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In America, salads are much more difficult to find — let alone good ones. They're also priced accordingly, thanks to the magic of supply and demand. So, even a
by q7xvh97o2pDhNrh 3y ago
In America, salads are much more difficult to find — let alone good ones. They're also priced accordingly, thanks to the magic of supply and demand.
So, even after an epic lunchtime quest of hunting/gathering, you might end up out 20-30 bucks for a depressing pile of iceberg lettuce, croutons, and shredded cheese. (In America, this is often called a "Caesar salad." Yes, really.)
Even if you do happen to be in the rare neighborhood that has a good salad connection, you're still committing to spending your lunch break furiously chewing raw vegetables in whatever few minutes you have left after running to go get your meal. This is what I did every day for months when I worked in an office, but let's not pretend it's ideal.
The dream would be fresh, cooked vegetables, so that one could get the best bioavailability. [1] But that is largely a fever dream, even in major cities. For example, I can count on 1 hand the number of restaurants I know where I could order a simple plate of steamed/roasted broccoli for less than 20 dollars.
[1]: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1878450X15000207#t0020 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1878450X1...
- cykros 3y agoYou might be surprised how many Chinese takeout places will happily part with some steamed broccoli and brown rice for a reasonable price. Sure, it's not on the menu, and most of what is may well be covered in sugary sauces, but at least in my experience, they tend to be a pretty reasonable bunch when it comes to just selling what they have for the right price. Though I'm in the Northeast -- your access to wildly abundant Chinese takeout may vary.
- RetroTechie 3y ago"So, even after an epic lunchtime quest of hunting/gathering, you might end up out 20-30 bucks for a depressing pile of iceberg lettuce, croutons, and shredded cheese." Depressing indeed! Where I live, it's like €1.50 per ~500g chunk of raw broccoli (just the vegetable, harvested, possibly washed and wrapped in plastic, transported to supermarket). Other vegetables in similar range, and no problem finding stores with a decent selection of veggies & fruit. Are US farmers somehow unable to grow broccoli <$1.50/lb? Or food stores incapable of selling raw veggies @ reasonable prices?
- vel0city 3y agoI can easily find fresh broccoli for around $1.50/lb at several grocery stores near me here in the US. There's loads of stores with a variety of vegetables that are decently cheap and are also eligible under my state's food stamp/child food supplement programs for low income people. Looking at price indexes from the US Fed it might just be cheap for me here. The average seems close to $2/lb. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/APU0000712412 https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/APU0000712412