LIers get a taste of hunger in America

For seven years, Daniel Grinberg worked to help feed Long Island's hungry. He and his family worked in soup kitchens. They collected food and distributed it to the needy. He volunteered his time as a board member of Island Harvest, a hunger relief organization.

But - as Grinberg and his family would volunteer to find out - it is one thing to help the hungry. It's another to feel some tiny measure of what thousands of Long Islanders have no choice but to endure almost daily.

He was slated to receive an award from Island Harvest for his work. "I felt kind of hypocritical . . . because for all I had done, I really didn't know what it was like to be hungry," he said.

Grinberg talked to his wife, Laurie, a former teacher. They put their minds together and, after two weeks, came up with an idea: The Grinberg family of Old Brookville - one of the richest areas on Long Island - would spend most of October feeding themselves on $60 a week, the middle range of what a family of four could expect to get in public food assistance.

A small gesture

- hopes will prod other Long Islanders to do the same.

"Their experience is important, it is valuable because it inspires the rest of us to work harder, to do more" said Father John Vlahos, pastor of the Greek Orthodox Church of the Holy Resurrection in Brookville, who does not know the Grinbergs.

Daniel Grinberg knows there was no way the family could experience what a hungry family on Long Island goes through. "The best we could try to do was to try to walk in someone else's shoes," he said. "I'll tell you this, I learned more in a month than I did in seven years."

Boxed mac and cheese

a half-can of black beans topped with American cheese.

Before they started, they contributed all of the food in their pantry and refrigerator to Island Harvest. Before they were done, "I went from shopping in one place to searching out the most affordable food I could find in several places," Laurie Grinberg said. "It was hard. It was eye-opening how hard it was."

Daniel Grinberg, a food industry entrepreneur, said he would find himself sitting and thinking, "I used to spend $60 for takeout sushi, and there are parents trying to feed their families for $60 a week," he said. "I couldn't stop thinking about that."

Laurie Grinberg discovered that the family no longer could afford fresh fruit and vegetables. And, as the month wore on, she said, "I was really eating one meal a day because if there was a choice between feeding myself and the children, it was always children first."

The experience changed the family. Matthew and Emma said they do not waste food. Laurie Grinberg said she buys only what the family needs during shopping trips, using coupons and sales. "I don't buy a lot of what I used to buy," she said. ". . . I can't handle buying a $6 frozen pizza anymore."

Which is probably why the family's pantry and refrigerator are still sparse.

Daniel Grinberg is working on a plan for a new business. "I'm incorporating social responsibility and dealing with hunger in the DNA of the firm," he said. The company, Elara Foodservice, will provide accessories for food servers. One of the company's goals, he said, will be to raise money for Island Harvest. Elara employees will be encouraged to donate time and energy to the effort, too.

Grinberg said that he learned that hunger can snare anyone - a lesson, incidentally, that led Holy Resurrection parishioners Effie Marie Smith and Millie Gianoukakis to start the food pantry at the church.

The pantry at Holy Resurrection serves families from Brookville to Glen Cove, including many who never thought they would be facing the prospect of going hungry. "We know families that went from living in a house with five bedrooms to a house with one because of the economy," Vlahos said.

Grinberg said he understands that the same could happen to his own. "All it takes is one illness, one catastrophe and anybody can be there," he said. "That became clear really fast."

Grinberg said the family will do it again - because he wants to fuel an even deeper commitment. "Cancer is something we can't do much about, but hunger? That's something all of us can cure. Every single one of us can do something about that."