Comments on: Splurging Now and Then

By: Sylvia

Sylvia — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 01:55:00 +0000

Your photos really are beautiful– and so is your writing. It’s the first time I’ve stopped in to your blog, but this title was super intriguing to me. I think it’s so true, how as I child “we can’t afford this” is much easier to accept than “it’s bad for you”. I’m semi-teaching my daughter the same thing my parents did to me.. Hey, it works!
-Sylvia

By: Cote

Cote — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 17:19:47 +0000

Great post!

Greetings from Chile

By: Eva

Eva — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 16:09:14 +0000

I had a similar childhood experience, growing up thinking that junk food was out of our budget except for the occasional treat (a York peppermint pattie eaten in the car on the way home were a luxury I remember with deep yearning).

I don’t think the reason is that things have changed so much, but rather that the organization of a tight food budget can go two different ways. One way is to buy the empty, but cheap, calories found in ultra-cheap junk food. The other way is to invest time in converting fairly cheap, fresh, bulk ingredients into ready-to-eat food. If you subscribe to the latter philosophy, it’s difficult to justify junk food in your budget because you don’t get much bang for that buck, nutritionally speaking. A frozen dinner may be cheap in one sense, but it won’t give you leftovers and is hard to recycle into several meal adaptations.

Now that I’ve been shopping and cooking for myself for a while, I suspect that this latter way is the way my parents see their food budget.

By: alice

alice — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 20:55:45 +0000

Wonderful post and beautiful photos.

By: Gina

Gina — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 03:57:03 +0000

I’ve been really interested to read these posts about eating cheaply. For the past few months I’ve been living in New Zealand, and in our flat we cook together on NZ$30 a week, which is about US$20. Sure, we all buy a bit of food outside of that, but that’s the majority of our food budget– and I think we eat pretty well! We cook everything from scratch… frozen meals would be a big luxury. Maybe it’s a difference in prices here in NZ, but I’m certainly living in what you described as your childhood. Takeaway curries or a packet of biscuits are a luxury… lots of fresh fruit and vegetables from a market are the norm!
I guess it is the stocking up of ingredients that puts people off. We certainly have weeks when our stocks get depleted and we need to spend a bit more, but in the long run cooking for ourselves definitely saves money.

By: Jim

Jim — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 02:52:03 +0000

Great words, great photos and I wish I could taste it through the screen but I’d be willing to bet great food as well. I must try the baked white beans but will probably use roasted red peppers as I like them better than I like tomatoes.

Jim – Musings on the Path to Frugality

By: Erica

Erica — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 23:38:16 +0000

This is such a great post. I’ve been reading all the posts on the Hunger Challenge this week and it’s so neat to hear your thoughts on the issue of hunger. You are absolutely right that preparing meals from scratch takes a good amount of know-how and resourcefulness. . . and especially time. But as you have proved, it is possible. Thanks so much for participating.

Oh, and your photos are beautiful!

Erica @ UWKC