LeAnn House teaches piano, harpsichord and music theory at the College of St. Scholastica. She doesn't just make beautiful music, however, she also makes pies -- and enlists her students in the effort.
It's all for good cause, says Meg Kearns, the food shelf director for CHUM, the program that benefits from the sales of the pies.
"We receive cans and cans of pumpkin each year, many more than we can distribute," said Kearns. She said when House learned about the supply, she began the annual pie sales.
Starting early in the morning on Oct. 3, students will be mixing, rolling, filling, and baking pumpkin pies, available for sale, for $10 each, that afternoon at First United Methodist Church. The sale runs from 1 to 5:30 p.m. Leftover pies will be frozen and distributed to food-shelf guests for their Thanksgiving meals.
Kearns says the CHUM food shelf is in need of support, with average food costs rising from 22 cents per pound to 28 cents per pound over the last year. In the first 6 months of this year, food costs for the food shelf have increased by 84 percent, on top of a 135 percent increase from last year, she reports.
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"We are seeing more people in need of food assistance and they are returning more often. It has become more difficult," Kearns said, "to keep our food shelves full."
