Food Elitism, Again

I'm glad that Dreher has (again?) taken up the subject of the cost of eating crunchy. So glad, in fact, that I'll even link him! I'm not sure I buy the smaller portions business and I don't (as usual) like Dreher's tone, but the post is worth reading and mulling over.

What aren't worth reading are the comments. Dreher and his commentors are snarky, unpleasant, and (at times) dogmatic. I wanted to jump in, but just could stomach all the iterations of "my way is the right way." So, I'll say my bit here.

Non-crunchies, it's time to admit that Dreher and others are right that processed food IS more expensive than cooking your own from whole ingredients. Does everyone have the time to cook from scratch? No, but the question, as Lydia has pointed out in comments and in her own posts, is why don't people have the time. The answer, as near as I can make out, is that they are working to maintain a lifestyle that excludes things like cooking from scratch from their range of options. Working, in other words, to afford the Hamburger Helper and Oreos that are an inferior substitute for homemade food. But lifestyle choices aren't everyone's problem. For some people, the food budget just is one of the places to squeeze out extra costs that they truly cannot afford, including free-range chicken, grass-fed beef, and local dairy. (The short version: not all poor people are mindless victims of the industrial-food consumer culture!)

Crunchies, it's time to acknowledge the implication of your sacramental view of food: processed/industrial food eaters are bound to feel judged by you when you tell them that their eating choices are a denial of all that is good and holy. Furthermore, even though homecooking is pretty easy, you don't make it sound easy. My experience is that you make it sound as fancy and exotic as possible, maybe because you think it sounds cooler and more appealing when the names are in French and the ingredients are "artisanal."

Look, it really is true that shopping around the outside of the store and cooking yourself will save you money. Sometimes, buying at the farmer's market or the health food store (or Whole Foods, if you've got one, but most of America hasn't got one) is also less expensive. A varied shopping strategy keeps my family's food costs down and we eat "real" food most all of the time. But my husband and I are graduate students with a child that we choose not to put into daycare and so we cannot afford to eat as "pure" as we (or crunchy foodists) would like. I'm happy with our choice and happy with our food.