Survey: Are You Sacrificing Food Quality for Savings?

I voted: "Despite the skyrocketing food costs, I do pretty well. I buy fruit and veggies in season. I eat very little meat, so that's a cost savings."

I think what many people are missing here is that it's not only the explosion of the Chinese middle class and the world population that are pushing these prices up. It's also a pure strategical move made by the global food industry, as explained here:

http://www.corrupt.org/news/global_oligarchy_boosts_food_prices_for_more_profit

The provided choices are terrible. My family purchases brand names only when the store brands aren't worth anything. In many cases we actually prefer the store-brand to the name brand.

I buy the lowest level of production possible (No Processed food). My beans are dried (not from the can), everything I can get in bulk I do, I go to three different grociery stores on my bike on a Saturday (great exercise) after doing some meal planning with my girl friend. I buy fruits and veggies that are in season. It is amazing the difference this makes and we feel great after the bike ride and after every meal. I also buy meat about twice a month.

The only thing that has changed for my household is that weekly T-bone steaks are now bi-weekly or swiss steaks instead. I swear our consumption of Milk and eggs has risen as fast as the price. We are not going to compromise these anytime soon, however, I am more interested in turning our shed into a hen house for eggs and free range. It would be enough to provide for my local family & neighbors.

We are looking forward here in the North to our gardens providing us much through the Summer into the Fall. We did lose a few plants to last nights frost. Our back up plants that are still growing inside though will replace them.
On the future menu -squashes, kale, swiss chard, lettuces, tomato, beans. The local farmers will provide the rest.

I agree the options are pretty terrible. I buy mostly locally grown foods, and avoid grocery stores as much as possible. Even though I eat little meat, it's more expensive because it's local organic grass-fed meadow-raised meat.

Hey Captain America, same here! We planted our corn a little too early and despite covering it up I'm pretty sure we lost a few. We'll be able to replace them though :)

As for the food, we recently invested in a coop (Fair Shares in St. Louis MO). It cost us $2500 and we get 47 weeks of food, all locally grown and all responsibly grown (not all of it is organic though). Considering our cost for food was averaging out to $1000 a month, we'll be saving quite a bit of money even if we have to supplement here and there. With the added bonus of our garden, I don't think we'll be in any trouble come this summer unlike other families :)

I've been picking salad greens since February (started indoors in containers), just pulled up my first crop of radishes and carrots. My onions, potatoes, peas, beans, and early squash have all sprouted outdoors. I doubled the size of my vegetable garden so I should be able to grow about 50% of my food this summer and have quite a bit left over that I can store this winter. I'll be building my greenhouse this summer too so I can have a good sized fall crop too. I don't eat meat or eggs so that already cuts the food bill quite a bit. For me and my wife we spent about $100/month on food last summer to supplement what I grew. I'm hoping I can get that down to about $50-75 this summer. This weekend I'll be making the last of my winter squash from last year into soup for my lunches next week.

We grow ours. It's a cold year here in the PNW, so we're emphasizing peas, cabbage, and kale. Other years we do more corn and tomatoes -- many of this year's tomatoes will grow upside-down in the greenhouse. Rip up those yards and put 'ya back into it, peepuls!

risa b

Since I buy almost everything except rice, polenta, flour and dried beans at the farmers market, I haven't seen a price increase. The biggest cost increase I've seen is moving from CA to NYC.

My home energy use is in the 25th percentile for both heating and electricity, and my wife and I only commute a few miles a day in cars that get over 30 mpg. Energy costs are such a small amount of our budget that we've got plenty of money for other things.

We're using the extra money to improve the energy efficiency of our house. Our next purchase is going to be a tankless water heater.

There are multiple reasons everything costs more. Inflation of the dollar itself is actually caused by the dropping of the Gold Standard.

The housing market crash, people using plastic like no tomorrow, the "population crisis", and the US government mandated "food shortage" (that's what I'm calling it because it's our governments fault for putting corn to fuel) are just making it worse.

I Iive in Mexico City and last month I switched to buying my fresh produce at the central market. Not only is everything there about 60 - 70% cheaper, it is much fresher and I am able to pick only local Mexican producers.
With the money saved, I can buy the rest of what I need organic, and still I have managed to shave off over 500 pesos off my weekly grocery bill. (About $50)
I get MUCH better quality food for less!

Sorry, but I think the poll itself is flawed...

I responded 'other' because i wasn't sure what i was responding to:

"The prices are killing me too but I refuse to compromise."

I agree. my 'refuse to compromise' comes from refusing to buy fruit and veg from multinationals when I know i can buy them at the local farmer's market... but I'm not sure what the question was...

"Despite the skyrocketing food costs, I do pretty well. I buy fruit and veggies in season. I eat very little meat, so that's a cost savings."

I agree. I'm also getting hardcore into nagging people about the value of learning to grow your own food...

I buy 90% of my produce, bread and other food items at the farmers market. We go as a family once a week, eat breakfast, and enjoy the music. I love getting to know the people who grow my food. It brings a deeper connection to our community and to our food.

I can fill up five canvas bags full of wonderful food for less then $100.00. I could never do that in a store.

Buy local!

We were all ready eating as much local food as possible and now that prices have started to rise, we are still doing that because they have risen less than at the supermarket. Here in the UK, food prices have risen about 6.5% over the last three months, so it is really causing some people problems.

I'm so jealous of those of you who have farmer's markets! The closest thing we have to that is some guys sitting on the side of the road who sell corn on the cob...but we grow that in our garden already.