ann Hoskins-Brown and Community Outreach and Advocacy Specialist, Katelyn Baron will be attending the annual Food & Nutrition Services Symposium in Washington DC from September 29^th to October 1^st. This symposium encourages collaboration between peer organizations and offers training on interacting with elected official and academic institutions. The MANNA team will meet with staff from the offices of Representative Chaka Fattah, Representative Bob Brady and Senator Pat Toomey from Pennsylvania along with several of their New Jersey counterparts. MANNA’s goal is to help these officials understand that food truly is medicine and nutritional support should ultimately be a reimbursable standard of care that is a right to everyone facing a life threatening illness.

Continue to check our blog for more updates on MANNA’s “food is medicine” advocacy work.

October is Vegetarian Awareness Month

Posted on September 24, 2014 by Alissa Vandenbark

Even for non-vegetarians, October is a great time to take an extra moment or two to reflect on personal food choices. What we eat affects our health as well as the planet in significant ways. Every meal matters when it comes to making a difference. One way to start small with your veg journey is to start with one vegetarian night a week, “Meatless Mondays.” Try to challenge yourself, friends and family to eliminate meat from your Monday meals by creating an entirely vegetarian breakfast, lunch and dinner. Even MANNA clients can participate in this vegetarian endeavor, we offer one vegetarian dinner entrée per week in addition to a large variety of fruit and vegetables with their meals.

There are several reasons to think about vegetarianism. For starters, it is a great way to focus on eating veggies. Five a day is the goal, and more is even better! All MANNA meals strive to emphasize fresh fruits and vegetables. Combined with exercise and other healthy habits, plant-based diets can reduce the risk of hypertension, heart disease, and type 2 diabetes. Also, vegetables, fruits and legumes tend to be very nutrient dense and are full of vitamins, minerals, fiber, and phytochemicals. A vegetarian diet can also help double down on fiber and then some, the average American gets only about 12g of the 35 g. of fiber per day that is recommended.

Curious to learn more about the health benefits of a vegetarian diet? Or just looking for some ideas? Try these resources:

www.vrg.org/nutrition or www.vegetariantimes.com

Need another reason to picks beans instead of burgers in October? Do it for the planet! Vegetarian diets require less water for production and produce less CO2 as a byproduct. On a nationwide scale, this really adds up. For more information on the environmental effects of meat production, check out the article below.

www.science.time.com/2013/12/16/the-triple-whopper-environmental-impact-of-global-meat-production/

Food is Medicine: A Growing Belief

Posted on September 19, 2014 by Alissa Vandenbark

Despite its humble beginnings, the “food as medicine” principle that MANNA’s system is based on is finally beginning to be recognized and acted on by our policymakers. A fact sheet published in July by the Union of Concerned Scientists reports that the new Farm Bill includes a program that will use healthy food access to help prevent chronic illnesses and reduce medical costs.

The report comments that the American diet, typically high in meats, sugars, and processed foods and low in fresh fruits and vegetables, has led to the highest spending in health care of any country in the world. Most of our medical spending is on chronic illnesses, many of which could be prevented by improved diets. However, prevention and treatment is not as simple as just telling people to change their diets. The U.S. food system makes it very difficult for many people to access healthy foods, given that most low-income communities lack stores that sell fresh fruits and vegetables, and those that do often sell them at unaffordable prices.

The 2014 Farm Bill begins to address this problem with a program called the Food Insecurity Nutrition Incentive (FINI), which offers grant funding to community organizations working to secure affordable access to healthy foods. FINI requires that organizations match these federal funds with contributions from other sources. The report by the Union of Concerned Scientists suggests hospitals supply the match, using The Affordable Care Act requirement for community benefit initiatives. FINI provides the opportunity for health care facilities and healthy food initiatives to collaborate, all in the name of improving health and reducing health care costs.

At MANNA, we support initiatives like this that break down the perceived barrier between health care and food. While MANNA is not a preventative service that would fit under FINI, we do work in the same realm, using food as an integral part of a treatment plan. Healthy food is critical to a healthy life and we hope to see more progressive legislation in the future that builds on the understanding that food is medicine.

This post is by Kelly McGlynn, rising senior at Brown University and former Advocacy & Health Policy Intern at MANNA.

Spreading Hope and Education

Posted on September 16, 2014 by Alissa Vandenbark

MANNA recently partnered with Camp Dreamcatcher for an education event. The event took place on August 19, 2014 at Camp Saginaw in Oxford, PA. The week-long summer camp was created for youth infected/affected by HIV/AIDS. This year, Camp Dreamcatcher invited MANNA’s Registered Dietitian, Alura Costa, to teach an interactive nutrition workshop. Alura partnered with Carly Roop, a Registered Dietitian from Joan Karnell Cancer Center, to develop a class to educate the campers on healthy eating specifically focusing on diabetes and heart disease, two chronic illnesses that can be prevented and controlled through healthy eating and exercise.

Alura and Carly showed the campers how to read and understand important nutrition information on nutrition labels so that they can make healthy food choices for themselves. They focused on healthy serving sizes, calories and sugars of foods that are commonly found in corner stores and how to find healthy options. The campers then participated in making delicious, homemade yogurt popsicles using ingredients that you can easily find already in the home including greek yogurt and fruit. At the end of the session, the campers were able to identify healthy food options and enjoy their delicious popsicles!

Supporting Camp Dreamcatcher is important to MANNA since we started out as an HIV/AIDS organization and continue to serve and support that population. As nutrition educators, we must take advantage of any opportunity to reach out to the youth in our community to provide them with the education and skills that they need so that they can lead a long and healthy life. This year’s Camp Dreamcatcher event was a huge success! To learn more about Camp Dreamcatcher and the children whose lives have been touched by HIV/AIDS please visit www.campdreamcatcher.org.

August is Family Meals Month

Posted on July 29, 2014 by Alissa Vandenbark

August is Family Meals Month, a time to take a break from busy schedules and come together as a family to share a meal. Eating together four or more times in a week has proven benefits, including nutritional health.

Family meals are an opportunity for conversation which teaches children how to listen and provides them a chance to express their own opinions, giving them a voice in the family. Positive dinner conversations and active listening expands children’s vocabulary and reading ability and increases their sense of security. Family meals have a positive impact on children’s values, motivation and self-esteem. Eating frequent meals together also encourages positive nutritional health. Planning, preparing and cooking healthy meals together teaches children the skills they need to carry on these healthy eating habits throughout adulthood. Studies have shown that families who eat dinner together tend to eat more fruits and vegetables and healthy protein sources and fewer fried foods and soda.

August is also a very popular month for kids to go to summer camp. Campers are often exposed to new foods that are also wholesome and nourishing. This month, MANNA’s Registered Dietitian, Alura Costa, will be teaching an interactive nutrition workshop at Camp Dreamcatcher. Alura will talk with campers about healthy eating and demonstrate ways for the kids to prepare the foods at home. Look for more information and photos from this day on the MANNA blog and website. Learn more about this camp for children whose lives have been touched by HIV/AIDS at www.campdreamcatcher.org.

SUMMER FOOD SAFETY

Posted on June 26, 2014 by Alissa Vandenbark

Light up the grill – summer is officially here! During these months of grilling fun, MANNA wants to help keep your family and friends safe from foodborne illnesses with these simple food safety practices. Remember! Food safety is a TOP priority at MANNA because many of our clients have compromised immune systems.

Practice good hygiene and wash your hands before eating, preparing food, or between foods that would cross contaminate such as red meat and fresh vegetables. Always wash hands with warm soapy water for at least 20 seconds.
Marinate your food in the refrigerator to prevent bacteria from growing. Always reserve a portion of unused marinade to brush on food while it is cooking. Never re-use marinade that was used to flavor raw meat, poultry or fish.
Preheat your grill approximately 20-30 minutes before grilling. For charcoal grills, the coals should be just coated with ash.
Use a food thermometer to ensure that food is cooked to the proper temperatures.
Food should never sit at room temperature for more than two hours. Use chafing dishes, slow cookers, and warming trays to keep hot food hot. Keep cold foods cold by nesting them in bowls of ice or rotating items into the refrigerator/freezer.

Grilled Vegetable Kebabs

Ingredients:

10 (12-inch) wooden skewers
1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
1/4 cup white balsamic vinegar
1/4 chopped fresh basil
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 red onion cut into 1-1/2 inch pieces
1 yellow bell pepper cut into 1 ½-inch pieces
1 pound Chinese or baby eggplant cut into ¾-inch slices
3 small zucchini, cut into ¾-inch slices
20 grape or cherry tomatoes

Directions:

-Soak the skewers in water for 30 minutes.

-Whisk together the olive oil, balsamic vinegar, basil, garlic, kosher salt, and black pepper.

-Thread vegetables onto skewers.

-Brush vegetables generously with marinade.

-Grill, covered with lid over medium-high heat. Turn occasionally. Cook 10-12 minutes or until tender.

AIDS Education Month

Posted on May 30, 2014 by Alissa Vandenbark

Did you know? The majority of AIDS cases in MANNA’s 9 county service area are in Philadelphia.

Did you know? As of 2012 there are more than 19,800 Philadelphians living with HIV/AIDS.

Did you know? HIV/AIDS ranks in the top 3 diseases of MANNA clients.

Nutrition plays a vital role for individuals who are infected by HIV. They may suffer from decreased nutritional status caused by poor nutrient intake, malabsorption, metabolic disturbances and side effects of medications. It is extremely important for people infected with HIV to maintain proper nutrition to keep their immune system strong, enabling them to better fight the disease. To prevent muscle wasting and weight loss, it is recommended that individuals diagnosed with HIV/AIDS increase their protein and calorie intake. A few examples of foods that are high calorie and high protein include peanut butter, eggs, dairy products, red meat and poultry. In addition, food safety is extremely important for individuals who have compromised immune systems. It’s imperative to avoid foods that are high-risk, including raw eggs, unpasteurized products, raw meat or fish and unwashed fruits or vegetables. A healthy diet combined with exercise may help with symptoms such as fatigue, metabolic abnormalities and maintaining a healthy weight.

This June, marks the 20^th anniversary of AIDS Education Month (AEM), hosted by Philadelphia Fight. MANNA registered dietitian Alura Costa will be speaking about HIV and nutrition at the 4th Annual Faith Leaders and Community Summit on June 7 from 8 AM to 2 PM at the Marriott Hotel located on 1202 Market Street. Workshops at this event include pastoral self-care, prayer as healing, women, faith and HIV, teen pregnancy and HIV and more. Learn more about the events offered through AEM during the month of June at http://www.aidseducationmonth.org/about/.

The Mediterranean Diet

Posted on April 30, 2014 by Alissa Vandenbark

Originally considered the diet of the poor man, the Mediterranean Diet is now considered among the healthiest in the world. Based on the natural diet of people living in countries surrounding the Mediterranean Sea such as France, Italy, Spain, Morocco, and Greece, this diet emphasizes plant-based foods, healthier fats and proteins, plant-based seasonings, and exercise.

To try this diet yourself, add fruits and vegetables at meal time or as snacks throughout the day. They are full of disease-fighting antioxidants, vitamins, and minerals, and the added fiber in whole grains has been linked to decreased levels of cholesterol while also promoting intestinal health. Switching to whole-grain bread and eating grains such as barley, quinoa, and farro is a great way to incorporate the Mediterranean diet into everyday life.

Use heart-healthy fats such as olive oil, and eat nuts and other unsaturated fat sources high in omega-3 fatty acids. Limit amounts of saturated fat such as butter. Choosing these heart-healthy options helps lower LDL (or the “bad” cholesterol) and will provide you with antioxidant benefits.

Keep consumption of red meat to a minimum—no more than just a few times a month—and eat fish and poultry multiple times a week. Substituting fish and poultry for red meat will help lower your cholesterol intake and promote heart health. Use salt minimally; use herbs and spices to flavor dishes instead.

So, what type of beverages should you consume along with all of these healthy foods? Red wine in moderation! A glass of red wine with your meal is actually allowed, but if you don’t already drink, don’t feel the need to start.

Enjoy this recipe that follows the rules of the Mediterranean diet—and check the Be Well Philly Blog for some tips on how to incorporate physical activity into your everyday life.

Mediterranean Style Grilled Salmon

Ingredients
• 4 tablespoons chopped fresh basil
• 1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley
• 1 tablespoon minced garlic
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• 4 salmon fillets, each 5 ounces
• Cracked black pepper, to taste
• 4 green olives, chopped
• 4 thin slices lemon

Directions
Prepare a hot fire in a charcoal grill or heat a gas grill or broiler. Away from the heat source, lightly coat the grill rack or broiler pan with cooking spray. Position the cooking rack 4 to 6 inches from the heat source. In a small bowl, combine the basil, parsley, minced garlic and lemon juice. Spray the fish with cooking spray. Sprinkle with black pepper. Top each fillet with equal amounts of the basil-garlic mixture. Place the fish herb-side down on the grill. Grill over high heat. When the edges turn white, after about 3 to 4 minutes, turn the fish over and place on aluminum foil. Move the fish to a cooler part of the grill or reduce the heat. Grill until the fish is opaque throughout when tested with the tip of a knife and an instant-read thermometer inserted into the thickest part of the fish reads 145°F (about 4 minutes longer). Remove the salmon and place on warmed plates. Garnish with green olives and lemon slices.