Thanksgivings’ looming presence has got me thinking about the cost of food.
When you hear about ‘poverty food’, what comes to mind? Or, what food makes you think that someone who eats that regularly must be one step above eating canned dog food?
And why?
Ramen noodles - cheap and terrible for you.
Fast food - cheap and terrible for you.
Hamburger helper - cheap and terrible for you.
Hormel dinners. Etc.
Basically any convenience food that has a large number of calories, high fat, salt, etc. for a cheap price is poverty food. According to an article I read by National Council of La Raza, there is a direct relationship between food insecurity and obesity. Meaning people who don’t know where their next meal is coming from tend to pack in the calories to last through the hunger period. We don’t think of obesity and starvation as coexisting, but in the U.S. they do.
Generic macaroni and cheese.
That’s interesting, because I think of dirt-cheap fast food as the ultimate poverty food. Carls Jr., to be precise. I had a friend years ago, a single mom, who ate/fed her kids almost exclusively Carls Jr. every supper. She was on many forms of various state assistance, including food stamps, but for some bizzare reason dollar hamburgers were the usual dinner. Because, you know, they were cheap. She knew how to cook, at least enough to fix a real meal, but bemoaned the cost, so therefore bought fast food every single day.
Pizza
Mac’n’cheese
hot dogs
ramen noodles
chili*
veggie soup*
hot pockets
any of those tv dinners
sandwiches (white bread, a piece of cheap meat, and maybe a piece of cheese)
cereal (generic corn flakes, etc)
This has pretty much been what my diet has consisted of the last few years. Not healthy in the least, but when your monthly grocery bill for 6 people is $200, you eat what you can.
*It costs me between $20 and $25 to make soup or chili, but I can feed 6 people on it for 3 to 5 nights.
Ramen noodles.
Hamburger and cream of mushroom soup over rice.
Chipped beef on toast.
Ramen noodles.
Macaroni and cheese from a box.
Beans and rice, with not much else.
I was very poor in my 2nd year of University. Chose books over food and lived on damn near nothing for nearly a month. A local restauraunt offered bottomless coffees, and I basically lived on the cream and sugar that went into them.
So, for me, “Free Refills” always makes me think of those poverty days.
Dented cans, day old bread, and christmas cake (in April).
Those things also make me think of shopping on a very limited budget.
Moving to Cafe Society from IMHO.
Spam with mac n cheese
Ramen noodles
Hot dogs
Hormel beef stew
I don’t make a lot of money, but I’m happy to say that stuff is far behind me. I hope for good.
When I was a child we were poor. My mother would make a pot of white rice and pour in a can of tomatoes. We called it “poor man’s stew”.
Beans and rice
Cheap fast food - the dollar menu type stuff as mentioned above, for much the same reasons.
Drink mixes, like kool-aid - again, fairly calorie dense, flavorful, but cheap.
Beans on toast, aka poverty pizza.
Growing up I knew a lady who would chop up an onion, fry it in a little oil, boil some spaghetti put that on a plate, cover it all with ketchup and feed it to her kids. “It’s a meal!” she’d say. We were all poor back then but, damn, at least we had rice and beans and codfish!
Fried Potatoes for me. We were poor and potatoes are/were cheap. We had fried potatoes for every meal.
Gruel, thanks to Oliver Twist.
While I would consider some of this poverty food, I cannot wrap my noggin around some of the choices people have said. Real chili, Hormel stew, hot pockets and most TV dinners cost more that what I consider poverty food, just unhealthy, all imho of course.
My list:
Generic pancake mix, instant mashed potatoes, ramen noodles, powder milk (in cereal etc), spaghetti with no meat, salted noodles. I remember all those as meals during my horrendous choice to live with the man who conceived me.
I haven’t compared the menus lately, but I get the impression that Carl’s Jr. is one of the more pricy fast food places. Maybe they have a dollar menu, I don’t know, but I think of the fancy Western burgers and such when I think of CJ’s. McDonald’s is the bottom of the rung, IMHO, or Taco Bell, if you want to try “Mexican.”
Then there’s chipped beef on toast, aka shit on a shingle. That’s more military food, though.
Rice and beans
Potatoes and cabbage
Any sort of “greens” that’s inedible until boiled
In the grand scheme of things, you have to be pretty darned rich to eat what we call “junk food”.
“polka dot soup” - chop up a hot dog to put IN the ramen. The kids will eat it, but most adults say, bleah.
boiled chicken leg quarters with minute rice.
“dog ear soup” - basically you throw the last pound of hamburger you’ve got in a pot with all the cans of whatever veggies leftover from what you got from the food cupboard,… including those you don’t really like… plus macaroni - if you have any left. Add a little seasoning, simmer, and hope it doesn’t taste like ass.
tuna “casserole” - made from generic mac 'n cheese, food pantry tuna and a can of carrots
And yes, we’ve had all of these in the last month