dohebert’s Recent Comments

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  Food Budgets

  I just wanted to quibble with the statement, "Over the last century, Americans abandoned their kitchens nearly as quickly as they abandoned farms. In 1929, Americans spent 17 percent of their food budgets away from home. Today, that number approaches 50 percent."  

  I don't think that the food budget is really a fair measure to conclude that "Americans abandoned their kitchens."  When I look at my own spending, I see that I spend way more than 50% of my food dollars at restaurants - yet I only eat only eat about 10% of my meals away from home, and prepare the rest myself.  The trouble with measuring dollars is that I can buy $40 worth of groceries (lentils, flour, fresh vegetables) at the grocery store, coop, or farmers market and eat well for a week on food that I prepare myself.  Or I can go to a restaurant and blow $50 on dinner for two. (Not to mention the vegetables I grow myself all summer, which further skews my food budget toward the restaurants.)  Does that mean I've abandoned my kitchen?  Hardly.

  - deanOn Colorado's inmates-as-farmworkers plan says plenty about our food culture posted 2 years, 8 months ago 12 Responses