<p>^Too many people haven’t gotten the message that fresh food is healthier? I don’t know. One thing that our area does is have a program like food stamps with vouchers that can be redeemed at the Farmer’s Market. They do get used. Out here, most farmers markets are more expensive than either the supermarkets or the ethnic groceries, so no one pinching pennies would use them without a subsidy.</p>
<p>I can say that this particular farmer’s market is cheaper in terms of produce (because I think they make their money on their spectacular flowers, shrubs and trees), but you may be onto something that it’s an outlier in that regard. Not sure if they accept food stamps, but I need to check that out. It would be a real shame if it were located right there and the people most in need couldn’t get some support in using it. However, the produce really is cheap.</p>
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<p>I think it is at least partly based on stereotypes. The stereotype of the wealthy, slim, and tanned middle-aged woman who stops in her Mercedes at the gourmet grocery on her way home from a morning at the spa to pick up some organic arugula and goat cheese to go with the rest of the meal her Chez Panisse-trained cook will be preparing that evening, vs. the stereotype of the obese woman with more tattoos than teeth pushing a cart around Wal-Mart that is stuffed with hot dogs, cheap frozen pizzas, soda, potato chips, and other snacks - with her six chubby kids trailing behind her.</p>
<p>It becomes more expensive if you have to pay to travel a distance to purchase the food. I’m not sure how that would work in other areas, but it is the case in SOME areas of NYC.</p>
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<p>And you can control what you put in the bread that you make yourself.</p>
<p>oh* bread *
I haven’t tried to make bread since I found out I can’t eat gluten about 4 months ago.
I miss it.</p>
<p>It looks like a large part of the problem is people don’t know what to do.
Eggplant & jicama dont come with instructions.
[Obesity:</a> Access to grocers doesn’t improve diets, study finds - latimes.com](<a href=“http://www.latimes.com/health/la-he-food-deserts-20110712,0,537936.story]Obesity:”>Access to grocers doesn't improve diets, study finds)</p>
<p>Consider the current heat wave. Suppose that you have to travel two miles to your grocery store and you didn’t have a car. Your options are walking or taking the bus or walking to the store and taking the bus home so that you don’t have to carry the bags of grocerys home by foot. The bus and walking would take roughly the same amount of time after waiting for it and because of all the stops that it would make.</p>
<p>Do you want to risk your perishables in the heat?</p>
<p>The costs of home cooked are: transportation, preparation, cooking, cleaning and waste disposal. Additional time is assumed for all of those things. There is additional planning required. If you shop once a week, you need to eat certain things within a certain amount of time or they spoil - you have the potential for wasting food. Home cooked can also imply that your refrigerator is full after shopping which can result in waste because stuff gets shoved to the back and forgotten.</p>
<p>If you’re baking your own goods, you have to decide on whether to use the oven when it is really hot out. My feeling is that eating healthy does cost more if you look at overall costs, including time. We’ve been through this whole exercise in the last three months and have had to rationalize the process and try to minimize the costs. Trader Joes has been a big help in the cost department.</p>
<p>Home cooked can also imply that your refrigerator is full after shopping which can result in waste because stuff gets shoved to the back and forgotten.</p>
<p>That is a nice thing about having a dorm sized fridge- it is hard to miss anything ( but also impossible to chill a full sized watermelon)</p>
<p>In my area, the many farmers markets are more expensive than supermarkets, and supermarkets are nonexistent in the poorest areas. In neighborhoods that are a tiny step up from the poorest, the markets have sub-par perishables that perish quickly. Ethnic markets seem better, however.</p>
<p>We are small family in a small house, our refrigerator is 18 cu.ft. which is really small by upper middle class American standards, but probably a size more common among people of modest means. When someone (not me!) slams the refrigerator door, the freezer door inevitably pops open – which means we can’t store anything for very long in the freezer since the temps are sub-optimum. Stocking up doesn’t always make sense.</p>
<p>Dietary changes are really hard to make. It took DH over 25 years of living with me before he would eat fruit on his own initiative! I am the one who still has to buy it, however. And then there’s my elderly mom: She buys fruit and vegetables because she knows they are good for her, but rarely eats them or only eats them when they are so old and far gone that they have lost all nutritive value. “It’s too much trouble,” she complains, even if the fruit is cut up. But the blueberry muffins and danishes somehow get eaten without a problem. . . .</p>
<p>But on a happier note: At my daughter’s old (private, girls) middle school, as an experiment, they set out huge bowls of small fruit, either small apples or small mandarin oranges. Keeping them stocked was next to impossible, because the girls would devour the fruit so quickly! Instantly available, visible, sweet, and <em>cute</em> seemed to be the key!</p>
<p>Time is the factor (and energy) that stops many of us short, and we compensate with money. But there are fast healthy alternatives as well. Trader Joe’s has many. Their hummus, baby pita, and carrot juice are my current indulgence. Bagged salad, bagged spinach, baby carrots are at most stores. More expensive, but no more than a bag of Cheetos or potato chips. </p>
<p>BCEagle, you forgot an option-bike. I had a few days without a car last week, and biked for groceries, as I do at our farmer’s market. Can’t carry as much, but that is ok. </p>
<p>It is a cultural issue. In other parts of the world, good meals are thought to be a right, and much time and energy is spent celebrating food, and the people you eat it with. Somehow eating is something we cram between other activities, so what we eat assumes less importance than perhaps it deserves.</p>
<p>Somehow eating is something we cram between other activities, so what we eat assumes less importance than perhaps it deserves.</p>
<p>Important point.
We eat when we are driving/walking/doing something else.
We hardly notice what we are eating.
Meals aren’t a time for celebrating nourishment , they are a unwanted distraction if we can’t do anything at the same time , kind of like how we feel about sleep!</p>
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<p>You’d need a particular kind of bike for transporting groceries. My custom racer wouldn’t be terribly useful at transporting groceries. It wouldn’t work very well during New England winters either.</p>
<p>There also has to be space to properly STORE food that is purchased. Some families with low income live in rather crowded conditions and may share refrigerator, freezer & storage space with many others. They can’t easily fit Costco-sized portions of things and don’t have the funds to buy bulk in advance and spread it out over a period of time. When food isn’t stored properly and goes bad it isn’t a savings to anyone. Transportation to get the food & safely transport it home IS an issue as well.</p>
<p>I agree that you can build healthy delicious meals that are relatively low cost
If you have the time & energy to do so,
if you have the tools needed ( I don’t have a blender or a food processor but I do have a good knife, which was $$$$),
& if you have the skills & motivation to make food that tastes good besides just being filling.</p>
<p>But as a parent who was for a while a single mom of two young special needs kids, I can tell you that I was often too exhausted to do anything but make something that I knew they would eat. Like box mac & cheese or frozen pizza.
It is really a vicious cycle because you don’t ever feel rested or relaxed & that impacts everything.</p>
<p>No particular kind of bike, though yes, a custom racer would probably be burdened by the rack for a ‘grocery bag’ or panniers such as I have for my bike, though I’d think most bike mechanics could figure out how to mount one, on the seat post if nothing else. Adding a backpack, all sorts of shopping can be done by bike. Around here, those of low income into functional biking have milk crates strapped on their racks. Here in balmy Wisconsin, some folks bike all year. I personally avoid the times with ice on the street, but for the most part I can bike some part of March through November. </p>
<p>Years ago, twins in the stroller, I was freer to walk for shopping, as I had all sorts of places to stash and hang purchases. The two miles or so to the Farmer’s Market was much more possible as a walking trip. </p>
<p>I’m not saying all this to be argumentative, more to point out that seeing possibility, and exemplifying it, as well as creating opportunity can lead to societal change, which is what we need to combat obesity and inactivity in this country.</p>
<p>EK, I had many exhausting single parent years. I know it is not easy. We had the boxed macaroni and cheese, whole grain on busy nights. Adding frozen peas and chopped tomatoes, some salad or carrot sticks on the side, not such a bad meal. Some salad with HB eggs and sliced meat is quick and healthy for summer meals.</p>
<p>I agree that you can sometimes just use bungee cords and a milk crate to carry groceries, but with my poor balance, I am better off with one of those * old lady shopping carts*! ;)</p>
<p>We went to few chain restaurants when our kids were of an age to use a * kids menu*, but I hope this isn’t a passing fad.
[Chain</a> restaurants will make kids menus healthier - seattlepi.com](<a href=“http://www.seattlepi.com/news/article/Chain-restaurants-will-make-kids-menus-healthier-1463134.php]Chain”>http://www.seattlepi.com/news/article/Chain-restaurants-will-make-kids-menus-healthier-1463134.php)</p>
<p>There’s definitely a cultural component to this. From a recent (heartbreaking) article about some of the issues of trying to give students healthy meals:</p>
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<p>[Why</a> Los Angeles Schoolkids Get Lousy Meals - Page 1 - News - Los Angeles - LA Weekly](<a href=“http://www.laweekly.com/2011-06-16/news/why-los-angeles-school-kids-get-lousy-meals/]Why”>http://www.laweekly.com/2011-06-16/news/why-los-angeles-school-kids-get-lousy-meals/)</p>
<p>Make hummus yourself using dried chickpeas and it’s dirt-cheap. Make it with canned garbanzos because life has gotten busier and you’ve got the money, and it’s still cheap. But if you’ve never had it in your life, where are you going to get that first taste? And how are you going to acclimate your kids to it, or even to the idea that there are lots of new and interesting foods to try?</p>
<p>I’m sorry, but in my area it would not be possible to grocery shop for a family by bike. Just couldn’t be done. Also, the truly poor in my area don’t have places to store bikes. Mostly they walk, which means bodegas, because the supermarkets are located in areas that are more car friendly. I know a lot of people who grocery shop on foot and if they have a person with them, it works out fine, but not by bike.</p>
<p>A friend sort of in my age group uses those shopping carts. They work very well! I decided I’m not embarrassed to walk around the farmer’s market with her. </p>
<p>Yes, that cultural component is the biggie. Introducing foods from an early age is key. Involving them in the process, as my Ds first grade teacher did, make that hummus together, with a story about how people eat it in the Middle East, the importance of olive oil to that culture, and you might have more kids trying it. Show them that that sesame strong taste in hummus is from those seeds on the top of a hamburger bun, and you add familiarity. Some kids just have sensitive palates as well, and giving them healthy alternatives rather than giving up might help.</p>
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<p>Middle-eastern restaurant. If they exist in your area.</p>