Food and Frugality in the Post-Pollan World

Sometimes it seems like we're figuring out what our grandparents already had down: how to make it, mend it, stretch it, save it, grow it, or cook it ourselves. I'm just another young adult muddling through the Great Recession, an age both of straitened budgets and increasing realization that cheap food comes at a brutally high collective cost. These days I'm chopping cabbage and shopping the discount racks - but give it a few decades, I realized, and I'm going to be the next generation's Depression-era grandma, telling the younguns how tough we had it and showing 'em how to make salad with broccoli stems. 

So I like to cook, I like to eat, I like to shop for groceries... but I hate spending money. And on this blog, you're going to hear all about it! I live in Brooklyn, so my grocery shopping and food strategy posts are going to be pretty area-specific, but I hope you'll find them somewhat useful.

I like to eat well and try to eat decently - that is, limiting sugary and starchy foods and trying to buy animal products raised as humanely as possible. That makes living cheaply challenging, since I have to figure out how to cut expenses without cutting corners.

But hey, look at the Food Administration poster on the left. Less wheat, meat, sugar, and fats? It looks like my ancestors had the same goals, and while victory for the Allies may not be riding on my dining choices, making the best you can with the resources you've got is still a good idea.

Join me and my fellow contributor(s?) as we post thoughts, recipes, tips, questions, and strategies, practicing to be the grandmas of the future.