Observations About October Money

As I predicted in my post about our September food spending, October's expenditures were indeed higher. We ended up spending $226.83 on food last month, with an additional $12.83 spent in household items. That brought our October total to $239.66 and our year-to-date average to $221.35.

There were some food purchases in October that were worth the extra pennies. We bought bacon—regionally raised and locally cured by a farm family now in its 4th generation of small scale, high quality pork production—and at $9.99/pound, it was worth every tasty, savory, hickory-smoked bite. That was a little over $21.00 of our food purchases there. And there was another $24.00 at a local orchard: culled apples to peel and freeze for apple pies and locally pressed apple cider that was the best apple cider I have had in decades. It was a luxury at almost double the going cost of commercial cider and one that we savored over three weeks, stretching out that deliciousness for as long as we could.

The cost of local food is one of those knotty issues that, gratefully, we are privileged enough to be able to sidestep. The locally grown food is far superior to what I can buy in a grocery. The dollars go directly to the grower—the orchardists in the one case, the pork producers in the other—so the money stays in the community. But if we were hurting financially with a severely limited income or job losses, the bacon and the cider and apples would be far beyond our reach. If we were not in dire straits but still on a tighter budget, I would have to choose between supporting our local agricultural community or being able to buy cheaper food. 

On the home front, our garden is done for 2020. A hard frost a few days caught the remaining cherry tomatoes, which were not ripening very much outside and would not ripen inside. The Bibb lettuce that flowered earlier in the summer reseeded itself and came up, providing us with some October/early November salads, but it was soured a little by the frost and is showing signs of wear and tear. I still had four cherry tomatoes, not very flavorful, and after putting them on a salad earlier this week, I bid goodbye to tomatoes until next June. 

Another knock to my conscience was seeing a recent reference to the USDA's monthly food reports. Call me a nerd, but I am fascinated what the official word is about food costs. The USDA presents four plans: thrifty, low-cost, moderate-cost, and liberal. The fine print at the bottom of each report spells out the foundations for the reports, including that "all meals and snacks are prepared at home." Other than exceptions for living in Hawaii and Alaska, where food costs bear little resemblance to the other 48 states, there are no other differentiations, such as dietary restrictions. 

Under the September 2020 report, the most current one, the thrifty monthly plan for two adults ages 51-70 is $381.90. Right now Warren and I are cruising well under that level. I'm okay with that.

I will share that for the first time in MONTHS, we had not one but two (TWO!) eating out (well, carry-out) experiences. The first was when we bought the bacon at Mom Wilson's, the local source of the best bacon ever. They also sell pulled pork sandwiches and we bought one to take home, splurging on the $8.00 "combo," which netted us chips and a huge dill pickle. Splitting it, we celebrated our 12th anniversary earlier this month. The second came when driving home after my infusion last week. Infusion days start with breakfast at about 5:30 a.m. and end with my getting back home and eating lunch around 1:30 p.m. When Warren picked me up to head home, he mentioned that the power was out when he left. All I could think of was I was tired, I was groggy from my meds, and I wanted food. Warm food. Tasty food. $15.12 later, we pulled out of White Castle with a bag of sliders, onion chips, and milkshakes. Money well spent on a long, hard day.

Eating the White Castle food brought back an old memory of the Minority Law Students Association (MLSA) at the law school I attended 40 years ago. The MLSA was holding a potluck gathering to kick off the year and I was there with my then husband, who belonged to the MLSA. Students were encouraged to bring a favorite ethnic dish from their family. We brought a Cuban dish. Some of the Filipino students brought rice dishes. An African-American student from Chicago walked in with a grocery sack and commandeered the stove and a frying pan. Chopped onions and little square hamburger patties went into the pan, while he set out small buns and a jar of dill pickle slices on the counter. By the time he placed the buns on top of the patties and put a lid on the pan to steam them, everyone had gathered around trying to guess his contribution. "White Castle!," I shouted and the student whirled around with a grin on his face. He pointed he spatula at me and said, one Midwesterner to another, "The best, right?"

Yes, they were. And sometimes still are.

On to November.