Food Dollars

Most Americans want to save money on food and clothes without considering whether the products are lower quality. If we aren’t willing to pay twice as much for a shirt made in Nebraska, then it doesn’t make sense to complain that manufacturing is going overseas. Our grandparents and great grandparents (the non-farmers) spent a higher percentage of their income on food than we do now. It’s great that our ancestors taught us thriftiness, but they didn’t know at the time how low the quality was going to go. Now that we are learning, it’s time to either allocate more of our budget to food, or learn how to eat better for less.

Compared to Canada, Japan, and the U.K., Americans spend significantly less on groceries (and clothing) and significantly more on healthcare,^[1] which give us one indication of the effect of cheap food. Another is in 1970, 25.9 percent of all food spending was on food away from home, and by 2012 that share rose to 43.1 percent. This has increased obesity and weight gain due to the higher calorie count and poorer nutritional quality of away-from-home meals and snacks.^[2]

Here are a few things I do when eating away from home and I’m sure you can find more ideas online. If anyone in your family orders something off a menu that comes with fries, be ready to ask the waiter if they will substitute a side salad. At least you might get a baked potato or coleslaw. Look at the drink options (and point them out to kids), and see if they have milk or something without HFCS. Lemonade has HFCS unless you’re at a healthy restaurant that squeezes their own juices. Water is the best and cheapest drink. When your plate arrives, cut your food in half and as you approach the halfway point, ask for a box. If the food sits there in front of you, it’s tempting to keep eating.

If you have access to Marshall’s, TJ Maxx, or Home Goods, those are great places to find real foods and cooking ingredients that I recommend in my posts. Even though you can’t guarantee what they’re going to have in stock, stop in once in a while and you’ll pick up things you can use at deep discounts. I find all kinds of oils there, including spray versions to prepare baking pans, coconut palm sugar and other healthier sweeteners, maca and other healthy powders. They have a large variety of teas, syrups, jellies, tapenades, gourmet foods, raw foods, and snacks like kale chips. If you know another place that carries products we need for healthy cooking at a discount, please share!