STOP saying healthy food is more expensive

Something to consider, not everyone on here lives in the same place. Prices vary with local and availability.

Where I am healthy food is more expensive. Okay, so everything is more expensive, but healthy food even more so. Produce quality is moderate to low, local produce is limited and not a great quality, and what little is better quality is even more expensive.

For us, the cost is simply a fact of life.

Edited to add: Mealwise, we very rarely eat anything out of the box, and never have.

But what do you mean when you say "healthy food?" Does produce have to be local in order to be healthy?

You're right, I should have clarified. Maybe natural would have been a better term. I meant things like fresh fruit and vegetables (I know frozen are perfectly healthy but my husband and I are not fond of the taste and texture of most of them). We don't buy locally grown produce because even the organics, which I could care less about, have low quality compared to imported.

Edited to add: Meat for us is a different matter as we buy ours wholesale so our costs there are lower than the general population.

Something to consider, not everyone on here lives in the same place. Prices vary with local and availability.

Where I am healthy food is more expensive. Okay, so everything is more expensive, but healthy food even more so. Produce quality is moderate to low, local produce is limited and not a great quality, and what little is better quality is even more expensive.

For us, the cost is simply a fact of life.

Edited to add: Mealwise, we very rarely eat anything out of the box, and never have.

But what do you mean when you say "healthy food?" Does produce have to be local in order to be healthy?

You're right, I should have clarified. Maybe natural would have been a better term. I meant things like fresh fruit and vegetables (I know frozen are perfectly healthy but my husband and I are not fond of the taste and texture of most of them). We don't buy locally grown produce because even the organics, which I could care less about, have low quality compared to imported.

Edited to add: Meat for us is a different matter as we buy ours wholesale so our costs there are lower than the general population.

That makes more sense. Personally, I do not believe that you have to eat only organics or only fresh" or only "local." This is why I am going crazy with all these comments. :laugh:

I follow IIFYM, so to me, if I hit my macros, I ate healthy. :drinker:

This is a non-issue for me. Food is something I'm willing to spend money on. I'll make sacrifices in other areas if I have to, but I've invested too much time and money in my education and my career to say that I can't afford to eat what I want. I'll get rid of cable, Internet, phone, trips, etc., before I cut back on groceries. I do try not to be wasteful with the food I buy because wasting food is just dumb, but that's about as financially concerned as I'm going to get on the subject.

in...to learn how 30.00 feeds two people for a week....

I live by myself and spend about 150.00 a week....

yeah, I'm still waiting for that advice too.
we're a family of 7 + my inlaws for the summer. so that's 9 for now.
would love to know how to keep my food costs down to $270/week
we eat meat/chicken only once/week, and have the puny aforementioned garden and pretty much everything but some condiments are made from scratch at home. good food costs alot of money and the bulk of my bill is produce and milk.

but the tip to snare rabbits is a good one. we have racoons and squirrels, wonder how they taste?

I'm currently living in a fairly deprived part of London has made some things come into sharp focus for me:

You eat as well as you want to.

If you want to live on fast food and chips and soda, you will find a way to make that work on whatever budget you have. You will buy big portions because it makes financial sense to bulk order- this might leave you in a place where you don't eat as often. You will use coupons and maybe even go to the sketchy wings place on the corner because they're cheaper than KFC and hey, you have a budget. You might have to cut back on buying fancy kitchenware because you have to eat. You don't have the time/ inclination to crawl around in mud for the sake of growing a handful of spinach over 6 months... you wouldn't know how to start even if you could be bothered. You're not going to drop £3 on a carton of egg whites, £3 can buy you lunch... maybe even part of dinner.
No shaming going on here, this is exactly what I used to do when I lived in Brooklyn. It wasn't Brooklyn, it was ME, I didn't have dollars to drop on accessorizing my kitchen, I had $15 and I needed to be able to feed myself for a week on that.

If you want to live on healthy food your bulk buys will be dried lentils, beans, rice. You will get up earlier or take a bus to the local food market (not organic/ farmers market, just a place where you buy fruit off the street) so that you can get 7 lemons for £1 instead of 3. You will buy the red apples because they're cheaper even though you prefer the green because hey, you're on a budget. You will take the time/effort to grow food. You will cut back on buying new clothes because you have to eat. You're not going to drop £3 on a carton of egg whites, £3 can buy you 18 free range eggs.

I guess this is what my mother did when we were growing up. Not always fun (lentilmania, a freezer full of peas and corn and spinach because fresh was too pricey) but it worked. I'm trying to get to that place.

Of course there's every combination of in-between as well. Healthy eating isn't a zero-sum game. Just because a healthy option is expensive in McDonalds or you have access to low cost fresh vegetables makes no difference to this.

You may have a budget but you always have choices. You do what is possible given your circumstances and your inclinations.

I'll stick to digging out ants and cicadas out of the ground. I also like to take my sticky tongue and catch and eat flies, when I'm not taking my mud bath.

[joey tribiani voice] how YOU doin[/joey tribiani voice]

I was going to write something...but then I was reading all the responses and forgot what I was going to post about...except that it was grocery related. Oh wait, I think I remember... Healthy food is more expensive. It is. I went to the grocery store yesterday and a steak was $8. Then I went to the grocery store down the street where all the food is local and super healthy and good for you. A frozen steak was $26. Healthy food is more expensive. I think what you intended to say was that although healthy food is expensive, you can make it work if you really try.