There’s a cost involved with being a gourmand: That organic, cold-pressed olive oil don’t come cheap. This week the San Francisco Chronicle takes a look at “Jane,” a gourmet who does it on a budget, choosing to give up a full-time job to stay home with her child as a single mother.
In her new circumstances, Jane nets only $1,200 per month and spends close to $300 per month on food for herself and her child; that’s 25 percent of her income (the average American currently spends 10 percent of his or her income on food, a figure that people such as Michael Pollan have argued is too low). And yet she maintains her lifestyle as a gourmet foodie, complete with organic greens. “How else would I eat?” she asks.
How does she do it? A combination of thrifty shopping, buying less desirable cuts of organic beef, growing her own greens, and making occasional forays into the garbage bins behind local organic bakeries to rescue day-old bread that has been thrown out (this method is perhaps only possible in Berkeley, where there are a wealth of such bakeries).
“This is just who I am,” she says. “What else could I do but eat well, no matter what?”
I don’t know … I did it for $3 a day without diving in dumpsters, growing my own greens and spending hours in the kitchen.
Conclusion – Eating like a Chowhound on $3 a day
http://www.chowhound.com/topics/429348
Like Jane, I relied on Grocery Outlet … someone should give that company a big fat kiss for providing high-quality and often organic food for pennies. I bought a pint of Haagen Dazs coconut sorbet for 50 cents this week. I bought a package of Kosher beef franks for 79 cents. Organic eggs … 18 for $1.99.
In the above report I did a comparison of the food in supermarkets to those at farmers markets and it turned out that supermarkets are more expensive than even places like Ferry Plaza.
On top of that veggies from farmers markets are fresher and last longer and are usually a lot bigger than what supermarkets sell.
And then there is the “W” word. Walmart is selling organic products. I can buy organic yogurt and organic milk for about half of what it is sold for elsewhere. Hey, you do what you have to do.
“Jane” is apparently right at $3 a day, too, and feeding a boy (hate to think what happens when he starts getting bigger).
I really didn’t get the dumpster diving. She has a $25 cheese budget, but takes bread from a dumpster?
Generally, this article was much less illuminating and especially helpful than I wanted. Apparently this Grocery Outlet is a key part of being able to stick to such a low budget, and I don’t know that it’s available outside the Bay area. Definitely not around here.
I’m trying to change my household over to as much organic and high-quality food as I can (not “gourmet” or “foodie,” but sustainably raised, humanely treated, minimally processed etc.).
So far the only things I can figure out to make any dent in the budget are cutting out meat almost entirely and drastically limiting cheese. Eliminating “convenience” foods from the house (and we didn’t have very many before, mostly canned soups) hasn’t lowered costs at all.
renz,
Not to toot my own horn, but I hope you will look at my link. It isn’t as SF oriented and the principles can apply anywhere.
I see from your profile you are from Austin. I can’t imagine there are not a ton of Mexican markets there which offer great deals at substantial discounts.
I never knew until I did my experiment that a local market substatially discounts meat when it is two days before the expiration. I can buy steaks and chickens for $2 that are still fresh and excellent.
Bakeries often have day old bread or even end-of-the-day specials. Supermarkets have mark downs. There is a lot of things that can be done without eliminating meat.
Maybe ask on your home board about great bargain stores, or stores in your area that have special bargains.
I misunderstood. I thought the challenge was eating organically/sustainably (at least, primarily so) on $3/day.
Eating cheaply can be done, sure, and it’s not essential to go to the Mexican markets for that (in Austin, though, you’d have to make an effort to find a market that was not largely Mexican). I’ve done it for a while, and learned quite a few tricks you mentioned, although I haven’t achieved anything like $3/day.
To find the sell-by date deals, I’d have to go to Randalls (same as Safeway), which is still a good deal but there aren’t any $2 chickens. And a free range chicken is more like $10 (or more).
For me, the hard part will be finding humanely raised beef and pork without having to drive across town or drop $20 or more per lb. Especially when cheap beef and pork are abundant in my neighborhood.
Yes, I didn’t mention the sustainable part in my report. A lot of farmers in my area don’t mark themselves as organic in protest to the absurd rules that are geared toward corporate labelling of ‘organic’.
Though I was going for healthy eating and not just cheap eating, about 80 percent was either organic or sustainable.
However, those same businesses raise sustainable food which has standards that are usually higher than those labelled ‘organic’.
Which goes to the label. Dig a little deeper at those ethnic markets if you can. Some of them practice the same sustainable practices but don’t advertise it.
A local Central Amercian market butchers a pig weekly from a family farm that is sustainable. He expects good pork like back in El Salvador, yet the prices aren’t different than any other small market.
Chinese markets are known for chickens that for all purposes are raised sustainably. They just don’t make a big deal about it.
Maybe it isn’t happening in Austin yet, but even the mainstream groceries here are moving into organic groceries and meat with prices only slightly higher than conventional food. So since jane is in my area, I know it can be done. She was a little hung up on ‘name’ organics like Strauss. Go with generic organics. Trader Joe’s in my area actually sells Strauss. It is just under their own label, but still organic and a lot less expensive.