All month, we've looked at the invisible crisis of hunger in our cities—how it intersects with homelessness, health, access, and affordability. We've talked about people eating dollar meals because they have no kitchen, skipping food to pay for transit, and developing chronic illnesses from diets shaped by scarcity.

If you've walked through a grocery store or ordered takeout recently, you've felt it. Our fridge broke down a few weeks ago, and we had to order food for three days while waiting on a replacement part. Nearly $70 for some Chinese takeout for a family of four, and that was just dinner! Prices like that aren't just inconvenient. They’re unsustainable.

A while back, I met a woman who had just moved into a shelter after months of living in her car. She told me she'd been eating fast food almost every day, not because she liked it, but because it was the only thing she could get. No kitchen. No fridge. No place to store leftovers. She was working odd jobs and surviving day-to-day, so anything that required prep or cleanup was off the table—literally. That left her with the dollar menu.