Cheap is not the end of the story.

Until the US gets on the same page with places like the European Union, there will be two kinds of food here. There will be cheap food, and good food, and they will not be the same stuff in the vast majority of cases. With it being Thanksgiving this week, the talk of turkeys is abundant. I personally do not like turkey, so I didn't buy one, but when I was at Sun Harvest, I noticed that they had free range turkeys there for about $1.50 a pound. That doesn't sound like a high price to me, and for free range, it's well worth it. I recommended this to some people, just trying to be helpful, and they acted like it was ridiculous. After all, the (cheap disgusting awful) grocery store chain that is in every neighborhood in this town had them for $.47 per pound. They weren't free range, though.

I guess there are different standards for what constitutes "the best place in town to get a turkey". I had not seen free-range anywhere but Sun Harvest, and if I were going to buy a turkey, it would definitely buy a free-range one, so I thought it was worth mentioning. It seems like most others have the idea that the best place to get a turkey, is the cheapest place to get a turkey. Forget how it was raised, what it was fed, how it was processed... none of that matters as long as it's cheap, right?

Another thing that I've found strange for a long time about the military is how it's a big competition to see who can feed the biggest family for the cheapest. Now, there is some validity to that. It does pay to shop bulk sales when the commissary has them (I once got cans of organic diced tomatoes for $1.25 each. Those same cans go for $4 each normally at civ stores.) It does pay to stock up on things when they're on sale, and to use coupons. For the really daring ones, it pays to bake your own bread, and of course avoid prepackaged foods as much as possible. That's really where it ends, though. There just comes a point when you're sacrificing good for cheap, and nobody is really benefited much by that.

Sure, our meat budget would be half what it was if we just bought whatever the feedlots are turning out, but when it comes to any animal product, you REALLY get what you pay for. Extreme animal rights has never been my thing, but animal welfare is. We vote with our dollars for how we want farm animals treated. We've all driven through the North Texas feedlots. Can you honestly say that looks like a great life for those steers? I don't want to vote with my dollars for that. Why would anyone if they have a choice?

Animal products are really only the beginning of the story, though. While I can totally understand buying some non-organic veggies and fruits at times, GMO foods are an absolute deal breaker. Sure, I can buy some canola oil for half the price of the sunflower oil we use, but 100% of our canola products in the US have GMO. Sunflower does not. In fact, if you look on the back of the bottle, it says "Certified GMO Free". GMO Free is not cheap. Just like free range and organic meats, you will pay for it. Isn't it worth it to know that you are not feeding your children genetically modified foods, though? Isn't it worth it to NOT feed evil giants like Monsanto?

In the US, we have a food problem, and that problem is that good food is hard to find. I am acutely aware of this due to the fact that this entire city has only one store that sells any foods that a conscientious consumer would feel good about eating, and it's all the way on the other side of the city from my house. However, even we find a way. The first thing people have to do is realize that cheap is ok to a point, but just like anything else, there are right and wrong ways to do cheap.

Here are some great ways to save money on the grocery bill, and free up that room in the budget to buy conscientious products such as free-range meats and GMO-Free products:

-Replace paper towels with flat cotton diapers. They work better than paper towels, and are far cheaper.

-Replace expensive cleaning products with vinegar solution. It is even greener than the green cleaners, and works pretty well if you do it right.

-Cloth diaper your babies.

-Breastfeed for as long as you can. (Really, for what 6 months of formula costs, you could buy a whole SIDE of organic beef!)

-Bake your own bread. You do not need a bread machine, and it is not difficult nor time consuming.

-Cook from scratch. Most of the ready made things you pay a lot for are actually really easy to make. Things like teriyaki sauce, pie crusts, and most marinades and glazes can be made from scratch for pennies rather than bought for dollars.

-Buy bone-in chicken rather than boneless skinless. You'll pay a lot less per pound, and deboning really isn't hard.

-Go meatless a few days a week.

-Use less meat every day. I've found that just about every recipe there is can be made with half to a third the amount of meat it calls for and still taste great. Sure, that package of organic grass fed hamburger meat costs $10, but I'm actually not spending any more than you are since I can get three pasta dishes out of it, whereas most people would use three separate packages of hamburger, costing about $4 each. My way actually turns out cheaper. (For anyone curious, a great way to beef up a dish that you are using minimal beef in is to use mushrooms. Portabello and Shiitake are both excellent varieties to use for this. Cut them up nice and small, and they blend right in with the meat. If you have family members who hate mushrooms, just don't tell them you did this. Thak hates mushrooms and it works for me.)


By doing these few things, it can be possible for nearly any family to avoid being forced to choose between good and cheap. Really, this is our food we're talking about here, the stuff that fuels our bodies every day of our lives. It's nothing to mess around with.