Sorry, but there is no world in which shopping at the grocer every day is more convenient than shopping once every 1.5 or even 2 weeks or so.
I live in a dense city and very close to grocery stores, this is still true.
I live in a dense city and very close to grocery stores, this is still true.
I was with you until this rather extreme statement.
It depends a lot on what "convenient" means. If you want fresh produce and meat and don't have the huge fridges that seem to exist in most American households, it's a lot more convenient to shop for fresh, newly arrived stuff at a small neighborhood grocer's every 2-3 days.
It's also a form of social contact, another thing which isn't really included in "convenience", but maybe should be; given how many people are talking about mental health problems caused by lack of social contact these days.
I don't eat animal products so that might be influencing my thoughts around food longevity though.
I was measuring convenience in terms of time. It seems from my observation that a lot of people also don't cook for themselves as much as we do, so they might get more value out of the small trip.
How far do you take this? If you don't have a refrigerator at all, or any way to prepare food at home, then it's more convenient to eat out three times a day.
For you.
I keep seeing your replies throughout this chain and I can't help but notice that you seem to be astounded by differences in what ultimately amounts to personal preference. What might be convenient shopping for you may not be convenient shopping for others. Lifestyle, locale, general eating habits and personal taste, among other things, are significant contributing factors to these differences.
Some people enjoy going on walks every day, some people order lots of take out, etc. All of those are acceptable. I am only largely disagreeing with the people who claim that somehow these two alternatives take a comparable amount of time (and the people suggesting that I must have no taste in vegetables or live in suburbia).
I don't think there is a single rule. I depends entirely which day/hour you do the shopping and where. When I lived in Switzerland supermarkets were closed from saturday at 5pm during the weekend. Which means doing your shopping on friday night or saturday would take a lot of time as a lot of people were doing the same. Doing it any other day of the week was much quieter.
I don't necessarily shop every day, but I do it several times a week. Also I don't buy my vegetables at the supermarket but at the fruteria (spanish place where you only buy fruits and vegetables). I mostly avoid premade dishes, I even do my own pizzas and tart doughs as well as bread sometimes. That means I am cooking every day. Problem with shopping once a week is I would have to decide for 7 breakfasts, 7 meals and at least 6 dinners. That is a lot of planning and live very little room for improvisation unless you are wiling to waste things or have a giant refrigerator which I have no room for in my european kitchen.
And yes I enjoy going out for a walk/ride every day after work so it is not annoying at all.
There is a lot of parameters to take into account, home space, schedules, shop opening hours, proximity, if tap water is drinkable and taste good...YMMV.
I think that is an overestimate because you can have leftovers and also breakfast is generally pretty easy, but I agree that there is greater planning overhead.
My partner and I compile a list of all the meals we want to make for the next two weeks before shopping, if you get in the habit it doesn't take too too long.
1. my fridge wouldn't be big enough
2. I have chosen to live carless because I don't have my own parking space and it is very difficult to find a parking space at any given time of the day close to my place.
3. I can only carry 2 european sized grocery shooping bags and a small backpack with my motorbike (a maxi scooter as they call it) when I go there with my gf. I can carry more in a hiking backpack if I go alone and I could theorically buy a bigger top case, similar to the big cube the pizza delivery riders are using but that would still be less than a fully loaded shopping cart.
And I am saying that someone may still find it more "convenient" to do so in spite of whatever additional time may or may not be involved. Convenience is far too nuanced and dependent upon personal preference for you to be stating, as an absolute, that it is not more convenient for someone to shop every day than it is once every week or two.
And I say this as someone who shops on a more weekly or bi-weekly basis.
Also, if you watch the video you will see that bi-weekly driving/parking for groceries eats more of your time budget than multiple small trips to a well-located shop.
most produce does not spoil anywhere near as fast as you are suggesting.
That's untrue. Produce, especially if bought fresh, keeps for longer than 2 days in the fridge.
Certain items keep longer than others - carrots (of which I am especially fond of snacking on) keep very well.
What doesn't last for two weeks in a fridge?
Maybe you refuse to, but you could. An organic head of lettuce easily lasts a week or more in the fridge. Anyway, the extent to which produce has been "designed" is greatly overstated. Two hundred years ago people used to store apples in barrels for weeks if not months.
I'm not in the US, I buy organic and local produce at a farmers market. They usually last two weeks in the fridge.
If they are lasting only three days for you, maybe you are buying produce that is already over a week old.
I usually decide what I want to cook on the evening when I go grocery shopping. Weekends kind of suck because I have to plan two days ahead. (and have to carry two days worth of food)
Bonus: I don't have to take the car either.
but stated otherwise, you are saying that my getting a big order saves me 2 hours every time I do it. 10 minutes is also almost certainly an underestimate, assuming you live a 5 minute walk from the grocery store.
No, it takes less than a minute extra walk from my daily commute (walking), the rest of the nine minutes are to compensate for traversing the grocery store multiple times and wait in line at checkout.
If I expand it by another ~4 minutes I have other options as well.
If time was of extreme mindless essence I'd also take the bike.
Going daily to the grocery store costs lots of more time. The vast majority of people do not live a 1 minute walk from a grocery store, even in dense urban areas.
Doesn't apply to everyone of course (using a bike rather than walking dramatically helps though), but it does tie back to the US urban planning leaving a lot to be desired.
In the US, which was the point of my original comment. Here in Berlin I have at least 4 stores (Edeka, Lidl, Al Natura and a no-name Bio Markt ) in a 200m radius.
(edit: I am not one to complain about downvotes, but it is ridiculous to see this comment in gray, yet no one able to actually address the point. Bad urban planning and car-dependency in North America is intertwined with a lot of cultural aspects of the society, including this ridiculous notion that groceries are "inconvenient" and therefore better if done in bulk and/or less frequently)
These days you might face resistance to allowing light industrial again because people would accuse it of creating traffic and possibly leading people to park in front of their house - Nextdoor posters’ main principle is they should be able to park everywhere for free and nobody else should.
Do people really do that? The majority of what I get is the same across trips.
Also there's a thing we do that the daily shoppers sound unaware of: It's called a grocery list. A pad of paper left on the countertop that, at any time over those weeks, anyone in the house can add an item to if they want something different or know we're about to run out of. There's almost no planning involved.
That depends, it's recommended to walk a certain amount every day to stay healthy. If the trip to the grocery store is part of that, then you don't have to count it in the time spent.
The madhouse of a Costco or supermarkets on a weekend is time efficient, but it’s stressful.
A quiet and daily shopping experience can be a pleasant way to unwind after a day of work.