SAN ANTONIO – San Antonio “foodies” brought back a hashtag to do some good in their community.
Gabrielle Gonzales, known online as ‘Siempre San Antonio,’ challenged people on social media to the #FoodiesFillingPantries challenge.
“We have a platform and we should be using our platform for the good of our community,” Gonzalez said. “So I decided, let me do a little challenge and get my foodie friends involved.”
Food influencers will tag each other on social media with the hashtag #FoodiesFillingPantries. It challenges them to go to the store, fill up a grocery cart and then take those items and fill up a food pantry.
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“Thanks to her list, I was able to find a pantry near my home and I went and I filled up the pantry,” Rick Rodriguez said.
Rodriguez runs the Instagram account ‘Random Acts of Snacks’. He was challenged to participate in the challenge this year and said it felt great to give back to the community.
“It’s been some tough times right now for some folks,” Rodriguez said. “It was bare, so I was glad to help. I’m hearing that from the other foodies as well, that they’re seeing the same but they’re happy to help and donate.”
The food pantries didn’t have much in them on Sunday afternoon. The hashtag is coming back into the social media realm as SNAP benefits did not arrive on time and federal employees were not getting paid.
“Folks will sometimes put out calls [to fill the pantries], especially during the holidays, or especially when they hear about the shutdown, knowing that folks are gonna not have their SNAP benefits,” Sylvia Mendoza said.
Mendoza manages one of the food pantries in San Antonio. She said she loves when people donate because the community can rely on each other when people are in need.
“People will take it upon themselves to organize, to bring things and to fill the pantry and it’s just the best thing to know that that’s how people from San Antonio are,” Mendoza said.
The goal is to start with food influencers and hopefully encourage everyone in the community who can give back, to fill up a pantry when they can too.
“If it’s just a couple of bags of beans, go for it,” Gonzalez said. “That will help a family in need.”
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