Poor and fat in the US?
Options
Replies
-
If your friend is looking for a protein heavy diet for working out then he is best off buying meats since they are rather cheap here in North America, such as beef, fish, pork and eggs are all rather cheap. Also post workout protein shakes are pretty cheap depending on the brand, up here in Canada you can get 2KG for ~$40, that could last you for about 2 months at one shake a day.
That *might* be true in Canada, where you live, but in the US beef and fish are among the MOST expensive items sold in supermarkets.
I'm currently eating on a limited budget and have struggled with this issue myself. I have learned that for US residents, the easiest and most affordable way to eat a healthier diet is:
1) Avoid eating animal flesh & animal fat (lard, butter, etc.)
2) Avoid heavily processed foods
3) Avoid fried foods
4) Eat more non-meat items: beans, legumes (pulses) and unprocessed grains (rice, quinoa, oats, etc.)
5) Eat more fruits and vegetables. Fresh fruit & vegetables tend to be quite costly in many places, but the frozen varieties are equally nutritious and MUCH cheaper.
6) Eat peanut butter. It is widely available, very nutritious and very much affordable. Just avoid the brands that add lots of sugar & salt to the peanuts.
Average price of chicken breast in Canada is $8 a lb, I have friends in philly who won't pay more then $2.5. Sorry mate, Canada is waaaaaay more expensive then USA.0 -
find a farmer's market - cheaper fruit, veggies and meat.0
-
If your friend is looking for a protein heavy diet for working out then he is best off buying meats since they are rather cheap here in North America, such as beef, fish, pork and eggs are all rather cheap. Also post workout protein shakes are pretty cheap depending on the brand, up here in Canada you can get 2KG for ~$40, that could last you for about 2 months at one shake a day.
That *might* be true in Canada, where you live, but in the US beef and fish are among the MOST expensive items sold in supermarkets.
I'm currently eating on a limited budget and have struggled with this issue myself. I have learned that for US residents, the easiest and most affordable way to eat a healthier diet is:
1) Avoid eating animal flesh & animal fat (lard, butter, etc.)
2) Avoid heavily processed foods
3) Avoid fried foods
4) Eat more non-meat items: beans, legumes (pulses) and unprocessed grains (rice, quinoa, oats, etc.)
5) Eat more fruits and vegetables. Fresh fruit & vegetables tend to be quite costly in many places, but the frozen varieties are equally nutritious and MUCH cheaper.
6) Eat peanut butter. It is widely available, very nutritious and very much affordable. Just avoid the brands that add lots of sugar & salt to the peanuts.
Average price of chicken breast in Canada is $8 a lb, I have friends in philly who won't pay more then $2.5. Sorry mate, Canada is waaaaaay more expensive then USA.
$2.5 / lb is robbery in the U.S. for chicken.0 -
I think the biggest problem with food and obesity is that most of the poor obese people are totally uneducated about making good food choices. I see it all the time when you stand in line at the grocery store. An obese woman with her obese children will have a cart full of junk food, chips, pop, precooked toaster foods, Pizza Pops, ice cram, cookies, etc and when they go through the checkout the bill is twice as much as mine. If they took the same amount of money and bought some frozen veggies, brown rice, chicken, milk, eggs, etc they could have some nutritious meals for less money and not be obese but then again that would require someone to get off their *kitten* and cook it rather than have the kids stuff something in the microwave.
True.
Only partly true. I was just in the grocery store. I wanted a cut of crock pot pork or beef. The prices have gone up astronomically for some reason and I had to do without. What will I use for those calories? Probably milk. Not as healthy by any means, but much cheaper per calorie.
Eggs, however, are pretty cheap sources of protein, OP. Tired as I am of them, I still eat them regularly for this reason.0 -
Unless we are talking about ACCESS to food, income levels are not as much of a factor as people want to believe.
If you have no access to transportation and live in an area in which you can only access bodegas and convenience stores, yes, it's difficult to find what you need for a healthy diet. But if you have access to transportation and actual grocery stores, you can eat well on a budget. It takes planning and being willing to cook; and it helps if you coordinate your menu with sales, but it can be done.
If you look at the local grocery circulars to see what protein sources are on sale and then plan your weekly menu around those, it can be much cheaper than eating out or buying pre-made meals, not to mention far more nutritious.
This. When I had about $50-75 to last me two weeks, I would get the ads for Fresh & Easy and Frys. I'd figure out what meat was on sale and what fruit/veggies were the cheapest. If something I needed wasn't on sale (like soy milk), I kept a mental list of where these items were cheapest without sale (aka comparison shopped). It wasn't easy but I ate healthy and cheaply.0 -
I don't know much about US prices either as I am in Canada....but one thing that made a world of difference for me is watching weekly flyers and signing up for coupon sites. They surprisingly do have healthy food coupons. When I find certain good foods at great prices, I will freeze them so that I'm not paying regular price the following week.
Also if your friend makes purchases for house hold and hygiene stuff with sales and coupons...it will add for more money in the budget to put towards healthy food.0 -
I think the biggest problem with food and obesity is that most of the poor obese people are totally uneducated about making good food choices. I see it all the time when you stand in line at the grocery store. An obese woman with her obese children will have a cart full of junk food, chips, pop, precooked toaster foods, Pizza Pops, ice cram, cookies, etc and when they go through the checkout the bill is twice as much as mine. If they took the same amount of money and bought some frozen veggies, brown rice, chicken, milk, eggs, etc they could have some nutritious meals for less money and not be obese but then again that would require someone to get off their *kitten* and cook it rather than have the kids stuff something in the microwave.
True.
Only partly true. I was just in the grocery store. I wanted a cut of crock pot pork or beef. The prices have gone up astronomically for some reason and I had to do without. What will I use for those calories? Probably milk. Not as healthy by any means, but much cheaper per calorie.
Eggs, however, are pretty cheap sources of protein, OP. Tired as I am of them, I still eat them regularly for this reason.
We weren't talking about beef:huh:
However, the droughts this summer are going to dramatically raise the price of all animal products and some grain products. Food for humans, food for pets, and consumer items you never even knew contained corn. :sad:0 -
I've recently started going to Ethnic Market places and stores. The Latina store in my neighborhood has a butchery and the meat is always cheaper and fresher than the Big Box stores. Also for fish try an Asian Market, you'll be hard pressed to find fresher fish than there.0
-
I live in a downtown area. FORTUNATELY, not with a struggling financial situation. I live in a fairly decent area, but, like most downtowns, you have scattered "good" and "bad" streets. Within a mile of my house I have 3 Irish pubs, at least 10 other drinking establishments, taco bell, arbys, two fast food chinese places, a fast food japanese place, a fast food mexican place, 2 ice cream stands, 3 sandwhich places, 3 pizza places, a giant burrito place, and a pharmacy with a huge processed and junk food section. We have pretzel stands, and hot dog stands. Guess what we don't have. A single grocery store.
To get to a grocery store, I have a 20-30 minute drive, depending on where I choose to go. It's a pain in the butt for ME, with a car, and money for food and gas, to get to and from a grocery store. Even I have to plan ahead though, there's no such thing as "grab something on the way home from work" The grocery store is a big deal outing.
After a pricing adventure, I learned that processed food, calorie per calorie, is MUCH more expensive than grocery items. for 5 dollars at taco bell, I can have over a thousand calories, easily, and a soda. There's a full meal. I can't get a full mean of healthy food, if I want, say, meat rather than beans as a protein source, for 5 dollars...
Therein lies the problem: Access to healthy food, convenience and availability of processed and fast food crap, and the cost of eating healthy as opposed to eating junk. We are a country that caters to the lifestyle that leads to obesity, and it shows in our statistics. They have made it so much easier to be unhealthy, and all the advertising caters to that.
Yes, it is much harder to eat healthy when you are living below the poverty line. Add to this a lack of education about healthy food choices, kids growing up with poor choices, living with poor choices, and feeding their kids poor choices. Wait: there I go calling them choices again... They aren't really, when it's the only accessible option, it's not really a choice, now is it.
Thinking back to my broke college days: Mac and cheese, Ramen noodles, and vending machine crap, because I didn't have a place to store anything else, and it was far cheaper than anything in the cafeteria, except maybe the drippy greasy pizza...
But hey, in corporate America, it's easy to get ahold of their product... Much harder to get ahold of a farmer's product....0 -
I don't know much about US prices either as I am in Canada....but one thing that made a world of difference for me is watching weekly flyers and signing up for coupon sites. They surprisingly do have healthy food coupons. When I find certain good foods at great prices, I will freeze them so that I'm not paying regular price the following week.
Also if your friend makes purchases for house hold and hygiene stuff with sales and coupons...it will add for more money in the budget to put towards healthy food.
If you have internet access, check your store's website. They often have printable coupons or coupons you can add to your store loyalty card. If you don't have internet access--the public library will work if you can get there.
I realize the truly financially stressed probably don't have smartphones, as they are a luxury. But if you do have one, store apps often offer different coupons that can be either added to the store loyalty card or scanned at the register.0 -
[/quote]
We weren't talking about beef:huh:
However, the droughts this summer are going to dramatically raise the price of all animal products and some grain products. Food for humans, food for pets, and consumer items you never even knew contained corn. :sad:
[/quote]
The real sad part is almost everything processed contains corn. I love science, but selling the science experiments of over processed foods sucks.
I digress.0 -
First, about the article...80/20 beef is cheaper than 90/10 most likely because that 10% fat is cheaper than 10% of meat. If you pour off the fat after cooking it, it doesn't have to be fattier than 90/10. And the 1200 calories of chips is ridiculous. That's about education, not affordability. It's not as though someone who is poor is going to spend $1 on 1200 calories of chips for their daily calorie intake rather than buying healthier items. Instead, they're going to eat several portions of those chips and spend just as much as they could've spent on healthier, lower calorie alternatives.
Now as far as sources of healthy foods. Shop the sales, clip coupons, buy in bulk and freeze it. Boneless skinless chicken breasts and ground turkey go on sale frequently. So does peanut butter, whole plain almonds and eggs. Brown rice, beans and cottage cheese are good sources of protein. There's also protein powder (I use BSN Syntha Six) which you can buy online for fairly cheap. I might not be poor but I am frugal. If you're shopping sales and buying what you need and what's healthy versus what you want and what's easy, it's definitely possible to get by on limited funds.
An easy recipe that is super cheap is bean & cheese burritos. I made the tortillas and refried beans and bought the shredded cheese on sale. It came out to 31 cents per burrito and 235 calories. I made about 4 dozen, wrapped them in wax paper and froze them.
Here's the recipes in case anyone wants to do it:
http://homesicktexan.blogspot.com/2007/03/and-end-to-my-quest-flour-tortillas.html
http://allrecipes.com/recipe/refried-beans-without-the-refry/ (only use 2t salt...trust me, 5t is WAY too much)
Then put refried beans (I forget what the weight was but it was about 2 spoonful) on a tortilla, add 1/8c of shredded cheese, wrap up and eat or freeze. To cook them, I let them thaw for a while and then just microwave (flipping once). The inside will be crazy hot so open it up, let it cool for a minute, re-roll and eat.
ETA: Lays chips are on sale near me right now for $2.15. That's 1,650 calories. 1,650 calories of the bean burritos above would be $2.11.0 -
Cheap food is fast food here. There are a LOT of people here living at or below the poverty line. Most of us have at least 2 or 3 jobs just to keep up. There is no "healthy" food for poor people. Fruits, veggies are EXPENSIVE..even at the farmer's market.0
-
Back in the old days poor people just went hungry. Now poor people have access to so much delicious food that they can't stop themselves from eating too much and they become obese . . . . sounds tragic. Of course a massive amount of that obesity is due to people (from all walks of life) drinking their calories in soda and fruit juice, and please don't tell me that tap water isn't readily available!
In reality, the real reason poor people and rich people have different BMI's is more likely due to education than access. Many of the poor people I work with are simply grossly misinformed about food. I'll tell them to stop drinking soda, and they start drinking Kool-Aid instead. Then I say drink water, and they refuse because it doesn't taste as good.
According to the article, it is alot cheaper for people to buy unhealthy food.. Apparantly they cant afford to eat healthy!0 -
Cheap food is fast food here. There are a LOT of people here living at or below the poverty line. Most of us have at least 2 or 3 jobs just to keep up. There is no "healthy" food for poor people. Fruits, veggies are EXPENSIVE..even at the farmer's market.
So how do you stay healthy?0 -
I live in a downtown area. FORTUNATELY, not with a struggling financial situation. I live in a fairly decent area, but, like most downtowns, you have scattered "good" and "bad" streets. Within a mile of my house I have 3 Irish pubs, at least 10 other drinking establishments, taco bell, arbys, two fast food chinese places, a fast food japanese place, a fast food mexican place, 2 ice cream stands, 3 sandwhich places, 3 pizza places, a giant burrito place, and a pharmacy with a huge processed and junk food section. We have pretzel stands, and hot dog stands. Guess what we don't have. A single grocery store.
To get to a grocery store, I have a 20-30 minute drive, depending on where I choose to go. It's a pain in the butt for ME, with a car, and money for food and gas, to get to and from a grocery store. Even I have to plan ahead though, there's no such thing as "grab something on the way home from work" The grocery store is a big deal outing.
After a pricing adventure, I learned that processed food, calorie per calorie, is MUCH more expensive than grocery items. for 5 dollars at taco bell, I can have over a thousand calories, easily, and a soda. There's a full meal. I can't get a full mean of healthy food, if I want, say, meat rather than beans as a protein source, for 5 dollars...
Therein lies the problem: Access to healthy food, convenience and availability of processed and fast food crap, and the cost of eating healthy as opposed to eating junk. We are a country that caters to the lifestyle that leads to obesity, and it shows in our statistics. They have made it so much easier to be unhealthy, and all the advertising caters to that.
Yes, it is much harder to eat healthy when you are living below the poverty line. Add to this a lack of education about healthy food choices, kids growing up with poor choices, living with poor choices, and feeding their kids poor choices. Wait: there I go calling them choices again... They aren't really, when it's the only accessible option, it's not really a choice, now is it.
Thinking back to my broke college days: Mac and cheese, Ramen noodles, and vending machine crap, because I didn't have a place to store anything else, and it was far cheaper than anything in the cafeteria, except maybe the drippy greasy pizza...
But hey, in corporate America, it's easy to get ahold of their product... Much harder to get ahold of a farmer's product....
You are saying that you can not prepare a healthy meal at home for less than $5? $5 a serving?!
This is problem of not knowing how to cook.
Trust me, I am no master chef. But I have learned the basics of cooking and do so regularly. I have never spent $5 a serving on ANYTHING. I average about $1.50 per serving, and that is with a goal of a diet that is 40% protein. And I live in one of the most expensive areas of the U.S.0 -
We weren't talking about beef:huh:
However, the droughts this summer are going to dramatically raise the price of all animal products and some grain products. Food for humans, food for pets, and consumer items you never even knew contained corn. :sad:
[/quote]
The real sad part is almost everything processed contains corn. I love science, but selling the science experiments of over processed foods sucks.
I digress.
[/quote]
I'd digress with you as I have some strong opinions about the subsidies that made corn ubiquitous and lowered the nutritional value of everything, but that is a separate topic.
0 -
I think the biggest problem with food and obesity is that most of the poor obese people are totally uneducated about making good food choices. I see it all the time when you stand in line at the grocery store. An obese woman with her obese children will have a cart full of junk food, chips, pop, precooked toaster foods, Pizza Pops, ice cram, cookies, etc and when they go through the checkout the bill is twice as much as mine. If they took the same amount of money and bought some frozen veggies, brown rice, chicken, milk, eggs, etc they could have some nutritious meals for less money and not be obese but then again that would require someone to get off their *kitten* and cook it rather than have the kids stuff something in the microwave.
Do you think they don't know that these foods will make you fat? Sorry, but I think a lot of it comes down to being lazy. Most of these foods take no time to prepare and taste good. Like you said, get off your butt and put some effort into your meals.0 -
I get EVERYTHING on clearance or on sale.
The grocery stores around here have clearance price meats that they need to sell that day, way cheap and if you freeze them their good til whenever you want to eat them.0 -
Unless we are talking about ACCESS to food, income levels are not as much of a factor as people want to believe.
If you have no access to transportation and live in an area in which you can only access bodegas and convenience stores, yes, it's difficult to find what you need for a healthy diet. But if you have access to transportation and actual grocery stores, you can eat well on a budget. It takes planning and being willing to cook; and it helps if you coordinate your menu with sales, but it can be done.
If you look at the local grocery circulars to see what protein sources are on sale and then plan your weekly menu around those, it can be much cheaper than eating out or buying pre-made meals, not to mention far more nutritious.
This. When I had about $50-75 to last me two weeks, I would get the ads for Fresh & Easy and Frys. I'd figure out what meat was on sale and what fruit/veggies were the cheapest. If something I needed wasn't on sale (like soy milk), I kept a mental list of where these items were cheapest without sale (aka comparison shopped). It wasn't easy but I ate healthy and cheaply.
Specifically for you...if you are shopping at Fresh and Easy and Frys you NEED to check out Sprouts prices on produce they are .... better. And sometimes organic is even cheaper than the not organice (Ex: Organic pommegranate 1.89 this week) For non organic staples of zuchini, onion, apples, pears, red/oj/yellow peppers, romain lettuce etc. all .88 / lb this week. They also carry the cheapest grain fed meat imo.0
Categories
- All Categories
- 1.4M Health, Wellness and Goals
- 391.3K Introduce Yourself
- 43.4K Getting Started
- 259.6K Health and Weight Loss
- 175.6K Food and Nutrition
- 47.3K Recipes
- 232.3K Fitness and Exercise
- 387 Sleep, Mindfulness and Overall Wellness
- 6.4K Goal: Maintaining Weight
- 8.5K Goal: Gaining Weight and Body Building
- 152.7K Motivation and Support
- 7.8K Challenges
- 1.3K Debate Club
- 96.2K Chit-Chat
- 2.5K Fun and Games
- 3.2K MyFitnessPal Information
- 22 News and Announcements
- 911 Feature Suggestions and Ideas
- 2.3K MyFitnessPal Tech Support Questions