• Missouri's low-income residents can qualify for food stamps to use for grocery shopping.veggie stand image by Mat Hayward from Fotolia.com
  
  The food stamp program in Missouri offers a way for the state's low-income residents to have access to healthy, nourishing meals. The primary benefit is a monthly allowance for buying food from supermarkets and other retail locations. Certain residents, including especially impoverished households and the elderly, may qualify for additional services.
  
  

Grocery Purchases

• Qualifying households receive a Missouri Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) card, which is similar to a bank debit card. You can use your EBT card to make purchases at most grocery stores, supermarkets and convenience stores. Merchants that accept the EBT card display a "Quest" symbol with a grocery bag logo on the lower left corner. You can buy almost any foods with your EBT card, but not hot foods or food that has been prepared for immediate consumption. You cannot buy alcohol or tobacco, but you can buy seeds and plants from which to grow food.
  
  

Expedited Food Stamps

• If your need for food stamps is urgent, you may qualify for expedited food stamps. These are available within a week of your application. To qualify, your monthly income must be no more than $150 before taxes, and the value of your liquid resources must be no more than $100. Alternatively, you must have basic shelter and utility expenses that are greater than the combined total of your current income and liquid resources, or be a seasonal farm worker or destitute migrant with liquid assets of less than $100. If you do not qualify for expedited stamps, the state has 30 days to process your application.
  
  

Meal Service Delivery

• You may be able to use your food stamp benefits to buy meals that an authorized, nonprofit meal delivery service will prepare and deliver to you. To qualify for this service, you must be at least 60 years old and have a verifiable physical handicap or disability that prevents you from adequately preparing meals. If you qualify for this service, your spouse can also buy prepared meals even if she is younger than 60 or does not have a disability.
  
  

Communal Dining

• Residents of senior citizens' centers or certain assisted-living residences may be able to use food stamps to buy meals at their communal dining facility. The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food and Nutrition Service must have authorized the facility to accept food stamps. An individual can use food stamps at such a facility only if he or she is at least 60 years old, or receives Supplemental Security Income and does not live in a commercial boarding house or an institution.