Event
Central Oregon Fill Your Pantry
Saturday, November 7, 2026
The 11th annual Central Oregon Fill Your Pantry is Saturday, November 7, 2026, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the OSU Extension parking lot at the Deschutes County Fairgrounds in Redmond. It's a bulk-buying farmers market where local farmers, ranchers, orchardists, and producers sell in winter-storage quantities, like 50-pound bags of potatoes and 25-pound boxes of ground beef, so you can stock your pantry, freezer, and root cellar with local food for the winter. Vendors accept SNAP/EBT and Farm Direct Nutrition Program vouchers, and the Bend Farmers Market runs the token exchange and Double Up Food Bucks.
This year Fill Your Pantry, the High Desert Food & Farm Alliance, and the Bend Farmers Market are again running Fill All Pantries, a community campaign to raise $75,000. The first $15,000 buys vegetables, fruit, meat, and bread from local farmers, ranchers, and bakers to give away free at the event to anyone in need. The rest supports the Bend Farmers Market's Protein Perks match for SNAP shoppers and HDFFA's VeggieRx produce prescription program.
There are more ways to help on the day. Bring canned or packaged goods for the Bend and Redmond Food Projects, which collect for local food pantries, or buy an extra bulk item and hand it to HDFFA, which passes fresh food along to NeighborImpact and its partner pantries. You can also donate, spread the word, or volunteer at a food pantry or at Fill Your Pantry itself. The organizations below are taking part, and they welcome volunteers all year.
Organizations taking part
A Bend-based nonprofit (formerly Central Oregon Food Policy Council) supporting a healthy, thriving local food and farm network in Central Oregon through food access programs, farmer support, and consumer education.
Volunteers glean and collect fresh produce for the Grow & Give food access program, assist at Farmers Market fresh food drives, provide general office and event support, or serve on Food Security and Agricultural advisory committees.
Boundless Farmstead is a 20-acre mixed vegetable farm 15 miles east of Bend, growing without chemicals, sprays, or GMOs and with a focus on soil health, low waste, and community. The farm sells to more than two dozen restaurants and grocery stores, offers a CSA, and is a longtime vendor at the downtown Bend farmers market and Central Oregon Fill Your Pantry. Boundless is a for-profit family farm with a seasonal workshare volunteer program.
Workshare volunteers help tend the farm's medicinal herb garden through the growing season: spreading bark chips, weeding, planting, harvesting, and drying herbs. It's a regular weekly half-day shift with a season-long commitment, and volunteers take home a family's share of vegetables each week. No experience needed, but the work is physical. Apply by email with a cover letter.
The Giving Plate is a Bend food pantry offering dignified, choice-based food relief. Guests shop for free at its Community Store, children pick their own food at the Kid's Korner Market, a mobile pantry bus reaches rural communities, and weekend food packs go to students in Bend-La Pine schools. In 2024 it served more than 97,000 people and distributed nearly 1 million pounds of food.
Volunteers sort donations and produce, assemble orders, and unload trucks at the distribution center; drive or ride along on food pickups around Bend (clean driving record required); help at food drives and special events; and collect and sort food during Bend Food Project drives. Ongoing volunteers apply online, and school, work, and court-ordered service hours are welcome (16-hour minimum).
Central Oregon's first nonprofit cannery, launched in 2025 to reduce farm food waste and fight food insecurity. It collects surplus produce from area farms that markets can't absorb and turns it into healthy, shelf-stable jams, sauces, pickled vegetables, and soups, supporting local growers while getting local food to families year-round.
Volunteers help glean and collect surplus produce from local farms, prep and process fruits and vegetables in canning sessions, label and package finished goods, and support distribution to food access partners, plus outreach and fundraising events.
The Redmond Food Project keeps St. Vincent de Paul of Redmond's food pantry stocked year-round through a simple neighbor-to-neighbor model. Launched in 2020 and patterned on the Bend Food Project, it enlists Redmond households as long-term food donors who fill a reusable green bag every two months, collected by volunteer Neighborhood Coordinators, turning small, regular gifts into thousands of pounds of food and meals for local families.
Neighborhood Coordinators are the heart of the project: they recruit neighbors as food donors, hand out reusable green bags, and on the second Saturday of every other month collect the full bags and leave empty ones, then deliver the food to the pantry. Food Donors simply fill a green bag with a few extra nonperishables over two months. Families often collect together, and kids love helping.
The Bend Food Project, a division of The Giving Plate, is an all-volunteer neighborhood food drive. Every two months, neighbors leave a green bag of nonperishable food on their doorstep, and volunteer Neighborhood Coordinators collect the bags and bring them to The Giving Plate's warehouse. Each full bag equals about ten meals for neighbors in need.
Three easy ways to help: be a food donor (about 15 minutes a month, filling a green bag every other month), become a Neighborhood Coordinator (about an hour a month, collecting your neighbors' bags on the second or third Saturday of even months), or join the support team unloading and sorting food at the warehouse during collections. It's a great fit for families and neighborhoods.
A nonprofit serving Crook, Deschutes, and Jefferson counties through food access, housing stability, child care, and financial services, empowering individuals and families to succeed.
Volunteer opportunities include sorting and packing donated food, supporting warehouse operations, and helping with group service days for corporate and community groups across food, housing, and family support programs.
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