Day 1: Shopping night and first LBL Cook-up!

What $40 will feed 4 people from Sunday 15th May - Friday 20th May. It would probably happily feed only 2 of us though. Talk about food for thought.

Antman, Timmy, Mez and I enjoying our stew concotion of red kidney beans, tinned tomatoes, canneloni beans, rice, lentils, onion, garlic and garam masala... oh and 250g of rice! Delicious and moderately nutritious.. except that it might form not just our dinner for Sunday night but for a few more appearances throughout the week. We need to make this last.

A concoction of legumes potato's and tinned tomatoes. This will be eaten on rice. Yeah, legume concoction on rice for as long as we can get by - Antman

So above are the first photos of our dinner last night and  $40 worth of shopping, with factoring in oil, salt and pepper amounts form our own pantries at home, Team Hakuna Matata has their food for the week!  Each team member has two pears, one carrot, 4-5 potatoes (according to the size), 500ml of milk, 50g of garam masala, 250g of red lentils, 250g of raw sugar, 250g of rolled oats, 250g of white longrain rice and equal portions of two vanilla cakes. We have also the two planned community meals of Tomato Tuna Pasta and Legume Stew which we will share out throughout the week since it was easier to cook the meal together.

It's already starting to dawn on me the issues of food security that our impoverished fellow man and women have to face each day.  It's also a strange feeling of rationalising my meals, rather then my usual motto of "Live to Eat, not eat to Live" - a sentiment I share with my friend Steph whom is taking up the challenge for an ENTIRE MONTH!

I am loving the fact that we can have as many cups of warm water and cold water but it is no substitute for tea. I would really love some tea but we couldn't afford such a luxury for the week.

I'm amazed that as a group, we have raised already $1295 towards the Global Poverty Project to help fund education programs in Papua New Guinea. 

Keep tuned and don't forget to check out www.livebelowtheline.org.au/hakunamatata