Wait, what? If you're hungry, nutritious food (canned beans and such) will cost less than $5 a day. And that's without cooking. If you can boil water, you can save some money and increase the variety of food available to you.
Ah yes, surely the issue must be that people aren't eating enough poverty meals of canned beans and rice. Meat is obviously only for wall street investors
Meat is obviously only for wall street investors
When you need to cut your food budget and still want meat, you watch for meat sales, buy a bunch and freeze it. A vacuum sealer is fantastic for this since it lets you split stuff into single meal portions and seal it. Most grocery store meat departments will also willing to cut roasts and the like into pieces for you if you ask and that doesn't change the price - usually buying a pork loin and asking them to cut it into chops will be cheaper than just buying chops, for example. For quick meals pre-prepping a bunch of taco meat, meatloaves, chili or the like and freezing it is a great time saver.
Around here ground beef and pork loin go on sale pretty often, just a few weeks ago we had pork loin for $1.89/lb and discounted 85/15 ground beef.
Sardines are a great (and cheap!) source of protein and they're super nutrient dense. Tons of vitamin d, b, fish oils. This has little to do with the topic at hand, I just got turned onto sardines as someone that wrote them off my entire adult life and they're awesome!
On topic though, I love threads like these because we get to see all of the middle/upper middle class nepo-babies come out with their advice on how to manage living with a level of poverty they have clearly never experienced. Always such a special time.
they also have a fuckload of sodium
Nope! I have hypertension, so I'm extremely sodium conscious, out of necessity. The king Oscar tins we buy have 350mg of sodium in them, which is around 15% DV. That's not much compared to pretty much all red meats..
Havent you heard? You're not supposed to eat meat anyway.
This but unironically.
When milk of $5+ a gallon in most of the country, the solution isn't as simple as "cook at home" for those of us with a family to feed. Young Americans don't mean just 24 year olds.
Yeah the price of food for one person is easily doubled now. If you are single it's hard enough but if you have a family of 4 it's insane
We buying a neighborhood cow. What are they gonna do about it?
I have a toddler and cook at home. What exactly is your point here, I don't understand. Rice, beans, meat, produce call all be had for cheap. Milk IS one of the more expensive foods but it'll last two weeks, is probably a poor example when you can also buy 2lbs of pork for $6.
Your claim of two pounds of pork for $6 does not line up with Kroger's meat pricing.
But your link shows a half loin being sold for $2.50/lb, and a pork shoulder being sold for just over that.
Your claim of two pounds of pork for $6 does not line up with Kroger’s meat pricing.
You could easily do this if you buy on sales or close dated and freeze. Last time I bought pork it was pork loin on sale from a Piggly Wiggly at $1.89/lb. Buy several, ask the meat dept to cut them into chops if they will (or do it yourself if they won't) separate into single meal for the household portions, bag and freeze. They'll last even longer if you use a vacuum sealer.
We do basically the same with ground beef - buy a bunch when there's a sale, pre-prep some of it into taco meat, meatloves, chili, etc then portion, bag and freeze.
I guess that's true. I don't think we should be buying so much meat (if any) to begin with... I wouldn't ban it or anything, but Kroger or whoever selling nearly-expired meat for very low prices is not going to help matters. The only thing I can say for it is that at least they're attempting to avoid just throwing it out.
selling nearly-expired meat
For most things expiration dates are bullshit that's more about profits or product flow than safety. Most things are usually more than fine for at least a few days after, and freezing meat extends it's safe life by months.
To give you an idea how much expiration dates are bullshit, if you've ever been to a Sam's they sell these enchiladas, pasta and the like that are just throw in the oven for a bit and eat and they're all made with shredded chicken. They make these things in house, and they're all chicken because the chicken comes from unsold rotisserie chickens that have been out too long that they pick all the meat off and shred. Because the expiry on them isn't actually about food safety, and pulling them off the shelf, shredding and repackaging as chicken enchiladas or chicken pasta alfredo or whatever lets them invent a new mostly bullshit expiry date for the same chicken.
Toddlers don't eat very much. I feeding a family of four including two teens. My point is that while individual foods are cheap, a balanced diet is still expensive, especially the foods for growing children. Milk, eggs, fresh produce, unprocessed meats, all are significantly more expensive than they were 5 years ago. Hell, even uncooked rice is up to $1/pound.
I'm so excited for my new all-canned beans diet.
What if I told you that you don't need the processed foods you've been eating your whole life? Shocking I know.
You "I can't afford food"
Them "here's food you can"
You "no not like that! I need muh Doritos to be happy like the commercials tell me!!"
Most people in Mongolia eat one thing their entire lives and are fine.
I buy vegetables and meat mostly. are those luxury foods now? Last I checked that was just food.
fresh food is a luxury in the usa, yes.
i was grew up in a bottom 50% household. most of my childhood diet was sugary snacks, canned/boxed foodstuffs, and frozen meat/vegetables. fresh food was largely reserved for holidays. my mother used to spend about 60/week to feed a family of four, and this was after coupons and in the 1990s
So it's either 'bag of doritos' or 'eat all canned beans for the rest of your life.'
Most people in Mongolia eat one thing their entire lives and are fine.
This is just utter horse shit and it also sounds based in bigotry.
I like how some Americans aren't even pretending to strive to be the best nation anymore but just saying "eat like people in impoverished countries".
Like, people in Mongolia or for example my parents when they lived in El Salvador didn't eat beans every single day because they wanted to or enjoyed it - it's because there literally was no upward mobility and the oligarchy kept it that way.
You're the person who centuries ago would be defending the king as you ate only oats for the 10th day in a row because some other kingdom had minor starvation.
Wait, what? If you're hungry, nutritious food (canned beans and such) will cost less than $5 a day. And that's without cooking. If you can boil water, you can save some money and increase the variety of food available to you.
Ah yes, surely the issue must be that people aren't eating enough poverty meals of canned beans and rice. Meat is obviously only for wall street investors
When you need to cut your food budget and still want meat, you watch for meat sales, buy a bunch and freeze it. A vacuum sealer is fantastic for this since it lets you split stuff into single meal portions and seal it. Most grocery store meat departments will also willing to cut roasts and the like into pieces for you if you ask and that doesn't change the price - usually buying a pork loin and asking them to cut it into chops will be cheaper than just buying chops, for example. For quick meals pre-prepping a bunch of taco meat, meatloaves, chili or the like and freezing it is a great time saver.
Around here ground beef and pork loin go on sale pretty often, just a few weeks ago we had pork loin for $1.89/lb and discounted 85/15 ground beef.
Sardines are a great (and cheap!) source of protein and they're super nutrient dense. Tons of vitamin d, b, fish oils. This has little to do with the topic at hand, I just got turned onto sardines as someone that wrote them off my entire adult life and they're awesome!
On topic though, I love threads like these because we get to see all of the middle/upper middle class nepo-babies come out with their advice on how to manage living with a level of poverty they have clearly never experienced. Always such a special time.
they also have a fuckload of sodium
Nope! I have hypertension, so I'm extremely sodium conscious, out of necessity. The king Oscar tins we buy have 350mg of sodium in them, which is around 15% DV. That's not much compared to pretty much all red meats..
Havent you heard? You're not supposed to eat meat anyway.
This but unironically.
When milk of $5+ a gallon in most of the country, the solution isn't as simple as "cook at home" for those of us with a family to feed. Young Americans don't mean just 24 year olds.
Yeah the price of food for one person is easily doubled now. If you are single it's hard enough but if you have a family of 4 it's insane
We buying a neighborhood cow. What are they gonna do about it?
I have a toddler and cook at home. What exactly is your point here, I don't understand. Rice, beans, meat, produce call all be had for cheap. Milk IS one of the more expensive foods but it'll last two weeks, is probably a poor example when you can also buy 2lbs of pork for $6.
Your claim of two pounds of pork for $6 does not line up with Kroger's meat pricing.
https://www.kroger.com/pl/pork-ham/05006
But your link shows a half loin being sold for $2.50/lb, and a pork shoulder being sold for just over that.
You could easily do this if you buy on sales or close dated and freeze. Last time I bought pork it was pork loin on sale from a Piggly Wiggly at $1.89/lb. Buy several, ask the meat dept to cut them into chops if they will (or do it yourself if they won't) separate into single meal for the household portions, bag and freeze. They'll last even longer if you use a vacuum sealer.
We do basically the same with ground beef - buy a bunch when there's a sale, pre-prep some of it into taco meat, meatloves, chili, etc then portion, bag and freeze.
I guess that's true. I don't think we should be buying so much meat (if any) to begin with... I wouldn't ban it or anything, but Kroger or whoever selling nearly-expired meat for very low prices is not going to help matters. The only thing I can say for it is that at least they're attempting to avoid just throwing it out.
For most things expiration dates are bullshit that's more about profits or product flow than safety. Most things are usually more than fine for at least a few days after, and freezing meat extends it's safe life by months.
To give you an idea how much expiration dates are bullshit, if you've ever been to a Sam's they sell these enchiladas, pasta and the like that are just throw in the oven for a bit and eat and they're all made with shredded chicken. They make these things in house, and they're all chicken because the chicken comes from unsold rotisserie chickens that have been out too long that they pick all the meat off and shred. Because the expiry on them isn't actually about food safety, and pulling them off the shelf, shredding and repackaging as chicken enchiladas or chicken pasta alfredo or whatever lets them invent a new mostly bullshit expiry date for the same chicken.
Toddlers don't eat very much. I feeding a family of four including two teens. My point is that while individual foods are cheap, a balanced diet is still expensive, especially the foods for growing children. Milk, eggs, fresh produce, unprocessed meats, all are significantly more expensive than they were 5 years ago. Hell, even uncooked rice is up to $1/pound.
I'm so excited for my new all-canned beans diet.
What if I told you that you don't need the processed foods you've been eating your whole life? Shocking I know.
You "I can't afford food" Them "here's food you can" You "no not like that! I need muh Doritos to be happy like the commercials tell me!!"
Most people in Mongolia eat one thing their entire lives and are fine.
I buy vegetables and meat mostly. are those luxury foods now? Last I checked that was just food.
fresh food is a luxury in the usa, yes.
i was grew up in a bottom 50% household. most of my childhood diet was sugary snacks, canned/boxed foodstuffs, and frozen meat/vegetables. fresh food was largely reserved for holidays. my mother used to spend about 60/week to feed a family of four, and this was after coupons and in the 1990s
So it's either 'bag of doritos' or 'eat all canned beans for the rest of your life.'
This is just utter horse shit and it also sounds based in bigotry.
https://www.travelbuddies.info/mongolian-foods/ https://www.viewmongolia.com/mongolian-food.html
Etc.
I like how some Americans aren't even pretending to strive to be the best nation anymore but just saying "eat like people in impoverished countries".
Like, people in Mongolia or for example my parents when they lived in El Salvador didn't eat beans every single day because they wanted to or enjoyed it - it's because there literally was no upward mobility and the oligarchy kept it that way.
You're the person who centuries ago would be defending the king as you ate only oats for the 10th day in a row because some other kingdom had minor starvation.