Teenagers these days …  have a heart for service. During the month of April, the Morton Division worked with about 400 teens and grade school students packing Tender Mercies meals and re-packaging food products.  Metamora High School students ended a testing day by gathering in the gym and working together to pack a total of 15,000 Tender...

The family of Midwest Food Bank founder and president, David Kieser, was honored at the McLean County Republican Party Lincoln Reagan Dinner. Held Friday, May 17, the dinner included a presentation by  White House Chef Martin Mongiello, and a silent auction.  Chosen from among eight other nominees, the David Kieser family was one of ...

Midwest Food Bank is able to alleviate hunger for those in need due to the generous support received in the form of food donations, volunteer hours and dollar contributions. These are the key inputs to the MFB Business Model.  Some of our donors have given non-cash items to MFB. These include cars, stocks, real estate, collectibles, grain...

Tender Mercies is a low-cost, highly nutritious meal consisting of rice, pre-cooked pinto beans, fortified chicken seasoning and a soy protein. Here are a number of recent developments with our Tender Mercies program: New logo, new look! Tender Mercies has a new logo and bag design. Please have a look in the photo below. Labels with the new logo ar...

Midwest Food Bank donors come in all shapes and sizes (and amounts!). We appreciate the heart each one has for those struggling with food insecurity. Donated funds, great and small, are treated with respect and what we hope is good stewardship. ​ There is a unique subset of donors we'd like to take a moment to highlight. These are generous folks wh...

Where there is no guidance, a people falls, but in an abundance of counselors there is safety." -Proverbs 13:14​​ Midwest Food Bank's National Board met for an annual strategy session in February. The gathering of the nine board members was a time to reflect on the MFB mission and faithfully look forward to the future. Humbled by the growth in the ...

Midwest Food Bank's very own Carol Jankowski was recently given some well-deserved recognition. The Morton Community Chamber of Commerce honored Carol as the 2019 Distinguished Service Award Winner. Carol, Executive Director of MFB Morton, received the award for her years of leadership and service to Morton. She has served countless hours in numero...

Most people have never heard of DOT Foods in Mt. Sterling, Illinois. Midwest Food Bank is fortunate to have a partnership with DOT Foods which is the largest food serve redistribution company in the United States.  DOT Foods employs 4,200 people and was founded in 1960 by Robert and Dorothy Tracy. On average about two semi-loads of food are do...

​ At Midwest Food Bank we are often reminded of God's ability to provide exactly what is needed at just the right time.  That happened again recently when MFB received four semi-loads of beans – black, pinto, kidney – from a farmer in Illinois and another farmer in Iowa.  How did these farmers know to contact MFB with this donation? ...

"Are you cooking chili? It smells good in here."  That was the reaction of a food pantry volunteer that was recently in the Morton Division to pick up food. Yes, we were cooking chili – Tender Mercies style. Midwest Food Bank Morton is the home site for Tender Mercies – a meal program of MFB. Each packet includes a high-grade rice, p...

How many people can a church feed on a Saturday? Bethel Lutheran Church helped feed 10,000 people on a Saturday morning! The church sponsored and hosted a Tender Mercies meal packing event on Saturday, Oct. 20.  About 70 adults and children gathered in their school gym to pack meals that will be distributed both locally and in Haiti ...

Midwest Food Bank is actively involved in Hurricane Florence relief. We will be posting updates and volunteer opportunities here. We appreciate your interest and your involvement.  To learn more and/or to donate visit: https://midwestfoodbank.org/hurricane-florence-relief Thank you!  

The staff and volunteers at the Midwest Food Bank Morton have been prototyping larger bags of the Tender Mercies meal packet – rice, pre-cooked pinto beans, soy protein and chicken flavored seasoning. These larger bags are especially helpful for food pantries that serve meals to large numbers of people. MFB Haiti also has an interest in creating la...

" ...by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: 'It is more blessed to give than to receive.' "  - Acts 20:35 It's a blessing to us at MFB to see so many people concerned about those in need. Elementary school children learn the value of thinking of others. High shool and college-age men...

  225 volunteers, 2.5 hours, 7,000 meal packets! That is what Midwest Food Bank, Resonate Church, and many volunteers accomplished on March 3. The math is even more powerful when you consider that each packet feeds four people - that's 28,000 meals. The Morton location of MFB is working with groups in central Illinois to organize and host even...

​ The Morton location started 2018 by packing and preparing a container of Tender Mercies is be shipped to Haiti. This was in cooperation with MFB's newly established Haiti Division. A total of 59,400 packets left the Morton warehouse in mid-January with a final destination of Haiti. Volunteers on the Tender Mercies machine worked diligently to fil...

  Midwest Food Bank Morton hosted the first ever "Feed the 5,000" event in November 2017. Three Morton churches, Bethel Lutheran, Blessed Sacrament and Grace Church, participated by sponsoring the cost of a pallet of Tender Mercies. Volunteers from each church worked together to pack their pallet, too. A pallet of Tender Mercies feeds 5,280 pe...

As a Salvation Army first responder, Midwest Food Bank is answering the call to send disaster relief food boxes to Texas. By the end of Hurricane Harvey, up to 100 inches of rain is possible. Already over 30,000 people are seeking temporary shelter. The extreme and widespread damage calls for long term relief efforts. Two semi loads of Family Food ...

  Midwest Food Bank volunteers become our best advocates and the Ingham family of Washington is a great example of that. They were encouraged to volunteer at Midwest Food Bank by the Otte family - regular volunteer leaders at the Morton Division. "We needed to find something that our family could do together and enjoy while serving our communi...

Midwest Food Bank is reaping the benefits of a newly expanding program. HATCH for Hunger is a partnership between Kroger Co., Rose Acre Farms and Elanco Animal Health to provide quality protein to undernourished people through the power of an egg. Originally started in 65 stores in central Indiana, HATCH recently expanded to 136 Kroger stores acros...