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Comment by D_Alex | Hacker News Reader

Can I ask: What is the motivation of trying to limit the cost of your food to such a low (for first-world) amount? I am really weirded out by the number of me-too responses, the philosophy of such extreme saving on food is alien to me.

For me, delicious food is near the top of my priority list. I really do not stint at all, my grocery bill is abt $40/day for 2 people... that is $15k/yr, such a bargain considering: rent+utilities on my modest apt is $35k/yr, 2 cars (Subaru+Toyota... not fancy) abt $20k/yr all up (I live in Australia).

Good food is such a bargain.

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A few things.

1. Perhaps they have substantially less spending money than you do. (I never understood cutting back on food expenses until my wife and I went through some tough financial times.)

2. Perhaps they don't value food as much as you do. I enjoy good food, but I'd never say that it is near the top of my priority list. I'd much rather have cheap food and a better broadband connection than the reverse.

3. Perhaps they are trying to scrape together every bit of money they can to put towards their startup. There is a reason that PG uses the phrase "ramen profitable."

I'm scraping together every bit of money towards my startup... but not skimping on food at all. Perhaps that's because it's a food startup and I'd feel hypocritical eating ramen everyday! But, really, it's more because I think there are better things to skimp on than food.. i.e. the fuel that makes us who we are and sustains us everyday.

Besides I've got 3 years of data to show that it's possible to eat cheaply and still get great food.. you just have to do a few things:

1. buy in volume 2. cook for yourself/others, don't eat out 3. cut back on meat 4. waste as little as possible!

The startup is foodia, btw. More to come soon...

I'm glad to see I wasn't the only one horrified by this - food is one of the great pleasures in life!

My wife and I have been pretty hard up (when she was finishing law school and I was a startup co-founder) - but we always managed to have decent food.

Agreed, I don't get the stinginess on food either. Among price, healthiness, taste and ease of preparation, price is my last priority. I'd love to read a blog post or article that optimizes on the other three criteria instead.

http://thefoodeverywhere.com

Consider that you have $70k/yr in living expenses, and many people don't even come anywhere close to earning $70k/yr.

Food is one of the places you can cut a lot of your spending without needing to make major lifestyle changes, so it's one of the first places people look.

Also, I think you will find different people place different value on food flavor. I personally am very, very deep into "eat to live" territory, and I take a certain amount of pride in that approach.

Cut out the cars and he's down to $50k/yr. Though it can be a social disadvantage to varying degrees, it is possibly to live without a car in most urban areas in Australia. Still $20/day per a person is much higher than average. It's possible to cut down on that quite a lot and still enjoy nice food. Then again, it might be these people who will spend anything who are pushing the food prices up here. Food inflation has been rather significant in Australia in recent years (it's still at least a percentage point higher than general CPI). Though probably also a result of the duopoly held by Woolworths and Coles.

I agree with you. I don't understand why people try to save in food to keep their 'lifestyle'. I'd rather not going out (bar/club/coffe shop) than skimp in food (which is a source of health and happiness!).

Our body is what we eat. I would move to a more suburban neighborhood or go out less but never lower the quality the food.

$20 per person per day? That's massive, even for Australia. What are you eating?

I easily top that, living in central Tokyo.

This is including eating out for lunch on weekdays though, which costs at least 10 dollars a day.

Fruit and vegetables are more expensive. A decent apple will cost about 1.50 each. 1 metric litre of milk costs about 2 dollars, and 10 eggs wil probably run you around 3 dollars.

Meat, depending on the origin and cut, can cost you about 6 dollars for about 150 grams (or a much, much more).

You can get frozen manufactured food for fairly reasonable prices, but I'm kind of a snob and pretty much will not eat anything that has ingredients I don't understand in it.

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