Like so many others, I am really trying to pare my grocery budget back - but trying to provide nutritious and tasty food is like walking through a field of landmines! High carb pastas make cheap, filling meals; fresh produce is horribly expensive during the winter months, and canned vegetables have nutrients processed away; I picked up a bag of frozen vegetables and was amazed to find that, although the package itself was large, it was nearly empty! Then there are the food items fabricated from corn syrup, oils, and who knows what else, that might have come from a nightmare version of the food replicator on Star Trek.
A killer ham and cheese sandwich started me on this tirade:
Yesterday, I bought a large package of lunchmeat - sliced ham for sandwiches - and was amazed when I got home and realized what I had: it LOOKED like ham, and TASTED like ham, but the similarities ended there. The package informed me in tiny print (like I can easily read microscopic words in the grocery store, I am old!) that there was at least 33% ground ham in this product, leaving me to wonder what the hell the other 67% was....this cannot be good....corn syrup and pressed oils. How many families, trying to stretch pennies to the limit, will use this along with American Cheese Product (not much cheese, mostly oil, but it LOOKS like sliced cheese) on the most inexpensive white bread. You might as well put a slab of shortening dusted with sugar on a piece of cardboard. The government requires warnings on video games, movies and television shows that are not appropriate for children - they should do the same on worthless foods masquerading as things they are not.
Meat, fish, poultry, grains, fruits and vegetables, dairy. Food pyramids. Whole grains, fresh produce. How can the average low income mother shopping for a family of 4 or 5 possibly afford to do this? Forget free-range and organic! No wonder obesity is rampant among the young, particularly lower income, children. Keeping them fed comes first, for better or worse.
I am so blessed! Raising my children, I fell back on the things I learned from my mother, that she learned from HER mother - raising a family during the depression. Does anyone know how to cut up a whole chicken anymore? Or how to stretch it to make at least 3 healthy meals for a family? Mama made our bread - I used to only wish for Wonder Bread, it was just like cake to me - and now all I can say to her is 'thank you, THANK-YOU!!' If we're looking for answers, I think we need to look back - way back - to our long-ago American homes and recipes, and find that magic soup stone.
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