FRIDAY FOOD THING
Well, I’ve seen everything, now, and it’s convinced me to begin spending my afternoons fishing for catfish off the end of my dock: catfish fillets in my local grocery store have reached $8 per pound. Long considered culinary trash or culinary gold — depending on your geographic dinner-table upbringing — catfish fillets are now more expensive than medium shrimp and most cuts of premium beef, a fact that is actively confounding my brain.
After traveling for awhile and visiting Mom, I went shopping yesterday for the first time in several weeks, and I gotta tell you: it was a painful experience! Food and gas prices are zooming higher and higher while my pocketbook is shrinking faster than raw clams under hot lights. Equitably speaking, dollar for dollar, what used to fill up three grocery bags now barely fills one. I found Oscar Meyer hot dogs on sale for $3 per package and — compared to other ballooning pork and bacon prices staring at me from within the cooler — decided to stock up on a half-dozen packages for my freezer. See there? A strange hoarding mentality has already begun creeping into my thought processes, taking over my usual shopping sensibility: should I buy a case of Bush’s baked beans now while they’re still less than $10 a can? Should I top off my vehicles with gas today because tomorrow it will cost more?
You know, those three-for-a-dollar dried Ramen Noodles I saw yesterday are looking pretty darned good! Should have invested in a truck load of them last year when they were a dime apiece.
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4/9/11
Tim says: Oops! Make that $8.89 per pound.
A part of this sorry raising of prices that makes me sad is that there are many out there who don’t know HOW to live in a frugal manner and retain a comfortable way of life. I’ve been making out monthly menus for 20 years and have a large freezer in which I have a good stock of food. We’ve cut back on the ‘toys’ and fringe stuff, make good meals at home and get together with friends instead of movies or dinners out. I’m afraid that there are generations that don’t know how to live with simple joys.
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My husband and I both fish for trout; Johnson County stocks their lakes with them twice a year. You can have up to three poles. We both love fish and found it to be enjoyable and well worth the time considering the prices at the local fishmongers. Halibut , is selling for 18.99 on sale!
I remember when it was 69 cents per pound.
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What about the outrageous prices of pasta and bread?
It has been reported that vast fields of all kinds of grains are being harvested for bio-fuels, supplanting their traditional “bread-basket” role.
I wonder at families with many children and the fact that sandwiches may become an occasional treat.
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Buy the really heavy stuff now, buy the hotdogs and freeze them on a baking sheet so they freeze separately, then bag them! Busch’s Beans freeze very well…put them in a large zip-lock freezer bag and on to a baking sheet FLAT! Just break off a chunk when you want it !
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AMEN!!
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It’s beginning to make me change a bunch of travel and eating habits, and that’s for sure. I wish I better understood the reason that the gas prices are going up so high; I understand that it’s due to some sort of market speculation, but I just can’t wrap my pea-brain around it. Higher transportation costs = higher food prices. How’s your garden going, Tim????
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