SALINA, Kan. — Joe Kejr knows wheat.

"Not a real big one. Sometimes, you can see those in Kansas up to 20," said Kejr.

He's been farming it for quite a while.

"I graduated high school in '77 and kind of been farming since. It's kind of hard to believe how many years that's been, " he said.

Quite a while. You could say he knows a little bit about farming, especially wheat. The recent issues with the supply chain can keep him up at night.

I asked him which supply chain issue is most worrisome to him right now.

"Well, that probably changes by the hour, actually," he said.

Supply chain issues have been wreaking havoc on the farming industry for months, if not longer.

"It might be hard to get some of the fertilizers or parts that we need or even a tire that goes out on our air seater. You don't know if you're going to be able to get it," said Kejr.

But there could be an even bigger cloud hanging over the global supply of wheat – and other foods.

"You have 19-20% of the world's population with three times the amount of food that they need," said Jack Buffington.

Buffington is a supply chain economics professor at the University of Denver, and he's talking about China.

From this year's crop, China is expected to have 60% of the world's rice reserves, 51% of wheat, and 69% of corn. That's a lot of food.

"The food market is a global market, and prices are based on global markets, and for us, it translates into higher prices,"

The UN food price tracker reached an all-time high of 159.7 in March and dropped to just 158.5 in April, 30% higher than it was this time last year. That resulted in 5% inflation on a loaf of bread in 2022 in the US.

That's tough for working Americans trying to put food on the table. It's tough for Joe too. He doesn't have a lot of say about the price of wheat.

"We farm so we can help feed the world. You know, we care about people," Kejr said.

America's appetite for nostalgia is growing.

One example is in the snack aisle.

As people's snacking habits increased during the pandemic, many turned to old favorites instead of trying new products.

Companies are trying to capitalize by bringing back products from the recent past, like Dunkaroos and 3D Doritos, to appeal to millennials.

"It's what we like to call new-stalgia," said Carly Schildhaus, a senior public affairs manager for the National Confectioners Association. "Your favorite classic products, reimagined in different ways."

According to an NCA report released in May, the new-stalgic snacks are among the biggest snack trends of 2022.

The same report said s'mores would be a top flavor this year.

"People look to chocolate candy snacks for a little bit of joy or a little bit of sweetness in a challenging time," Schildhaus said. "People who grew up enjoying a traditional s'more might enjoy a different kind of nostalgic flavor in a different and new way."

Other trends include an increase in flavor intensity.

New candies and chips are marketed based on their level of heat or sour flavor.

Companies are also committed to offering a diverse array of options to cater to various consumer tastes.

"You might like something a little more classic. We have that for you," Schildhaus said. "But if you're looking to get a bit more experimental, we certainly have you covered there as well."

It remains to be seen if inflation will cause people to pull back on snack spending.

Grocery store spending remained steady during the 2008-11 recession, while restaurant spending fell about 18%.

The federal government is making it easier for farmers to grow food as the nation faces record inflation and supply chain issues.

The USDA is allowing farmers to insure a second crop planted and harvested on the same piece of land — a practice known as double or relay cropping.

One farmer in Iowa started planting a second crop back in 2016.

Until this week, it was illegal to insure his second crop — soybeans.

"That's why we have these meetings to help other farms understand what we're doing. That's why we push so hard with the insurance program. I went on my own without insurance. I could handle that, but I know for other farmers to transition they need that crutch," Loran Steinlage said.

The USDA said the goal is to help avoid a food shortage.

Watch the video above for the full story.

New research found that 35% of families in the United States that work full-time year-round do not have enough money to cover the costs of basic needs.

The study was conducted by researchers at Brandeis University’s diversitydatakids.org program at the Institute for Child, Youth and Family Policy.

Researchers said more than half of full-time working Black and Hispanic families cannot afford basic needs. The study showed that 25% of white families and 23% of Asian and Pacific Islander families who work full-time cannot afford basic needs.

According to the study, the situation is especially dire for low-income families with children. The researchers found that 77% of those who work full time do not earn enough to cover housing, food, and child care.

The researchers said that in order for families to afford the necessities, they should be making about $11.00 more per hour.

Black and Hispanic families would need to earn more than $12.00 per hour, the researchers said.

“Full-time work alone isn’t enough to cover the everyday essentials most families need to support themselves, which creates significant financial hurdles to support children,” said Pamela Joshi, Ph.D., senior research scientist and lead study author. “We’re seeing that full-time work provides even fewer necessary resources to Black and Hispanic families. That’s a problem because it drives inequities in child well-being. These results are a wake-up call for decision makers to prioritize policies that address income inequality and racial and ethnic equity and extend real opportunities for economic self-sufficiency.”

Queen Elizabeth II was the longest-reigning monarch in British history. She lived in the public eye for 96 years. But there are some things people may not know about the girl who was born in London.

HOME-SCHOOLING

Like many royals of her time and before, Elizabeth never went to a public school and was never exposed to other students. Instead, she was educated at home with Margaret, her younger sister.

Among those who taught her was her father, along with a senior teacher at Eton College, several French and Belgian governesses who taught her French, and the Archbishop of Canterbury, who taught her religion.

Elizabeth’s schooling also included learning to ride, swim, dance and the study of fine art and music.

“NO. 230873”

During World War II, young Princess Elizabeth briefly became known as No. 230873, Second Subaltern Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor of the Auxiliary Transport Service No. 1.

After months of campaigning for her parents’ permission to do something for the war effort, the heir to the throne learned how to drive and service ambulances and trucks. She rose to the rank of honorary Junior Commander within months.

‘GREAT MIMICKER’

Elizabeth often gave the impression of a serious demeanor, and many have noted her “poker face,” but those who knew her described her as having a mischievous sense of humor and a talent for mimicry in private company.

Rowan Williams, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, has said the queen could be “extremely funny in private — and not everybody appreciates how funny she can be.”

Bishop Michael Mann, the monarch’s domestic chaplain, once said that “the queen imitating the Concorde landing is one of the funniest things you could see.” Ian Paisley, the Northern Irish clergyman and politician, also noted that Elizabeth was a “great mimicker” of him.

ROYAL TAXPAYER

She may have been the queen, but she paid taxes too — at least since 1992.

When Windsor Castle, the queen’s weekend residence, was ravaged by fire in 1992, the public rebelled against paying millions of pounds for repairs.

But she voluntarily agreed to pay tax on her personal income. She said she would meet 70 percent of the cost of restoration work, and she also decided to open her home at Buckingham Palace to the public for the first time to generate extra funds from admission fees.

LITTLE LILIBET

The queen was christened Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor of York, in honor of her mother, paternal grandmother and paternal great-grandmother. But as a child, she was endearingly known as young Lilibet by her family — said to be because she couldn’t pronounce “Elizabeth” properly.

In a letter to her grandmother Queen Mary, the young princess wrote: “Dear Granny. Thank you very much for the lovely little jersey. We loved staying at Sandringham with you. I lost a top front tooth yesterday morning,” before signing off, “Love from Lilibet.”

The nickname became more widely known after Prince Harry and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, named their daughter Lilibet Diana in 2021.

A STEADFAST ROMANCE

Elizabeth and her husband Prince Philip enjoyed a stable relationship for more 70 years, a union that far outlasted the marriages of three of her four children: Charles, Anne and Andrew.

“He has been quite simply my strength and stay all these years,” the queen said of Philip on their 50th wedding anniversary.

Their story began in 1939, when Prince Philip of Greece, a handsome 18-year-old naval cadet, was detailed to entertain the 13-year-old Elizabeth for a day. Several years later, Philip was invited to join the royal family at Windsor Castle at Christmas, and he soon made discreet inquiries whether he would be considered an eligible suitor.

The couple married in Westminster Abbey in 1947. When Philip died in 2021 at age 99, Elizabeth described his passing as leaving a “huge void” in her life, according to their son, Andrew.

MULTIPLE BIRTHDAYS

Elizabeth was born on April 21, 1926, but it was sometimes confusing for the public to know when to celebrate.

There was no universally fixed day for her “official birthday” — it’s either the first, second or third Saturday in June, and was decided by the government.

In Australia, her birthday was celebrated on the second Monday of June, while in Canada, was marked on a Monday either on or before May 24, Queen Victoria’s birthday.

Only the queen and those closest to her celebrated her actual birthday in private gatherings.

HOW MANY CORGIS?

It’s widely known that Elizabeth loved corgis — Princess Diana reportedly called the dogs the queen’s “moving carpet” because they accompanied her everywhere.

She owned more than 30 corgis over the years. She also had two “dorgis” — crossbreeds of dachshund and corgi — named Candy and Vulcan.

Elizabeth was photographed hugging one of the dogs as far back as 1936 at age 10, and was given a corgi named Susan for her 18th birthday. The breed was introduced to the royal family by her father, King George VI, in 1933, when he bought a male corgi called Dookie from a local kennel.

As queen, she also technically owned the thousands of mute swans in open British waters, and had the right to claim all sturgeons, porpoises, whales and dolphins, according to a statute from 1324.

‘A PRETTY NICE GIRL’

The queen inevitably became the subject of pop songs.

The Beatles immortalized her with the tongue-in-cheek “Her Majesty,” calling her “a pretty nice girl” though “she doesn’t have a lot to say.” The brief song, sung by Paul McCartney and recorded in 1969, appeared at the end of the “Abbey Road” album.

Other musical treatments weren’t so kind. The Sex Pistols’ anti-monarchist “God Save The Queen,” released right before her Silver Jubilee in 1977, was banned on British television.

TEA AND SANDWICHES

Queen Elizabeth II reportedly loved jam sandwiches with her tea. She recorded a sketch ahead of the Platinum Jubilee celebration with Paddington Bear. She joked with the character, saying she kept her sandwich in her iconic handbag.

Crime scene tape did not stop a food delivery robot in Los Angeles from getting where it needed to be on Monday.

The Los Angeles Police Department had set up the tape at a suspected shooting at a high school, which later turned out to be a hoax, USA Today and "Today" reported.

According to the news outlets, the robot rolled down a sidewalk when it stopped at an intersection before the crime scene.

When it got to the police tape, it seemed to contemplate what to do until what appeared to be a TV cameraman lifted up the tape, and the robot continued on its way, the media outlets reported.

Officers looked a bit confused as it passed by them, the news outlets reported.

According to the news outlets, officers were called to Hollywood High School around 9:45 a.m. for reported shots fired call, USA Today reported.

The newspaper reported that Los Angeles School District's Superintendent Alberto M. Carvalho later tweeted that officers had determined the call was a hoax.

Did you know Americans will waste about 305 million pounds of food this Thanksgiving? That’s according to information from food waste nonprofit ReFED.

ReFED calculated that this year, approximately $15 in food waste will be generated by each dinner for 10 people. Production of this wasted food generates greenhouse gas emissions equal to driving 169,000 cars for a full year.

But there are some ways you can reduce your waste, according to ReFED.

One is to plan ahead by calculating the food for each person. Another tip is to develop a strategy for your leftovers by making sure you have the proper containers. Finally, it’s helpful to clean out your freezer and make room for everything you're saving.

Remember, most leftovers can stay in the fridge for 3 to 4 days. These items should be refrigerated within two hours after being cooked in a container that’s airtight, according to the USDA. Composting your food scraps is also a better option than throwing it in the trash.

If you do happen to have any cans or unopened items you didn’t use, the USDA recommends donating to your local food bank.

The hunt begins in darkness. Les Giese and his son Thor make their way through a public forest in Annandale, New Jersey to a tree stand where they’ll wait for dawn and if they’re lucky — a deer. We settle in, 25 feet above the ground, watching the sun rise through the trees. 

NEWSY'S SAM EATON: So what's the secret? You just. It's a matter of just waiting?

THOR GIESE: It's getting in between where they live and where they eat.  

After about four hours and no deer, we call it a day. We meet again on the trail with Thor’s dad, Les, who also came up empty. 

"They’re either running through the woods like a freight train or they’re like a ninja, you know," said Thor Giese. 

Les Giese and his son aren’t hunting deer for themselves. They’ve already filled their freezer with enough venison for the year. Any deer they get from now on will instead feed families in need. It’s a program run by the New Jersey chapter of Hunters Helping the Hungry and Giese is the president. 

"Right now, we're doing roughly 25,000 pounds of venison a year. Pretty close to 100,000 meals across the various food banks and pantries of New Jersey," said Les Giese. 

In the two and a half decades since he founded the non-profit with friends, Giese says it’s become one of the top three game meat donation programs in the country. But he says it’s not just about providing food for the hungry. It’s also about saving these forests. 

"A forest, a healthy forest like you see behind me here can handle 15 deer per square mile. This particular forest has probably got close to 150 deer, 10 times the carrying capacity of this forest," said Les Giese. 

And with one in 10 U.S. households struggling to feed their families Giese says hunting more deer as a source of lean, healthy protein is a no brainer. It’s also become a lifeline for New Jersey food banks. 

The problem of deer overpopulation in the forests of states like New Jersey is getting worse, but so is hunger. And it's places like this where the solutions to those two crises come together. 

Shannon Williams is interim director of Norwescap Food Bank in Phillipsburg, New Jersey. She says the warehouse we visited distributes two million pounds of food a year to food banks, soup kitchens and homeless shelters all over the state.  

SEE MORE: Inflation, Surge In Prices Impacting Food Banks

"This is the Norwescap Food Bank. This is our warehouse," said Williams. "And this is some of the venison that we received through the processors and through hunters helping the hungry and that we distribute to our agencies." 

Williams says the venison is in high demand, especially as the cost of providing meat to families has soared. 

"With the pandemic and now with the food inflation and the costs rising on everything, it's been very difficult and the need has just continued to rise. And we're we're doing our best to to keep food coming in and out as quickly as we can," she continued.  

From the rockies to New England and the deep South, white-tailed deer populations have exploded in recent decades. After being decimated by hunters in the 1930s, deer have made a stunning recovery, increasing one-thousand-fold in less than a hundred years. 

But the process has imperiled the same ecosystems that have sustained their recovery. 

Jay Kelly is a biologist at Raritan Valley Community College. He says more and more deer squeezing into smaller and more fragmented forests is sending the entire ecosystem into free fall. 

"So this is a typical forest in central New Jersey. What you see here, you'll find pretty much throughout the region. And what's noteworthy is the absence of any living things in the understory." 

"[At} about 15 [deer] per square mile regeneration starts to decline. The, you know, waist high seedlings will begin to disappear. And above 20 per square mile, everything begins to shut down in the forest with loss of bird populations, all components of the vegetative understory, arthropod, amphibian densities and so forth," said Kelly.  

In New Jersey deer densities usually exceed a hundred per square mile, creating what Kelly calls a zombie forest. Not only is the biodiversity lost, the only thing replacing the older trees as they die are invasive species like this Japanese angelica tree. 

"The canopy of leaves will come out of these angelica trees are these enormous compound leaves that have thorns on the stems of the leaf thorns and the leaf leaves and leaflets themselves. It's just armed with all sorts of defenses on every inch of the tree. It's really incredible," said Kelly. 

The good news is that once deer populations are reduced, the forest recovers.  

Duke Farms Nature Preserve in Hillsborough, New Jersey is a stark example of how quickly that change can happen.  

"So what you see here is about 15 to 17 years worth of regeneration since deer were initially managed aggressively at the site," said Kelly

Kelly says deer densities here reached 250 per square mile. After installing deer fencing and maintaining deer populations at much lower densities, the invasive species disappeared and the forest regenerated. 

"The trees that you see growing up, these are ash trees. There are hickory trees and oaks all growing in this understory," said Kelly. 

Kelly says short of reintroducing predators like wolves to these forests, hunting is the most effective means of reducing deer populations. But the number of hunters in the U.S. has been in steady decline since its peak in the 1980s. 

And in order to process the meat for food banks you need USDA certified butchers like J.B. Person’s family-owned Game Butchers in Lebanon, New Jersey. 

Person says his father started the business back in the 1960s.  

SEE MORE: Hunters Keep Food Pantries And Stomachs Full

"It's a pretty unique business — unfortunately. It's a dying trade," said Person.  

With grants now covering the cost of butchering for food banks, Person hopes more butchers will come online to help the program expand. In the meantime, he struggles to keep up. 

"And it doesn't last long. I mean, they come, they come pick up the meat — it sits in in their freezers for only maybe a week or two. And it's distributed and it's gone," said Person. 

That venison ends up at food banks. Flemington Area Food Pantry Executive Director Jeannine Gorman says they’re busier now than they’ve ever been. 

"We see anywhere from 50 to 70 clients, which pretty much means since COVID. And now in the height of financial inflation and everything else, we can see on average a person every three minutes," said Gorman.  

Cars line up to load pre-ordered food items. This is what the food insecurity crisis in America looks like. Bob Flanagan is one of them.  

"I'm self-employed, I'm a contractor. The bottom fell out after I got COVID because I can't work. I couldn't work," said Flanagan. 

Flanagan also used to hunt. But since COVID wrecked his lungs, forcing him to carry an oxygen tank with him at all times, he’s had to rely on the donations. 

"There's the venison. This is hamburger. I'll mix it up with the tomato sauce and make a spaghetti," said Flanagan.

It’s a rare thing for one crisis to help solve another. But Les Giese hopes the partnership he’s created between the state, the hunters, the butchers and the food banks offers a glimmer of hope. 

"We're trying to make the herd healthier. We're trying to make the forest healthier. We're trying to make some of the less fortunate people have some protein, low fat meat. Win win all the way around," said Les Giese. 

That night Giese, his family and friends gather to grill venison backstrap and share a meal.  

He says he grew up on a dairy farm in Illinois where sharing with neighbors was a way of life. And as the forests suffer, and more of his neighbors struggle to feed their families, Giese hopes that spirit of sharing will catch on. 

Newsy is the nation’s only free 24/7 national news network. You can find Newsy using your TV’s digital antenna or stream for free. See all the ways you can watch Newsy here. 

Food safety is a major concern after a power outage.

According to FoodSafety.gov, your refrigerator will keep food safe for up to four hours during a power outage.

A full freezer will keep food safe for roughly 48 hours.

People should not taste the food after a power outage to determine its safety.

According to the United States Department of Agriculture, refrigerators should be set to maintain a temperature of 40 degrees Fahrenheit or below.

Some refrigerators have built-in thermometers to measure their internal temperature. If your fridge does not, keep an appliance thermometer in the refrigerator to monitor the temperature.

The USDA says this can be critical in the event of a power outage. When the power goes back on, if the refrigerator is still 40 degrees Fahrenheit, the food is safe.

Foods held at temperatures above 40 degrees Fahrenheit for more than two hours should not be consumed, according to the USDA.

For tips on when to throw out certain refrigerated and frozen foods, click here.

The end of the year is a time to celebrate and reflect, but there are issues that made 2022 exhausting for many people. 

Breanna Dietrich, who lives in West Virginia, spent weeks searching for baby formula for her infant daughter when many shelves were bare nationwide. 

“Knowing where we were at, it still breaks my heart every day," she said.

Dietrich started a social media group earlier this year. It allowed people to post pictures of places they were finding the baby formula.

The formula shortage has improved since the middle of the year, but it's not over.

It's estimated roughly 87% of formula is now in stock.

However, nearly a third of adults with newborns at home said in a recent U.S. Census survey they’re still struggling to find what they need. Formula makers expect some shortages to continue until the spring.

Like the difficulty of finding the right baby formula, skyrocketing food prices is not an issue that will end in 2023.

Caterer Jessica Walks First said the ingredients she uses for her business doubled this year.

“They’ve gotten better in some aspects and in some aspects, they are still the same," she said.

Walks First's catering business specializes in Native American food. Her menu requires specific ingredients to be authentic, like wild rice, which she often buys from native growers on reservations.

In the fall, food and shipping costs were so high, she made 500-mile round trips herself, multiple times a month, to pick up the ingredients herself. Now, as 2022 comes to a close, she says she's in a better place.

“I’m not driving as much. I did find a good source for my wild rice where it now gets shipped to my house in 50-pound bags, so I have that going for me, which saves me 3-4 rides a month," Walks First said.

The USDA expects food prices to continue to rise in 2023 but not at the same rate as in 2022.

Walks First and Dietrich both are hopeful as another new year approaches.

“We get a little better back to the old normalcy," Dietrich said.

“I don’t do this as a job," Walk First stated. "This isn’t work for me. This is my passion, and my life dream, and I give it all I got."

A woman was killed and two others were injured when a Denny's sign fell on their car in Elizabethtown, Kentucky, authorities said.

The incident happened Thursday afternoon as the area was reportedly dealing with high winds.

A witness said the wind blew the Denny's sign from its post, causing it to crush the car in the parking lot. The front of the vehicle's car was smashed.

A 72-year-old woman inside the vehicle was rushed to a hospital in Louisville in critical condition. However, she was later pronounced dead.

The two other individuals inside the car are expected to survive.

Police are investigating the incident.

A spokesperson for Denny's released the following statement:

"Denny's is aware of the incident that took place at our Elizabethtown location on Thursday. Safety is our top priority, and we are working with the authorities to better understand what led to this situation. Our thoughts are with all of those involved."

Alzheimer’s disease is a complicated condition, and experts are still trying to figure out why some people develop it while others don’t. Now, a new study suggests that what you eat can play a role in your risk of developing Alzheimer’s — and two diets in particular may help lower your chances of developing the devastating disease.The study, which was published in the journal Neurology, examined the brains of more than 580 people who donated their body to Rush University’s Memory and Aging Project, which has been collecting annual dietary information and doing annual check-ups on study participants since 2004. The study analyzed data on the dietary habits of participants from 2014 through 2020 or 2021, and compared that with the number of plaques and tangles that were in each person’s brain during an autopsy.Plaques and tangles, in case you’re not familiar with them, are key markers of Alzheimer’s disease. In a person who has Alzheimer’s disease, beta-amyloid proteins clump together to form plaques that collect between neurons and interfere with cell function, according to the National Institute on Aging (NIA). Tangles are an accumulation of a protein called tau that collect inside neurons and interfere with communication between neurons, the NIA says.The researchers discovered that people who had eating patterns that closely followed the MIND or Mediterranean diets had almost 40% lower chances of developing Alzheimer’s disease than others.The researchers specifically found that green leafy vegetables were the most beneficial, with brain tissue from people who ate the most leafy greens looking nearly 19 years younger in terms of plaque buildup than those who only had one or less servings of leafy greens a week.The study raises a lot of questions about diet’s role in Alzheimer’s disease, as well as why these eating plans in particular may be helpful in lowering your risk. Here’s the deal.How can diet impact a person’s Alzheimer’s risk?There are a lot of potential factors that can influence your risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease, including genetics and aging, the NIA says. As for diet, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) says that it’s possible that what you eat may influence your risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease. The NIH also points to the MIND and Mediterranean diets as being especially helpful in the prevention of Alzheimer’s disease.“We and others previously found that healthy diets are associated with reduced dementia risk and better cognitive function in an aging population,” says lead study author Puja Agarwal, Ph.D., an assistant professor of internal medicine at the Rush University Medical Center in Chicago. What the latest study shows is that diet may be directly related to the formation of plaques and tangles in the brain, Agarwal says.“The exact mechanism of how diet and plaques and tangles relate needs further investigation and we speculated that there might be other mechanisms through which diet may impact the risk for Alzheimer’s disease,” she says.And, at a basic level, you are what you eat, says Amit Sachdev, M.D., M.S., medical director in the Department of Neurology at Michigan State University. “Diet is a metric for overall wellness,” he says. “In general. healthy body means healthy brain.”Why might the MIND and Mediterranean diets lower your risk of developing Alzheimer’s?Again, this is still being explored. However, there are some theories.“One of the proposed mechanisms is that both the MIND and the Mediterranean are plant-based diets rich in various essential nutrients and bioactive compounds that are required to maintain brain health,” Agarwal says. “They also have antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties which may help prevent amyloid burden and neuronal loss.”Dr. Sachdev agrees that the diets’ anti-inflammatory properties may play a role. “Some diets are better at controlling body-wide inflammation,” he says. “Unfortunately, the typical starch-heavy American diet is not a great choice.” However, he says, the Mediterranean and MIND diets “balance styles of food and portion size in a way that reduces overall burden of body inflammation.”Dr. Sachdev also notes that the Mediterranean diet in particular is linked to blood vessel health. “When we think of Mediterranean diet, we think of the health of blood vessels in the brain and reducing strokes. There is strong evidence for this,” he says. Research has also found that blood vessel issues are linked to an increased risk of Alzheimer’s.Mediterranean diet basicsThe Mediterranean diet is based on the lifestyles of people who live in the Mediterranean region, which includes Greece, Italy, and Spain, explains Jessica Cording, R.D., author of The Little Book of Game-Changers. It focuses on high intakes of vegetables, legumes, fruits, nuts, grains, fish, seafood, extra virgin olive oil, and some red wine. The diet also encourages followers to limit red meat, Cording says.“The Mediterranean diet is designed to be a lifestyle,” Cording says, noting that people on the diet are also encouraged to be active. Research has linked the Mediterranean diet with good heart health, optimal blood sugar levels, and a lowered risk of dementia.MIND diet basicsThe MIND diet (which stands for Mediterranean–DASH Intervention for Neurodegenerative Delay) is a form of the Mediterranean diet that focuses on plant-based foods linked to dementia prevention, according to the NIA. It specifically encourages people to eat from these food groups:Leafy green vegetables, at least six servings/weekOther vegetables, at least one serving/dayBerries, at least two servings/weekWhole grains, at least three servings/dayFish, one serving/weekPoultry, two servings/weekBeans, three servings/weekNuts, five servings/weekWine, one glass/dayOlive oil

The number of American kids in poverty went up by 3.7 million last month, partly due to the expiration of monthly child tax credit payments. That’s a 41 percent increase and the highest rate since the end of 2020.

Senior research fellow Zach Parolin said Black and Latino children are being disproportionately affected.

“In January 2022, one in every four Black or Latino children lived in monthly poverty, according to our estimates,” Parolin said.

Child tax credit payments were given to families from July to December of last year as part of the American Rescue Plan. The Internal Revenue Service paid out $250 per child aged 6 to 17 and up to $300 per child aged under 6. The payments reached more than 61 million children in over 36 million households.

“A massive policy success in terms of its impact on child poverty, in terms of its impacts on food hardship, and the evidence also suggests that at least for the six months that the policy was around, it didn't do much at all to affect rates of unemployment among parents who were receiving it,” Parolin said.

Robert Campbell, the senior Robert Campbelldirector of policy with Feeding America, says any resource to help get food on the table is important.

“While we can't speak directly to how individuals are using their child tax credit resources, we do know that households with low incomes often spend a large portion of their budget on food, upwards of 30 percent," Campbell said, "And we also know that food-insecure families often have to make tough choices between things like food versus rent or food and medicine.”

Despite the program’s success, there is no momentum to restore the child tax credit payments in Congress. Senators are split on whether to add a work requirement for families who receive the money. Regardless, both Campbell and Parolin say that investing in the country’s most vulnerable lifts everyone up.

“If you're low-income family, you receive these benefits when you have a young child, that child is less likely to face hardship and therefore is more likely to do better in school to go on and graduate high school and to experience a number of long-run benefits as a result of this policy,” Parolin said.

 

When it comes to a peanut butter cookie, getting the dough right is important -- but stuffing it with this delicious spread makes it all the more delectable.In order to get the perfect gooey center, mix peanut butter with powdered sugar, roll mixture into balls, then freeze them. This will prevent a peanut butter baking explosion.Check out the full recipe here.

The price at the pump and in stores is higher these days. The Consumer Price Index, from the end of 2021, shows inflation rose 7% from December 2020 to December 2021, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

“The two most important numbers are the headline number and that came in at 7% for the year 2021, the highest number since the early 80s. And the core inflation, the piece excluding food and energy, came at about 5.5%,” Nikolai Roussanov, a finance professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, said.

In the same year, Americans saw a 49.6% price increase in gas and a 12.5% increase in meats, poultry, fish, and eggs, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Economists say pandemic stimulus money contributed to some of the inflation, but is only partly to blame.

“When you have this tremendous amount of money coming into the economy, it stimulates aggregate demand. So that’s half of the story here. At the same time, the pandemic completely disrupted this incredibly complex and finely tuned machine we call the supply chain,” Connel Fullenkamp, an economics professor at Duke University, said.

Fullenkamp said inflation has been focused on goods rather than services.

“We have seen wages go up in the past year, but inflation has gone up so much it has eaten up all of those gains,” he said.

“Nobody wants to raise prices, so when you see food prices coming up in the supermarket, it is almost surely some function of rising input costs which are being passed on to consumers as minimally as possible,” Ricky Volpe, an associate professor in the Cal Poly San Luis Obispo Agribusiness department, said.

Volpe, who used to conduct food price research for the USDA, said it’s also important to look at the context of the numbers.

“Retail food prices today still remain lower in real terms than where they were a generation or two ago. Food prices have not skyrocketed relative to the U.S. dollar,” Volpe explained. “A lot of the major price increases that we’ve seen in the supermarkets pertain to more value added processed, ready-to-eat foods.”

People may want to consider what food prices are being compared to.

“Gas prices plummeted early in the pandemic. So for that reason, we should caveat some of the gas price inflation numbers saying that prices fell artificially at the start of the pandemic because of low demand,” Patrick De Haan, the head of petroleum analysis at gas price app GasBuddy, said. “We’ve never seen gas prices plummet so far and then jump so much in the course of a year and a half or so. But of course we’ve never lived through a pandemic and that's what's driving these price differences.”

Americans can expect to spend more of their money as demand and supply level out. Experts say it could take a while, depending on the commodity.

“I see it as lasting until the end of this year before things really start to get back to normal and those shipping costs and supply chain issues start to get really resolved. That's going to keep inflation higher than normal,” Fullenkamp said.

“The spring could be a very busy time, prices could surge, but then we do see some relief towards the end of the year as things slowly normalize back to where we were pre-pandemic in terms of oil production,” De Haan said.

When COVID-19 broke out in the United States, one of the first corners of life that was upended was grocery shopping: The aisles stood bare as the public stocked up, and then people turned to online shopping to stay safe in their homes.

But the transition online hasn't been seamless, according to a new study published Thursday.

Packaged foods are required by federal regulations to have nutritional facts and ingredients available for consumers to review when they are shopping in brick-and-mortar grocery stores. But information for some products in many online grocery retailers was not listed anywhere, the study published in Public Health Nutrition found.

"I think it's a misconception that people don't read the food labels," said study co-author Jennifer Pomeranz, an assistant professor of public health policy and management at New York University School of Global Public Health. "People who have been diagnosed with a disease or told that they are at risk for disease, the elderly, people with children ... people with allergies. ... People read food labels for different reasons, and it's incredibly important for safety purposes."

The study looked at 10 major national packaged products across nine online retailers at the start of 2021 and found that nutritional facts and ingredient lists were not included at all for almost 11% of products across retailers. In products that contained them, 63% did not disclose the presence of common food allergens, according to the study.

The United States Food and Drug Administration specifies what information needs to be available to consumers. That includes serving sizes, calories, added sugars, allergens, ingredients, and daily values of sodium, sugar, carbohydrates, fats and protein.

"I would argue that not disclosing the nutrition facts panel and the ingredients list, including allergens, is an unfair or deceptive act," Pomeranz said.

There is a limitation to the study in that the sample size is small, said Wendy White, industry manager for food and beverage at Georgia Institute of Technology, who was not affiliated with the study. White added that the small sample could limit the ability of the research to give an accurate look at the state of online nutritional information.

Keeping up with COVID-19

In a world where people are growing more conscientious about what is in their food, Pomeranz speculates that leaving out nutritional information is a strategy to sell packaged foods.

But White thinks the issue is more logistical than strategic.

"The pandemic changed everything for everyone," White said. "It really expedited the growth of (online) sales in a way no one could have anticipated, and so all of a sudden this became a forefront issue."

She added, "This is an excuse like any other, but I really do think with the pandemic a lot of retailers were caught unaware, and they really had to put together their online e-commerce platforms very, very quickly."

For a company looking to get a lot of products to many people quickly, it's a lot easier to put a picture of the packaging online than it is to make sure all the information is easily accessible, White explained.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is responsible for regulating labeling practices, and though White said the agency has taken steps to address the online information gap, it may take time.

"I think, the FDA, they are definitely taking steps to correct this gap that we currently have in some types of online food sales, but unfortunately the speed at which the FDA can create and then enforce regulations is notably slow," she said.

In the past, the FDA has recommended that online nutritional information be similar to its in-store counterpart, but "we acknowledge that most of our labeling requirements pre-date online sales practices," said FDA spokesperson Courtney Rhodes. The agency has been learning more about online labeling to inform recommendations and discussed the issue at an E-Commerce Summit in October.

"The FDA anticipates engaging further with stakeholders on the issue to inform next steps," Rhodes said.

People need to know

Whether for an allergy, diabetes, hypertension or even just being mindful of health, White said many people are cautious about what they eat.

"Understanding what is in a product, especially a formulated product, is vital to a lot of consumers out there," White said.

The U.S. has rules and regulations about how companies disclose nutritional information, which shows both what ingredients are in the food and how much of potentially harmful elements like sodium and sugar are in a serving.

"The American consumer has become very used to being able to access this information very easily. They're used to going to the supermarket, picking up that can, looking at the label and understanding exactly what is in that product," White said.

While policy on a national level might be slow going, the public can promote transparency from online grocery retailers with where they choose to spend their money, Pomeranz said.

"Online retailers have the ability to track our purchases and what we search for online, so it's important for people to know that they're not shopping on a blank slate," she said. "With that knowledge, it's worth looking around for retailers who do provide the information."

Pomeranz added, "It's becoming even more of a hot topic for younger consumers, and so obviously they may have a lot of spending power. So, it would be worth it for retailers to compete on that transparency aspect."

When it comes to healthy eating, there's more negative influence coming from social media than one may think.

A study published in the JAMA Network Open journal looked at some of the most followed accounts on Instagram and found an overwhelming number of their posts about food and drinks would be considered unhealthy by nutritional standards other countries have for advertising guidelines.

"If they post a single food post, or a single beverage post, this hits the news feeds of more people than the amount of people who are going to watch the Super Bowl a month from now," said Bradley Turnwald, one of the researchers for the study.

Turnwald studies factors that make people engage in healthy behaviors and what undermines their motivation.

"This can really contribute to a followers' perception of what is common, what is valued in society right now," Turnwald said.

The research also found half of all the drink posts were for alcoholic beverages. Past research has shown that the more exposure a young person has to alcohol, the more likely they are to drink.

But celebrity content isn't all to blame. When a celebrity posted something considered "unhealthy," the study found that they got more likes and comments than healthy food and drink posts, which incentivizes similar posts.

Turnwald also believes researchers would likely find similar trends in unhealthy food and drink posts among regular social media users.

"When a celebrity post something, and it can hit tens or hundreds of millions of feeds at once because they're looked up to as these role models and trendsetters in society," Turnwald said. "But if they would take those actions and post healthier foods and beverages, it could start to shift that norm of what followers are seeing and liking and commenting on, and I think that can have a really positive effect for public health."

PHILADELPHIA — A Philadelphia pizza parlor is hoping to help those who've been formerly incarcerated and are looking to revitalize the neighborhood.

“We’re at 28^th and Lehigh,” said north Philadelphia resident Abdulwahid Muhsin.

“It’s been a lot of violence in the neighborhood. You see the stuff changing around,”

Muhsin’s family has been in North Philadelphia for 70 years

“My grandmother bought the house in 1950,”

“These neighborhoods are just a byproduct of a neighborhood trying to survive on limited resources and trying to survive,” said Muhammad Abdul-Hadi.

He lives in the same neighborhood, believing the area is ready for some TLC.

“See, all these buildings are opportunities man, that’s how I look at them. These abandoned buildings are nothing but opportunities for something to come in that could potentially be a benefit to the community,” said Abdul-Hadi.

Abdul-Hadi puts his money where his mouth is, investing in a community restaurant: Down North Pizza.

“Down North Pizza is a mission-based for-profit restaurant. We exclusively hire formerly incarcerated,” said Michael Carter.

Carter spent 12 years of his life in prison.

Today he’s the executive chef at Down North Pizza.

“In Philadelphia, one out of every 23 persons out here in the workforce is on parole,” said Carter.

Two in 3 prisoners will get arrested within three years of their release, according to federal data published in 2021.

Four out of 5 will be arrested again within a decade.

It’s a trend that Down North and other businesses across the U.S. would like to reverse.

“Well, first of all, it's essential for you to know parolees to get jobs in general,” said Becky Trammell, an associate dean at Metropolitan State University Denver and has spent the better part of two decades studying prison populations in the US.

She says businesses like Down North are doing an essential job.

“It's not addressing the problem in the aggregate, but it will change lives. And it will help individuals, and so we need to support these types of programs that are doing something for this it's a big big problem,”

Muhammad wants people to stop seeing the formerly incarcerated as the enemy.

“The modern stereotype is that they’re evil, they’re bad people, they can’t get it right, which for the most part is the total opposite,” said Abdul-Hadi.

“If we keep dehumanizing these people and pretending like they're the monsters in the closet waiting for us to go to bed so that they can pick a machete for us, then we won't be. We won't have any incentive to try to do things to stop crying in the first place," said Tramell.

For Carter and some of his other coworkers, just because they’re out doesn’t mean they’re out.

“I’m on parole. So it’s like, I walk softly out here, every day. Do you know what I mean? Because any day one false move could mean I’m back on the other side automatically,” said Carter.

The hope is that Down North can represent redemption, both for its workers and community.

“We hope that it will get better. We hope that more businesses will open up to revitalize this,” said Muhsin.

WINTHROP, Maine — Spend a little time on Craig Hickman’s farm in central Maine and it’s clear he has a passion for growing his own food, something that for him that started early.

"My dad who was a Tuskegee airman on the ground, who probably would have been a farmer in another life, decided to turn our backyard in the inner city, the segregated inner city of Milwaukee into food," said Hickman, who is a Maine state senator.

"If you were dirt poor, but you could grow your food for yourself, then nobody could push you around and tell you what," he said.

Growing up how he did, his farm is not just a means for food, it’s his equal parts church and political ideology

"I feel like food is a ministry. Feeding oneself is a spiritual activity. It's a political activity. It's resistance, it's power," said Hickman.

It’s his strong, almost poetic views of food that are the fuel behind the state of Maine’s newest addition to its constitution: the right to food.

"If you have a right to life and liberty, if you have a right to obtain safety and happiness, which our Constitution says, then how can you not have a right to food?" he asked.

With 61% of the vote, Mainers passed the first in the nation right to food, which states that the people of Maine have the right to save and exchange seeds and the right to grow, raise, harvest, produce and consume the food of their own choosing for their own nourishment.

"More and more, we see if we don't write our rights down and explicitly protect them in constitutions, they can be infringed upon it anytime," said Hickman.

When you first hear of the concept it may sound like a no-brainer. However, according to research done by the University of Southern Maine, the state imports about 90% of the food Mainers consume, making it the state most dependent on outside sourcing of food.

With the pandemic tying up supply chains and stores baring empty shelves when demand shifted, Hickman sees the new amendment as giving people the power to opt-out of the commercial food chain.

"We take our food system for granted. We take our food supply for granted, but the pandemic proved to us we can't do that."

There is some opposition to the idea, including The Humane Society, which has expressed concerns about the legislation opening the door to animal welfare abuses. Hickman believes the existing language prevents that.

"We regulate, how you treat your cats and dogs, where we regulate humane and inhumane slaughter. Those things will not go away because of rights to food. There's language in the amendment that explicitly doesn't allow for the abuse of anything in the production of food, which would include animals," he explained.

The idea is picking up in other states with Washington and West Virginia working on right to food amendments of their own.

While the idea may catch on in other parts of the country, Hickman hopes more of his neighbors take steps to reclaim their power through food.

"Structures change. They don't change overnight. We have definitely thought put a different foundation under our food system. So, now, we'll see what we can build from it," he said.

CINCINNATI —

As a member of Crossroads Church in Oakley, Robbie Dufek said she has been inspired to give back.

"I'm a kind of giver that I do it for me, the joy that it brings me knowing that somebody else is going to receive the gift that I give them. I don't need to know who it is," Dufek said.

Knowing she's making a difference is what means the most to Dufek.

"It is just the act of giving that is important to me, and what I like to share and what my family likes to do," Dufek said.

Her family is one of the thousands participating in this year's Thanksgiving food drive through Crossroads.

Everyone who picks up a box is asked to load it up with a turkey and all the fixings.

"Each meal feeds six to ten people. So, across all Crossroads sites, we're looking at 100,000 people will be fed from all of these boxes throughout the region," said Keymonte Crooms, ReachOut Site Director at Crossroads in Oakley.

Boxes should all be filled by this weekend, just in time for the big-drop off. Like in past years, donors won't even have to get out of their cars to share a meal that feeds the soul.

"We've even had people see the collection going on and run to Kroger without a box and show up with plastic bags and say, 'Here's the food' and we'll have a box and can box it up for them that way," Crooms said.

Every box collected with then be distributed to 70 organizations throughout Greater Cincinnati that will then give Thanksgiving dinners to their members.

Anyone who wants to get involved can pick up a box at any Crossroads location.

Several industries have been disrupted since the coronavirus pandemic hit the U.S., including the food supply chain. From dumped milk to piles of uneaten onions and potatoes, this was just some of the food going to waste on farms across America due to COVID-19-related shutdowns.

“Really, its impact on the food supply chain started in March,” said Jack Buffington, a supply chain expert currently developing the supply chain program at the University of Denver. “Most of us who have been in the supply chain have never seen an event like this happen.”

While farmers were dumping or burying products, food banks were missing out on some much-needed supplies, and dealing with growing demand. So were grocery stores, as restaurants were closed and consumer buying habits changed.

“More of the retail food market went down and more of the consumer home food market went up,” Buffington explained. “This caused a major shock in the supply chain where you had this situation where some foods were going to waste and some foods were in high demand.”

First, the federal government stepped in to help. The USDA was given up to $3 billion through the Coronavirus Assistance Program to buy fresh produce, dairy, and meat from farmers and then distribute that to those in need.

And then there were nonprofit organizations like FarmLink.

“We matched a farm in Idaho, an onion farm, to our local food bank in Los Angeles,” Max Goldman with FarmLink explained. “We delivered 50,000 pounds of onions to them.”

He said that was their proof of concept.

Goldman is a student at Brown University. He and a group of students saw the disruption in the supply chain, and decided to do something about it.

“A lot of what we do is finding food that would’ve been sent to the dump,” he said.

So, FarmLink was born to help with food waste.

“We’ve done 2 million pounds in seven days,” Goldman said.

In just two months, they’ve reallocated 4 million pounds of food. They pay farmers their cost with donations and grants they receive, and help get the food to food banks. Goldman said the farmers are generally grateful

“One of the first farmers we worked with, he said the day he has to dump his food is the worst day of his life. He works all year to basically produce this food, and for him to have to dig a hole in his backyard and just take a dump truck and put all his potatoes and onions or whatever it is, he said it makes him cry, and it’s the worst day of his life,” Goldman said. “Even if he lost money on it, he was glad he could send this food to people in need during this time.”

So far, they’ve delivered food to approximately 30 states.

“This is not a new issue and it's been accelerated and made more public due to coronavirus, but every year there’s over 60 billion pounds of food waste,” Goldman said.

Buffington said the work of FarmLink and organizations doing similar work is just a drop in the bucket, but it’s promising.

“Small in scale of the overall supply chain, but it’s huge in this opportunistic saving of food,” he explained.

Buffington sees this type of work as a Band-Aid on the bigger issue, but it could open eyes to solutions down the road.

“Supply chains work really well on stability,” Buffington said. “It’s tough to think about innovation, which is disruption, when you're worried about a disruption to your current model.”

“I think when we pull out of this you’re going to see remarkable opportunities for innovation,” he said.

For now, FarmLink and other organizations are working to make sure food doesn’t go to waste. Goldman’s goal is to move over a million pounds of food a day.

“We’ve had tens of thousands of people reaching out wanting to help, and that’s just so uplifting and really gives you hope,” Goldman said.

For those who didn't learn what a perennial grain crop is as a kid, it's like the grass you see on the side of a road that comes back year after year, except it's capable of growing food humans can eat. 

The agriculture industry faces an immense challenge.

It needs to feed a growing population, but the process of providing that growing population tends to take an environmental toll on our planet. So scientists are using new technology and innovation to come up with solutions.

Kernza is essentially a cousin of wheat. It tastes sweet and nutty.

And its roots store carbon in the ground to help prevent soil erosion and water runoff. Unlike annual grain crops like wheat, oats, and corn, Kernza doesn't need to be tilled or replanted every year.

But Kernza wasn't born this way. Lee DeHaan and his team at The Land Institute in Kansas selectively bred it. And if there were an award for best plant parent, DeHaan would win gold.

"I grew up on a farm in Minnesota, and I heard about the idea of perennial crops when I was still a kid and wanted to develop a perennial grain crop," DeHaan said. "Every plant gets labeled and identified, and a couple of months ago, I took a small piece of leaf, and we essentially do '23andMe' for plants."

The process helps predict how each plant will perform, how tall it'll be, how much seed it'll grow, and how large its seeds will be.

"Wherever humans have gone and done agriculture, we've seen a massive loss of soil carbon and soil quality," DeHaan said. "That carbon is now in the atmosphere, and part of the solution to climate change is to get that carbon back in the soil."

DeHaan says it'll take decades to transform the developing crop from a specialty crop to a large-scale one, but for the plant parent whose devotion has sustained over 20 years, it's a dream DeHaan plans to see through.

Lauren Magarino at Newsy first reported this story.

“We started five years ago selling out of our house and now its expanded into this,” Anahi Mendivil said.

She works at Oasis Fresh Fruit & More, along with her mother, Haydee Caraveo.

“When the whole COVID thing started, it was just me, my mom, and my sister who were running and working, No one else was working with us and that's how we were able to maintain a bit of a budget with this less of a profit," Mendivil said.

Mendivil and her family members know the pains of running a business -- especially now during the pandemic. She helped translate for her mom.

“Now that people have been able to come back inside, it's been a little better but we’re just trying to adjust to all the new norms,” Mendivil said. “But sales have not been normal as they used to be.”

Their experience reflects what many Latinos are facing. A new study from Pew Research shows Hispanic businesses were hit especially hard by COVID-19. In May 2020, nearly six in 10 said they live in households that experienced job losses or pay cuts, compared to 43 percent of the overall U.S. population.

“Hispanic businesses however went from a 3.9 to nearly 20 percent unemployment, so it jumped a lot more than it did for whites and African Americans,” Jack Strauss, an economist and professor at the University of Denver, said.

“Less than a year ago,” he explained, “Hispanic businesses in general and Hispanic unemployment nearly matched that of the overall U.S.”

He said one of the reasons this group was hit hard, is because so many Hispanic-owned businesses make up some of the hardest-hit industries.

“Hispanics tend to concentrate in leisure and hospitality, which we all know has been hit very hard by COVID. Their second industry is retail, and then construction as well. All three industries were hit severely hard,” Strauss said.

“We work in the service industry, we are in restaurants, we are in cleaning services, we work in the meat industry, and Latino workers, they don't have the privilege to work from home,” Berenice G Tellez, Secretary of the Latino Chamber of Commerce in Denver, Colorado, said in a group Zoom meeting to discuss the topic. They all spoke about how language barriers played a role in the immediacy and availability of new information to Latino businesses owners.

“Some of them are running on fumes, so to speak,” Pete Salas, chair of the chamber said.

And many Hispanic-owned businesses are family run -- like Oasis.

“We've always tried to keep someone in our family working at all times,” Mendivil said.

Another aspect unique to these businesses, is they provide cultural space for the community.

“Something that really changed also is that people used to come in here on weekends. And a lot of people would be in here and eat and stay a long time and due to this, we have to manage how much people can be in here and how much time,” she said.

“I want to share the Americado experience, which is part of my Mexican culture, with everybody,” Francis Nieve Blanca, owner of Volcan Azul Catering and Food Truck, said. “The impact has been really on the amount of clients that we have, it has totally lowered our clients.”

“I have two jobs and the income for both actually has gone down, and that has impacted my family,” she said.

In a recent Pew Research survey, 70 percent of Latinos said the worst of the problems due to COVID-19 are still to come.

“This impact is going to last probably up to several years,” Strauss said.

However, these businesses aren’t ready to give up.

“We’ve been trying to incorporate new technology which is not very common for us,” Mendivil said. “So we can maybe go into doing deliveries.”

“It’s like my mom said, when money is not enough, you just tighten your belt. It's a saying in Spanish. Apretarse el cinturón, meaning that you just spend less,” Nieve Blanca said.

The first day of fall is just one week away and restaurants are preparing to take another hit.

“A lot of us are going into these months thinking, you know, how many more days can I survive until I have to close my restaurant?” said Kevin Boehm, a co-founder of the Boka Restaurant Group, an independent restaurant coalition.

Boehm is also a restaurant owner in Chicago, where COVID-19 restrictions have slashed indoor capacity. And he says outdoor seating won't be possible much longer.

The National Restaurant Association surveyed owners around the country. About three quarters say they're using patio space right now and hope to continue doing so for a least a few more weeks.

Outdoor dining is bringing in nearly half of their daily sales but keeping customers outside will soon get more costly.

“Equipment for outdoor dining, especially when it gets cold, get expensive, be it a tent for a parking lot, be it heaters or anything like that, that starts adding up in costs,” said Mike Whatley, VP of State and Local Affairs at the National Restaurant Association.

The association wants local governments to start grant programs for buying that equipment to keep temporary regulations in place that allow for more outdoor service.

The coalition hopes to see increased indoor capacity for cooler months. They're also lobbying for Congress to pass the Restaurants Act, which would create a $120 billion grant program for independent restaurants.

Boehm says there could be rolling closures through the winter.

“By the time we get to next summer, we're going to be looking at a much smaller array of restaurants, a lot less choices, a lot more chains, and the independent restaurant is going to be an endangered species,” said Boehm.

The National Restaurant Association says owners that are innovative are the ones that will make it through this crisis.