What People Eat
During this season of fasting, I always start reflecting on what keeping the fast is teaching me. While I'm not keeping the strict dietary fast, I am trying to fast in other ways. And, I'm trying to help Steve keep the fast, too.
While I've said it before, it bears repeating: Fasting teaches me that there's a big difference between what I want and what I need. In other words, I can eat vegan foods and survive. I don't need meat and dairy to be a healthy person. It also teaches me that I can get by with less and still be happy. Thinking about the average American diet in relation to the rest of the world is eye opening. We American's are fat and extravagant. We eat three meals a day, plus snacks, and we pack those meals with processed, pre-made convenience foods of every kind.
Even I, as homespun and thrifty as I like my meals to be, even I am guilty of falling prey to the convenience of boxed breakfast cereals and boxes of macaroni & cheese. I also eat far, far too much.
Here's what the world spends on food per week, pictured with the actual foods, people eating the food, and prices in $US.
North Carolina, USA -- $341.98/wk -- Almost $110/wk per person! Notice all the fast food and convenience foods. No wonder they spend so much to feed just a family of four!
Italy -- $260/wk -- That's $52/wk per person. They eat a lot of bread, fruits, and vegetables, but are still pricier than my own little family. Perhaps that's because Americans, while definitely eating too much and too many convenience foods, also spend less than 10% of their income on food. Our food is not only abundant, it's dang cheap, too!
California, USA -- $160/wk -- This is much more like the average U.S. family that tries to be thrifty. It's still $40/wk per person. Notice they don't eat out as much as the family from North Carolina, but they still fall prey to lots of convenience foods like cereal, frozen pizzas, frozen corn dogs, cookies, and sodas.
Mongolia -- $40/wk -- This family of 4 eats mostly meats and eggs, with bread and potatoes pulling a close second, probably because fresh vegetables aren't that abundant in the hinterlands of Mongolia. That said, they still pay close to $10/wk per person.
Egypt -- $68.53/wk -- Check this out! They feed 12 people a mostly vegetarian diet with some meat thrown in for cheap. I wonder what % of their income this $68 represents.
Ecuador -- $31.55/wk -- Here we have a family of 9 eating what looks like a mostly subsistence farming diet with no meat at all. That's $3.50/wk per person. I think we're finally looking at poverty, but they don't appear to be starving.
Breidjing Camp, Sudan -- $1.23/wk -- A mere 20 cents per week per person.
For my family of four (one being a baby), we spend about $115/week. That's buying organic and all natural foods whenever the budget allows -- including raw-milk and organic veggies from a local farmer, and local free-range chickens and eggs, and local grass-fed beef or bison. We buy some convenience foods for the kiddos -- like natural macaroni and cheese, cereal, and fish sticks. We also occasionally splurge on things like ice cream and juice. I'm very thrifty, and I doubt that someone would be able to eat a similar diet to ours for less without buying in bulk from a co-op (something we've never had the financial ability to do). This year, we're going to buy a full side of grass-fed and finished beef from a local free-range rancher and make out like bandits for a mere $2.81/lb! Although the cost is all upfront, it will probably bring our weekly food budget down to $100/wk and save us something like $390 this year in food costs.
When we first got married, we were a lot more poor than we currently are, and we could get away with spending $115/month on groceries for just the two of us. To do that, we rarely ate meat, and we certainly didn't care about having a Nourishing Traditions type of all natural/local/organic diet. It was also a decade ago, and food prices have seen inflation of anywhere between 8 and 20% annually since then.
According to the Federal Government statistics, the average poorer 2 person family spends at least $300/month on groceries.
While I've said it before, it bears repeating: Fasting teaches me that there's a big difference between what I want and what I need. In other words, I can eat vegan foods and survive. I don't need meat and dairy to be a healthy person. It also teaches me that I can get by with less and still be happy. Thinking about the average American diet in relation to the rest of the world is eye opening. We American's are fat and extravagant. We eat three meals a day, plus snacks, and we pack those meals with processed, pre-made convenience foods of every kind.
Even I, as homespun and thrifty as I like my meals to be, even I am guilty of falling prey to the convenience of boxed breakfast cereals and boxes of macaroni & cheese. I also eat far, far too much.
Here's what the world spends on food per week, pictured with the actual foods, people eating the food, and prices in $US.
North Carolina, USA -- $341.98/wk -- Almost $110/wk per person! Notice all the fast food and convenience foods. No wonder they spend so much to feed just a family of four!
Italy -- $260/wk -- That's $52/wk per person. They eat a lot of bread, fruits, and vegetables, but are still pricier than my own little family. Perhaps that's because Americans, while definitely eating too much and too many convenience foods, also spend less than 10% of their income on food. Our food is not only abundant, it's dang cheap, too!
California, USA -- $160/wk -- This is much more like the average U.S. family that tries to be thrifty. It's still $40/wk per person. Notice they don't eat out as much as the family from North Carolina, but they still fall prey to lots of convenience foods like cereal, frozen pizzas, frozen corn dogs, cookies, and sodas.
Mongolia -- $40/wk -- This family of 4 eats mostly meats and eggs, with bread and potatoes pulling a close second, probably because fresh vegetables aren't that abundant in the hinterlands of Mongolia. That said, they still pay close to $10/wk per person.
Egypt -- $68.53/wk -- Check this out! They feed 12 people a mostly vegetarian diet with some meat thrown in for cheap. I wonder what % of their income this $68 represents.
Ecuador -- $31.55/wk -- Here we have a family of 9 eating what looks like a mostly subsistence farming diet with no meat at all. That's $3.50/wk per person. I think we're finally looking at poverty, but they don't appear to be starving.
Breidjing Camp, Sudan -- $1.23/wk -- A mere 20 cents per week per person.
For my family of four (one being a baby), we spend about $115/week. That's buying organic and all natural foods whenever the budget allows -- including raw-milk and organic veggies from a local farmer, and local free-range chickens and eggs, and local grass-fed beef or bison. We buy some convenience foods for the kiddos -- like natural macaroni and cheese, cereal, and fish sticks. We also occasionally splurge on things like ice cream and juice. I'm very thrifty, and I doubt that someone would be able to eat a similar diet to ours for less without buying in bulk from a co-op (something we've never had the financial ability to do). This year, we're going to buy a full side of grass-fed and finished beef from a local free-range rancher and make out like bandits for a mere $2.81/lb! Although the cost is all upfront, it will probably bring our weekly food budget down to $100/wk and save us something like $390 this year in food costs.
When we first got married, we were a lot more poor than we currently are, and we could get away with spending $115/month on groceries for just the two of us. To do that, we rarely ate meat, and we certainly didn't care about having a Nourishing Traditions type of all natural/local/organic diet. It was also a decade ago, and food prices have seen inflation of anywhere between 8 and 20% annually since then.
According to the Federal Government statistics, the average poorer 2 person family spends at least $300/month on groceries.