The Food Depot, Northern New Mexico's Food Bank, is holding its major fundraiser, the 15th annual Souper Bowl and silent auction, on Saturday. With the new Santa Fe Community Convention Center as the event setting, it promises to be a delicious and fun-filled event.

Sherry Hooper, director of The Food Depot, says the group hopes to draw a thousand guests and raise $50,000. People will want to come out to see the new convention center and support The Food Depot, too. The convention center, open since the end of September, is a green building — the city is working toward a Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design Silver certification. It's commendable that material from the Sweeney Center was recycled for the new complex. And an underground parking facility with space for hundreds of vehicles will make attending the Souper Bowl even easier than it has been in the past.

Each year since its inception, the Souper Bowl has grown. In 2008, its sponsorship pool doubled, and this year there are even more of them. Sponsors contribute important help with publicity, the cost of renting the convention center, prizes, and in-kind donations. The New Mexican, Los Alamos National Bank, The Framing Company, Hutton Broadcasting, Herbs, Etc., and Christus St. Vincent Regional Medical Center are some of the largest sponsors of the Souper Bowl.

Thirty-five restaurants will donate their time, staff members and food to compete in four soup categories: chunky, creamy, vegetarian and seafood. The winners will be decided by participants' votes. Here's how it works: Attendees receive a ballot with the four categories when they come into the fundraiser, and each restaurant has a ballot box. The voters tear off the ballot for the soup they like the best in each category and drop it in the restaurant's ballot box. Judges keep track of the votes and a large scorecard registers "touchdowns"; a football is placed beside the restaurant's name each time seven new ballots are cast for a particular soup (apparently they're counting the extra point). The big prize is Best Soup, which is kept a secret until the end of the evening.

Hooper says that the restaurants work hard at producing new and interesting soups each year, and many of the soups wind up on the restaurants' menus. Last year, Joe's Diner and Pizza won both awards for Best Seafood entry and Best Soup for its Thai Shrimp Bisque. Over the years, there have been many memorable soups that have attained a kind of cult status through the Souper Bowl, and some of them are gossiped about for months after the event.

The silent auction will have 50 to 75 donated items, enticing attendees to bid.

A new, exciting part of the Souper Bowl is the half-time show (just like at a real football game) by Demon Heat, the Santa Fe High School dance team, and Capital High School's Jazzy Cats.

The Souper Bowl is an exciting and entertaining way for the community to help an important hub in Northern New Mexico's food-distribution network for the needy. Although many Santa Feans haven't felt the economic crunch as much as other parts of the country, many locals are still in need. Hooper says there is a 20 percent increase in demand for food over last year, while donations have gone down slightly. After the holidays, people tend to focus on other things, and food and cash donations normally decrease.

The Food Depot's office has been hearing reports of small businesses closing or laying people off. Many of the new clients they see have the same story; they say, "It's so strange for me to ask for help; I used to be the one giving help!" An increase in grandparents raising grandchildren while living on a fixed retirement income means that more of them are turning to food stamps and food pantries to get by.

The Food Depot staff continues to see the numbers of the working poor growing. These are families with at least one person holding down a full-time job, but can't make ends meet. They have fixed expenses of rent or mortgage, plus utilities. Food is the most flexible part of the budget, and that is where families scrimp — or sometimes go without. The Food Depot is seeing more and more of the working poor at the food bank and at other food-distribution centers in Santa Fe and throughout Northern New Mexico.

Who donates food? Where does it go?

It has been said that there is plenty of food to go around in the world; the problem lies in the distribution. Waste and plenty live side by side with want and hunger in the United States. Food banks have come to be important coordinating centers for collecting food that would go to waste and redistributing it to those in need, providing some relief for the hungry.

How does a food bank work?

The Food Depot takes food from larger regional distributors as well as local food producers and sends it out to distribution points in seven counties in Northern New Mexico. Other nonprofits — including St. Elizabeth Shelter and The Salvation Army, or hot-meal programs like the soup kitchen at St. John the Baptist Catholic Church — then distribute the food as groceries or prepare it and serve it in hot-meal programs.

Eighty percent of the food is donated from local grocery stores, restaurants and bakeries. If those retailers can't sell an item, The Food Depot sends a truck to pick it up. Two trucks run constantly, picking up and delivering food on a daily basis. The Food Depot also serves individuals and families who can't reach another distribution center because of transportation or scheduling problems.

Large donations from national sources come into Feeding America, a network of food banks that receives donations from large food manufacturers. They often overproduce or test an item, and then send the overflow to national food banks, which then sends the food on to local centers like The Food Depot.

On the state level, The Food Depot is part of the New Mexico Association of Food Banks. A collaborative relationship provides the food banks with two sources of food. A produce initiative gives bulk produce to the seven food banks in the state.

A second source of food is a contract that the New Mexico Food Bank Association has with the New Mexico Human Services Department to distribute USDA commodities, known by the acronym TEFAP, The Emergency Food Assistance Program. When there is a food surplus on the market, the government buys it up as part of the Farm Bill. That surplus provides commodities like canned vegetables, beef stew, tomato sauce, dry milk, pasta and fresh eggs to food banks, which then distribute these items to the hungry.

The Food Depot also relies on donations of food and money from local benefactors. Some people buy extra nonperishable groceries when they shop and drop them off at The Food Depot offices. Others send checks. People are particularly generous around the holidays, and donations often drop off in January.

Sherry Hooper points out that a $1 donation will provide a meal for four; some workplaces hold food drives, which help collect nonperishable items, and individuals come in and volunteer. Anyone with a little extra time or money can help feed the hungry through The Food Depot. Call 471-1633, extension 14, and talk to Justin Peters to make a food donation, or dial extension 12 to make a cash donation.