Are food prices rising?
There’s some back and forth on Instapundit over rising food costs and AP’s editorial laziness, and I had to kick in a few words. Food prices are absolutely higher and sometimes the change is made in a subtle and insidious way — as Consumerist often points out, the price and package size remain the same, but the volume of the food product inside decreases.
This doesn’t mean that the average family’s food bill needs to increase, but that they won’t be able to buy the same things they did a year ago. Try another brand. Try another store or co-op. Try generic. Clip a coupon now and then. Stockpile your favorite non-perishables when they’re on sale. Cook from scratch. Plant a small garden, or just a tomato plant in a sunny window. You don’t have to be a fanatic to make a dent in your food budget (but I wrote this post about saving beyond coupons if you are).
Unfortunately, you can’t save money buying nothing but organic produce, animals that were spa-raised and massaged by pretty Finnish girls, or pre-made convenience foods. Just as the media is picking up on the healthiness of eating whole, naturally-raised food, prices are on the rise. That means choices.
This week, my husband went grocery shopping with me. On the drive home I mentioned that I usually keep a mental budget of $10 for meat to stock the freezer each week. “Don’t tell me you feed us on $10 of meat a week!” Well, probably $13-15, if I include bacon and lunch meat. As dedicated omnivores (and I follow a restricted carb diet), we eat meat or fish daily. Can we afford grass-raised organic lean cuts of beef at those prices? No, we can’t. But I picked up a whole uncooked ham for $1 a pound that’ll feed us for days. I’m using old ham bones to make tonight’s dinner (homegrown salad, homemade foccacia bread, and ham, cheese, and cauliflower soup), which will run about $4 for three hearty eaters, with leftovers. When we can afford better cuts of meat, I’ll add some into the mix, but for now our menus must balance nutrition, taste, and price.
Eating cheaply and well is easy once you learn how; it doesn’t mean subsisting on ramen noodles and macaroni and cheese with sliced hot dogs or tuna, as I did in college. It takes time, however, and that’s a precious commodity for a lot of people.
