Healthful Foods Not an Option for Many

Add advanced pregnancy to that and it becomes an impossible pain in the ass.

A rational society would have delivery for people who are shutins, have new babies, or are in the final trimester of pregnancy.

but I also used to ride a bike to the store regularly, and also to work when I did not have a car for years. It sucks, and I am not saying it's easy, but ....

And it goes a long way toward explaining why that ward of DC has an infant mortality rate on par with countries like Bangladesh and Angola.

one way...I had one of those rolling cart thingys. It helped to plan out my meals for the week and then go shopping. Sometimes I would make what I had planned for a Tues. on Fri.(etc.), but the other option of walking all the way to the store versus making something I had already usually didn't win. I also learned (the hard way) TO MAKE A LIST, check my cubpboards, and NOT FORGET ANY INGREDIENTS. It took awhile to learn to do it this way, but it worked out pretty well once I got the hang of it - especially on those cold winter nights when I got home after work.

One other thing I did was I asked a relative who was a Costco member to take me there. I would buy a 25-lb. bag of rice, big bottles of olive oil and soy sauce (which I would transfer to smaller bottles), noodles, spaghetti sauce, and other canned goods. I only needed to do this 1-2/year. That way my trips to the local grocery were just mostly bread, meat, fruits & vegetables.

It requires some planning and is a bit more of an effort, but it does work pretty well (I think my food costs were cheaper too b/c of the planning btw).

It has something to do with how pharmacies are regulated,
any club store like Costco or Sam's club has to let you use their pharmacy.
At the entrance, just tell the bouncer that you're going to the pharmacy.

However, if you're just checking out with groceries, you still need to know/be there with someone who has a membership card.

I did (*ONCE* some years ago) go into Costco and asked a 'nice looking couple' if they would buy one of those MCI phone cards for me (I gave them cash for the purchase price + tax of it, of course). Once you have the card, you can recharge it all you want, I just needed the initial card....They were kind enough to agree.

I have a Costco membership now, but there was a certain time in my life when that $65 membership fee just "wasn't in the budget"/couldn't be justified for the few times I would use it.

Sooooo, I guess I'm just saying if *some stranger approaches you with cash for their own purchases, but just needs a "membership card" to actually get through the line.....maybe you will go to sleep at night knowing you did a "good turn" for someone. :shrug:

No 'disrespect' for Costco's business model, but life's getting awfully tough out there for some folks.

disparity and hard to resist if you have to count your nickels and dimes.

Does it really cost that much more for McDs to make a salad? Or are they manipulating the situation because they know they can get $4 for the salad because the soccer mommy wants it and her kiddo wants his Happy Meal?

at fast food places -- hard to believe, but true -- check it out.

When I lived in the hood, the grocery store has *nasty* veggies, almost no "healthy choice" or other lower fat products, and only carried whole milk. There were several gas stations nearby that only carried whole milk, the nearest 2% milk, let alone skim, was over 1.5 miles away.

I'd sooner trust whole milk than transfat-laden deep-fried meat.

It would seem to me that a sound community development project would be to encourage the location of supermarkets in high-density low income communities where no supermarket exists. If there are small independent grocers who aren't providing the items, why not encourage them to offer other products throug tax incentives or even demonstration grants? We subsidize sports stadiums and other commercial ventures, why not a few supermarkets?

This isn't a new problem after all, and the free market hasn't responded with similar products and pricing as the supermarkets outside of the neighborhood.

In West Oakland CA there is a grass roots project to fill the need for fresh fruits and veggies by bringing a mobile market ( a converted postal van) to the neighborhoods. That doesn't address the general need for more supermarkets in the area but it helps a bit.
http://www.yesmagazine.org/article.asp?ID=1290

For one thing most poor had gardens(even renters were allowed such a thing). For another fast food did not exist so the temptation of meal deals was not there. It was a slower pace and people stayed at home giving the cook ample time to simmer a pot of dried beans for dinner--no canned beans loaded with high fructose corn syrup. Granted they would have loved to toss in salt pork but they didn't always have the money for that. Meat often was a treat--maybe on Sundays. Soup was another staple and it consisted of whatever they could get out of the garden.Again no condensed soup loaded with sodium. Fruits were often what grew wild down the road. It seems they had a few advantages over todays poor which made eating a bit better a bit easier. Even a frugal person today would be hard pressed to find many stores that will sell lightly brusied veggies or fruit at a discount. Day old bread is also not as easy to find as it used to be. Counting pennies is a challenge and even more so if you have several hungry little ones and your job is one of those Mc-minimal wage types. Its far too easy to take them to a burger joint when you are tired and the larder is far from full.

i really feel for the poor, i know what it is like to be poor (afdc) and am not wealthy now as a grad student. fighting poverty, is my #1 issue, and why i favored edwards last year, but a mile is not a long walk, it takes about 15-20minutes. that makes for an hour long trip to the grocery store 3 times a week if you bring a back pack.


i guess what i am getting at, is that i dont feel this is a very real issue in terms of helping the poor. grocery stores being a mile away. a mile is nothing. now, if that grocery store that is a mile away, doesnt have fresh fruits, skim milk etc, than i think there is a problem. i dont buy this as an excuse to eat fast food


edit: i do believe the low price of fast food vs. the relatively expensive price of a healthy diet is an important issue.

make the walk so often, you just plan a little better (as I stated, more or less, in a post above).

I don't really think fast food is cheap. A Quarter Pounder, fries, and a coke at McD's is around $5.00 for one meal...most fast food places are the same about $5.00 for their "main thing" with a HFCS drink.

Where if you MAKE your own food:

Dozen Eggs: $1.69
1/2 lb. ham from Deli: $3.79
1/2 lb. shredded cheddar cheese: $1.50
1/2 gal. of REAL Orange Juice: $2.50

Voila! For $9.48 + tax you've got 6 ham & cheese omelets w/fresh OJ (breakfast for almost a week) for the price of 2 fast food junk meals.

Lunch or Dinner:

Head of Lettuce: $1.29
Package of Angel Hair Pasta: $1.09
Jar of Spaghetti Sauce: $2.00
Strawberries right now are (on sale for) $1.00/lb.

So, for $5.38 + tax you can have Spaghetti w/a lettuce salad and a lb. of strawberries for dessert. This would feed one person for 2-3 nites, depending on how big of an eater you are. Again, 2-3 meals for the price of one yucky fast food meal.

I could go on-and-on with different combinations with meat, vegetables, etc. I just wanted to keep the examples simple here. Hopefully you understand my point.

Frankly, the real issue is that people think getting one pot/pan dirty is too much work, and they don't want to take the few minutes to cut/clean fresh fruits and vegetables. It certainly is not cheaper (and we all know less healthier) to buy fast food rather than make your own.

I wish more people would look at this, the cost per meal of foods prepared at home vs. restaurants when it comes to trying to eat more healthily. I say this because I started eating better because I could not afford to eat out. Granted sometimes it sucks to cook - Ihave no AC and my kitchen is a sweat box right now, so I am mostly eating fruit, salads and hummus and things like that, and the prep time is not that bad.

And when I do cook, I try to make an extra portion or two for leftovers (for lunch or for later in the week in case I am feeling like I don't want to cook).

I have never understood the argument that junk food is cheaper, especially when you look at the nutrition levels of junk food.

bravo.

I started eating better because I could not afford to eat out.

There was a time in the life of our family of four that money was REALLY tight and I got very good at figuring out our 'cost per meal/person' over the course of a month. After awhile, it even became sort of a game for me (to see if I could get the 'cost per meal' down even lower) - lol. We ate very well (and still do), even though money is not so tight now.

I've often thought it would be fun to teach a little class about getting more out of your 'food dollars', but since I'm not a nutritionist, per se...I doubt I'd get offered any venue to teach it at. It would be teaching things that I've figured out/learned over time and people could figure out how to slowly integrate some of the 'tricks'/techniques in a way that would work for them.

I think the most difficult thing to do when you don't have a lot of money is BEGIN. To start 'stockpiling' the long shelf life items when they are on sale (the loss leaders) at your local grocery when there just isn't a lot of money there to make it through the month, but it IS possible.

As you said too, making extra portions when you DO cook and eating them the next day (or freezing them for next week) is very helpful/useful indeed.

Peace and Bon Appetit :-)