
Eat for $1.50 per Day – Layoffs, Coronavirus Quarantine, Food Shortages - throwlowcost
https://efficiencyiseverything.com/eat-for-1-50-per-day-layoffs-coronavirus-quarantine-food-shortages/
======
chantelles
I left home at 15 and some adults who worked together let me move in with them
and be their maid. I paid $150 a month in rent and got $10 a month to live on.
I worked out how to live off Milo (a Jamaican malt supplement), Chips Ahoy
cookies (1/2 a cookie a day for a treat) and dumpster dived vegetables (mostly
cabbages and carrots). I lived like this for years, when I got my first real
jobs I made sure to save at least 80% of every paycheck. I retired at 35 and
now I write about the apocalypse (one feature film, various shorts, one book,
graduate degree in Equity Studies/lots of essays and conferences). I know live
a very easy comfortable life, but most see me as bizarre because i have no
furniture and do not buy any beauty products (I've never purchased shampoo or
paid for a hair cut - I am female). There is an equal proportion of happy
memories scattered throughout my life, some of my happiest were when I had
literally nothing but one dress and 4 pairs of stolen Zellers underwear and
was sleeping in a car. The form of our lives impoverishes experience of
reality as much, if not more, as the content. It's a whole we do not see for
the misplaced desire for displays of wealth over relationships with everything
and everyone.

~~~
RobertRoberts
I lived with my wife in a van for months. We dumpster dived behind bakeries,
pizza places and ate very simple food. Even now 24+ years later we live a very
simple life with few things. (I left home at 17, and lived on the streets for
a time as well, so a van was luxury to me)

My hope is that if nothing else, the current situation opens people's eyes to
past indulgences with no thought toward the future. I wish I had saved as much
as you had, I would be better off now. (I simply never learned good financial
sense until later in life)

More than anything though, I am not afraid of going back to nothing. (I am
sure you may have a similar "mental safety net?)

It's not the end of the world and we can recover from this current state. Not
sure it's comforting to those that face this imminently, but many people have
survived far worse.

~~~
300bps
My hunch is dumpster diving works well when food is plentiful and people are
throwing perfectly edible items away willy-nilly.

Get a depression-style food shortage and suddenly what you find in the
dumpster won’t be as appetizing as the donuts that Dunkin just didn’t sell
that day.

~~~
chantelles
That's true. I mean, I mean the best dumpster diving is in rich
neighbourhoods. Food banks also dry up in hard times. I lived in Nelson BC for
a time when most people there were on welfare (it was at about 80%) and the
food bank only had apples from the harvest and those decorative gourds so I
got them and tried to cook them ( I was house sitting a Doukabor cabin for a
Buddhist couple ) and even ate a few bowls of what was THE MOST BITTER thing I
ever had even with a zillion sugar packets. But lets be real, what happens
when the dumpsters dry out is folks steal. That's why it's safer to have a
social net, for everyone.

------
nimbius
Its worth clarifying that the article is specifically addressing the _fallout_
from the pandemic: Unemployment and poverty due to failing economies and
shuttered restaurants and bars. In the US, Despite our country having vast and
endless supplies of food from megafarms and their accompanying subsidies,
there is very little safety net in America to ensure anyone is fed at all once
they are unemployed.

worth posting, a crash course on making sourdough bread:

[https://github.com/hendricius/the-bread-
code/blob/master/bas...](https://github.com/hendricius/the-bread-
code/blob/master/basics/sourdough.md)

I also maintain a git repo for frugal living.

[https://gitlab.com/nimbius/frugal/](https://gitlab.com/nimbius/frugal/)

~~~
treerock
I'm curious if anyone has numbers on how much a homemade sourdough loaf costs
on average. My experience is that flour is quite expensive (and currently not
available in UK shops).

I've also noticed a spike in electricity costs since we've started baking
regularly. (Difficult to calculate exactly)

My guess is that baking your own is a bit cheaper than going to some artisanal
baker, but a lot more expensive than a standard load.

~~~
ghaff
I'm pretty sure you would be correct.

The cost (assuming you have at least a minimal amount of equipment--including
an oven obviously) is basically the flour (which, as you say, can be hard to
find right now).

A 5 pound bag of flour is normally around $4-$5 in the US, and a large boule
(5 cups of flour) takes about 600 grams (~1.5 pounds) of flour, so maybe
$1.50. The other ingredients in a basic loaf are negligible and the
electricity is about 30 cents at a typical US price (ballpark of 10 cents per
KWh).

Call it about $2 all together. So, yes, less than an artisanal loaf but maybe
a bit more than cheap supermarket bread (though that's a larger loaf as well.)

~~~
rebuilder
Is this some kind of specialist flour? 1 USD per pound seems high.

~~~
ghaff
King Arthur flour (one of the big national brands) at Walmart in 5 pound bags.
They probably have their own brand which is cheaper.

~~~
maxerickson
Great Value flour here lists for ~$0.22 a pound in a 5 pound bag. Website says
they are out of stock though.

(Great Value is the Walmart store brand)

------
Mountain_Skies
If you have a way of measuring your body fat to a reasonable degree of
accuracy, you can ration your food by knowing how much stored body fat your
body can convert into energy per day. Your body can convert roughly 0.9% of
your body fat into energy in a day. So if you're 180lbs with 33% body fat, you
have 60 lbs of fat on you. You should be able to convert ~0.54lbs into energy,
which at ~3500 kcal per lbs comes out to 1890 kcal being the maximum calorie
deficit you can overcome with just stored body fat. Subtract that from your
daily calorie expenditure (another messy estimate) to get how many calories
you need to consume to avoid muscle breakdown and energy crashes.

Keep in mind that every person's body and metabolic system is unique so you'll
want to put in a generous error buffer. I'd cut the calorie deficit by half,
at least to start with. Also notice that each day your total stored body fat
will be less, so the number of calories your body can extract from that stored
fat will also be less.

Source:
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15615615/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15615615/)

~~~
robocat
You could do that, but it is dangerous to do so during an epidemic.

Having body fat helps you if you get very sick. Having low body fat means you
are at a higher risk of death when your body has to fight off disease. Being
very underweight increases your risk of catching diseases.

Of course, being excessively obese has other risks.

I am not a doctor (although anyone blindly following internet advice needs to
be careful!)

~~~
Mountain_Skies
There's a lot of space between obesity and underweight. What's being discussed
here is use of excess stored body fat to extend one's food supply without
impacting muscle mass or cognitive function. Perhaps I should have added the
recommended minimum body fat levels but anyone getting near those levels would
be unable to get an appreciable number of calories from stored bodyfat anyway,
defeating the purpose of using body fat for food supply extension.

------
captainbland
Good list. The problem, at least here in the UK, is that these cheap
foods/ingredients are exactly what we're seeing empty on the shelves now.
Unfortunately for those who live cheaply, expensive things go last.

~~~
BurningFrog
Does the UK also have price gouging laws in this crisis?

Those are what produce the empty shelves.

~~~
ForHackernews
yeah, much better to have £100/dozen eggs. That way, at least they'll be on
the shelves so rich people can still have them.

~~~
BurningFrog
Market prices keep items on the shelf, and also incentivizes increased
production, and redirecting supplies to where demand is highest.

Price fixing incentivizes hoarding and empty shelves.

~~~
_jal
> redirecting supplies to where demand is highest

Which is what the gp said.

> they'll be on the shelves so rich people can still have them

Complaining about word choice is a tradition around here, I know.

~~~
gridlockd
> Which is what the gp said.

They didn't say that at all, they said something completely different, thereby
proving that they _don 't understand the point_.

Not raising prices _at all_ evidently leads to empty shelves. Nobody can buy
_any_ eggs, except for the first lucky person that can get _all the eggs_ at a
bargain and then waste them without significant financial loss. In the case of
toilet paper, there isn't even a loss - you were going to buy it anyway.

As prices rise, demand goes down. The hoarders buy less, or at least pay
handsomely for the privilege, which is more fair. Nobody will raise prices
until there is no demand whatsoever ($100 eggs), just for the sake of stocked
shelves.

This system works _strictly better_ , it's just that people don't understand
it. That's why supermarkets _don 't_ raise prices. They can blame empty
shelves on "a few idiots" (who aren't really idiots) and avoid complaints for
price gouging, which could cause severe regulatory fallout.

------
Zenst
"These recipes will be based on Potatoes, Milk, Flour, Eggs, and Kale.
(Honorable mention to Pinto Beans and Carrots)"

Been a week since I saw any of those in shops, and can't recall the last time
I saw kale.

As always the cheap staple foods and tins are the first to go in panic buying
and you just know that all the stuff we usual meh at and lob into the food
bank box's are the exact stuff people are now stocking and hoarding up upon,
pasta, meal in a tin and all those other cheap meal options are now
everybody's emergency cupboard of hardness.

Coz, 6 months or so - food banks are going to be flooded with everybodies
reality hoardings, just to appease their own karma when in reality the damage
is already done and the impact of fear has been born and played out.

~~~
jwilber
Where are you living? I’m in Seattle, which, as far as covid-19 impact goes,
is easily at-or-near the top of the list of impacted cities.

I have not seen a shortage of anything aside from Clorox wipes in any of the
groceries around me. It’s surprising to me reading about such shortages,
especially in less impacted cities. Maybe the panic factor is higher for those
who aren’t directly in the midst of it?

~~~
Zenst
Outer-London
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingston_upon_Thames](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingston_upon_Thames)

------
blweiner
Another great resource for more affordable recipes with costs broken out per
meal is Budget Bytes:

[https://www.budgetbytes.com/](https://www.budgetbytes.com/)

------
tiawaven
A lot of penny dreadful here in the thread.
[https://i1.wp.com/upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f8/Int...](https://i1.wp.com/upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f8/Internet_dog.jpg)

But kidding aside. Most of the recipes are bullshit. You have nothing to eat?
Eat what is available. Nothing available? Start with tree bark soup.

If you are still able to buy groceries the best basic ingredients are rice,
beans, possible some tomato sauce (for flavor). Add some Olive oil for the
fatty acids if you can afford. You will be able to eat this for a pretty long
time before showing any deficiencies compared to the other suggestions on the
website.

~~~
Retric
The linked recipes are nutrition focused. The goal is to minimize cost without
risking heath problems that occur if you try and live off of say instant
ramen.

------
adwi
No-Knead bread is a godsend on every level: taste, cost, ease. Even the worst
loaf I’ve made is amongst the bread I’ve ever tasted, for ~ 15 min of
unskilled effort.

//

430g Flour (3.5 cups) .5 gram of yeast (1/4t) 9g salt (1.5t) 320g ~70° water
(~ 1.33 cup)

Mix the dry stuff then stir in water. Cover the bowl with a big piece of
parchment paper and let it sit on the counter for 12-36 hours.

Uncover, dust some flour on the parchment and use it as a work surface. Use a
wet spatula to fold it in on itself a few times, and dust flour to keep it
from sticking to itself or the paper.

Leave it for 2-4 hours, then lower the whole piece of paper into a dutch oven
you’ve pre-heated as hot as your oven will go. Bake for 30 min with the cover
on, then without for 15-30+ min to crisp the outside. Go darker than you
expect.

//

You’ll find a million variations but same principles: 1) use fermentation to
develop both flavor (ala sour dough) and the gluten strands, obviating need to
maintain a sourdough starter or to manually knead it 2) bake it in effectively
a very small and super hot oven, using the excess moisture in the dough to
steam it then, when finished uncovered, cooks the already near-finished bread
in a really hot oven to create an ideal crust. This cleverly mimics two
features of commercial ovens unavailable to home cooks: steam baking and ultra
high heat.

The cheapest all purpose white is ideal too, putting a loaf at what, 50 cents?
I’ve gleefully lived off these loaves multiple days with some butter, cheese,
anchovies etc.

Fun side benefit: having a glut of delicious bread got me to start making a
lot of crostini (aka tartine, toasts, etc), which are great vehicle to quickly
experiment with flavor combinations and techniques. It helped me develop as a
cook immensely.

~~~
blaser-waffle
> Go darker than you expect

Worked in a bakery in college. As my old boss would say, "we don't want
blonde, we want em brunette". Big improvement to taste once it cools down,
similar in concept to the fond at the bottom of a pan.

------
tyingq
Someone had mentioned (can't remember where) that watching the television show
"Chopped" might be useful while dealing with all the odd ingredients that
haven't been hoarded.

~~~
DanBC
In the UK we have Jamie Oliver on Channel Four with a programme called "Keep
Cooking and Carry On". [https://metro.co.uk/2020/03/20/james-oliver-launches-
emergen...](https://metro.co.uk/2020/03/20/james-oliver-launches-emergency-
channel-4-series-keep-cooking-carry-help-coronavirus-crisis-12431146/)

We also have Jack Monroe doing a thing on Twitter. #JackMonroesLockdownLarder
[https://twitter.com/BootstrapCook/status/1241045501090332679](https://twitter.com/BootstrapCook/status/1241045501090332679)

------
i_am_nomad
Another suggestion: eat seitan, if you can. It’s basically wheat gluten, made
into dough and baked like bread, but it has a meatloaf-like texture. Add in
spices and nutritional yeast or grated Parmesan, and it’s delicious.

On top of that, powdered wheat gluten has never been cheaper, probably because
it’s now an unwanted by-product of so much gluten-free baked goods and pasta.
You can find it online for about $4/pound.

[http://vegweb.com/recipes/baked-seitan-best-meaty-texture-
ev...](http://vegweb.com/recipes/baked-seitan-best-meaty-texture-ever)

~~~
_nhynes
To add to this, Textured Vegetable Protein (TVP) is often in stock despite
other dry proteins being unavailable due to most people not recognizing it as
food. It's incredibly filling (digests for hours), fairly inexpensive
(~$3.50/lb), and quite high in micronutrients like potassium [0]. This is what
I switched to after not having a kitchen in which to make pseudo soylent [1].

I'd recommend preparing TVP in the following manner:

1\. boil some water and add to TVP (add chia seeds, if possible, for fiber and
extra fat-soluble vitamins)

2\. in a separate bowl, partially microwave diced cheap vegetables
(alternating carrots and whatever was on sale was my go-to)

3\. add steamed veg to TVP, add spices/condiments, and microwave for a bit
longer

4\. stir in peanut butter

should take about five minutes total

For breakfast-y TVP, I replaced the vegetables with cocoa powder. Peanut
butter can also be subbed with any free food that you might find (e.g., from
lab meetings).

[0] [https://fdc.nal.usda.gov/fdc-app.html#/food-
details/339371/n...](https://fdc.nal.usda.gov/fdc-app.html#/food-
details/339371/nutrients)

[1] [https://github.com/nhynes/pbean](https://github.com/nhynes/pbean)

------
amasad
If you're on a keto diet and/or want to eat well and save big, I suggest going
to McDonald's and ordering 1/4lb patties which, depending on your location
might be $1 to $2 tops each.

Despite what they say, McDonald's patties are a 100% beef and they're
relatively good quality.

More info McD keto hacks here [http://www.zerocarbhealth.com/zero-carb-
ordering-from-mcdona...](http://www.zerocarbhealth.com/zero-carb-ordering-
from-mcdonalds/)

~~~
majos
How does this “save big”? Isn’t supermarket ground beef about $5/lb?

~~~
amasad
1\. Many people live in studios and don't have a kitchen

2\. Here in SF and every other city I lived ground beef is $9-10/lb

~~~
refurb
$9-10/lb for ground beef is 3x what I buy it for in SF.

~~~
amasad
Costco is obviously cheaper but you need a subscription and you need to
commute there.

~~~
refurb
Not even talking about Costco. The neighborhood Asian grocery I shop at has it
for $3-4 per pound, pretty much all the time.

------
ohiovr
If you can still get it, frozen self rising pizza costs less than $3 for about
a kilogram of food. As I live alone I would buy a pizza like this and chop it
into pieces before cooking it so it is fresh every serving. I add a few chunks
of butter to the bottom above foil. Similar taste to pizza hut for a fraction
of the cost.

Speghetti is also good when cooked with butter. Instead of adding the usual
tablespoon of olive oil to the boiling water try butter instead.

My immigrant ancestors lived on a diet of spaghetti, home made bread and pork
preserved in lard. I haven't tried the lard trick but maybe might be useful.

~~~
dvtrn
_Spaghetti is also good when cooked with butter. Instead of adding the usual
tablespoon of olive oil to the boiling water try butter instead._

Cacio e Pepe is another easy enough recipe that one can make without needing
an excess of ingredients, it’s in the name :)

~~~
ohiovr
Looks good. Gnocci with butter is also delish. Can be made from mashed potato
flakes and flour. Or fresh potatos. Manufactured food is so cheap you can get
a pound of it for a couple bucks already made.

------
kqr2
Another recommendation _Good and Cheap_ :

[https://www.leannebrown.com/good-and-
cheap.pdf](https://www.leannebrown.com/good-and-cheap.pdf)

------
CodiePetersen
This would be a lot more useful if any of those things were in the store. Our
stores here in Las Vegas are constantly being stripped. My mom said she had
gone to go pickup some milk for my nieces and had two quarts that she could
find and even then people were complaining about her "taking so much" and one
lady tried to take one. It's hard to find places that have stuff. When you do,
it weird stuff that you just have to use because there is nothing else.

------
czbond
Do intermittent fasting - no need to eat for 3-5 days at a time.

~~~
earthtourist
Careful giving medical advice. Fasting can be dangerous in some cases.

The advice I got from my doctor is to start with 24 hour fasts. And then try
48 hours. And then probably stop there.

(I am not a medical expert)

~~~
theNJR
Related -
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22578614](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22578614)

~~~
czbond
Interesting - thanks for posting. The difference in cortisol is useful to know
about.

------
mikkelam
Somewhat on topic; I experimented with making my own soylent-like derivative
back in university. I think that was about $2.5 per day for 3 meals. Prettty
miserable but the whole process was a lot of fun, felt like a mad scientist.

These days I just bake my own bread, mostly because it's 100x more delicious.
I'm probably not saving any money due to experimenting with all these
expensive-ass flours

------
jamil7
Dry beans or lentils and rice, maybe some spices if you have them or some
veggies. Less perishable and not based on Eggs and Dairy.

------
drewcoo
I can't determine if "chicken boolean" was a typo or an in-joke.

~~~
GilbertErik
Came here just to make sure it wasn't only me

------
blendo
I’ll also suggest nuts. Plenty of fat, and lots of varieties.

Personally, a handful of salted peanuts, pistachios, walnuts, or almonds.
According to the package, 1 oz (28 g) of walnuts are 180 calories, and 18 g of
fat.

Very filling.

~~~
jjice
I love nuts, but I personally don't find them filling, but more so satisfying.
I usually have a hand full (~1 oz) of almonds or peanuts in the morning for
breakfast, and I have noticed I'm a lot less hungry immediately after than
when I used to eat a sugary granola bar.

I'm no nutritionist, but I guess it's something about carbs causing us to want
more carbs, so keeping everything fatty helps reduce that bodily crave.

~~~
riku_iki
Blood sugar spike and crash.

------
6510
I ended up cooking for next to nothing by accident one time. I didn't notice
it until I discover all my money was still in the bank end of the month.

To make things more ironic my goal was to create superior food which
absolutely worked.

The main invention was this: For most meals we take a bunch of ingredients and
mix them into a deliciously flavored mix and give it fancy names. The grand
mistake we made is that the entire meal tastes the same. The second mistake is
that every ingredient we use really is an experience to eat in it self. Every
2 ingredients offer 3 different experiences. A, B and A+B

With 3 ingredients you get A, B, C, AB, AC, BC! Thats 6!

With 4 ingredients you get A,B,C,D,AB,AC,AD,BC,BD,CD! Thats 10!

So I needed some kind of structured platform to carefully plan out this
adventure. Pizza was my medium of choice but an oven dish should work too. (I
make small 25 cm pizzas)

So I got the Gouda, the mozzarella, the camembert and the goat cheese. (there
are many more of course) (4)

I got some varieties of mushrooms. (2)

I got some meat, chicken, bacon, salami, ham. (4)

I got some different kinds of fish. (3)

Some fruit is fine too. (2)

But the largest diversity of tastes are in the vegetables(!)(20?)

The "problem" the above presents is that you cant put a lot of anything on
there. My pizza is only 25 cm or 490 cm2. Lets say there are 60 bites on it.
The goal was to zone it into an adventure of identifiable tastes. More than 4
flavors per bite would ruin the experience.

With 35 different ingredients..., at least 1 slice of olive (or it isn't a
pizza) oregano, thyme, basil, onion, garlic, slices of red pepper, black
pepper, cayenne pepper.... you just have to many combinations to put
everything on it.

Each pizza will have to be a sub set.

I know it instinctively feels weird and disgusting to put a slices of carrot
on the pizza but in practice it really takes the journey of flavors some place
else. You wouldn't want 3 bites of it but the single bite really creates an
additional moment of "oh?" (hilarious note: guests feel the need to tell me
the pizza is delicious roughly every 3rd bite)

I just buy different boxes of frozen vegetables but you could cook or bake
and/or freeze your own.

We (there is a "we" now) (bake if needed then) sparsely spread the sub-
selection of meat and/or fish over their own region. Take a hand full of
vegetables mix and place each chunk strategically. Put a lot of thought into
the adventure and improve it every time. Take the minimum amount of each
cheese you've picked and spread it into similar regions as the meat so that
they overlap.

Really put a lot of thought into it. It helps if you look at an ingredient and
ask yourself what kind of meals are prepared with it. Then you take the [for
example] chunk of cauliflower, put 2 cubes of potato next to it and some Gouda
on top.

The end result should be a slab of flour with vegetables on it, good spices
and as little meat, fish and cheese as possible. Not because meat, fish or
cheese are not wonderful but because they get in the way of the vegetable
flavors.

Being cheep as fuck is just a side effect.

The only down side is that you have to keep making pizza 2 or 3 times per day
week after week after week. It never gets boring tho.

Final note: Keep as much stuff frozen as you can or your adventure ends up
chasing expiration dates.

~~~
yowlingcat
Very cool approach. Using combinatorics to create a recipe space is kinda
inside out from how people conventionally approach cooking, but it makes sense
that it is actually a far a more frugal way to prepare food assuming you can
actually come up with a suitable space that yields tasty outcomes.

~~~
6510
When cooking for others you have to learn which things to avoid and what they
like. For people who like spicy food I zone the pizza in regions of sliced red
pepper, cayenne pepper, black pepper, white pepper, wasabi and sambal. One
said it was the most interesting meal he ever ate.

~~~
yowlingcat
What are the various dimensions that you categorize flavors into? You just
named spicy as one. What would the others be? I remember looking at a list[1]
a while back and feeling a little underwhelmed by the dimensions used for
categorization, although I did think it was a good start. Perhaps it's
intrinsically hard because of how things overlap.

For what it's worth they're the following: bitter, cooling, earthy, floral,
fruity, herbaceous, hot, nutty, piney, pungent, sour, spicy, sulfury, sweet
and woody.

[1] [https://www.spicesinc.com/p-3743-flavor-characteristics-
of-s...](https://www.spicesinc.com/p-3743-flavor-characteristics-of-
spices.aspx)

~~~
6510
I don't really know a lot of spices. For a while I put a lot of spices on
everything then got bored with all of them. If something needs it I buy a
premixed package in stead of the laundry list of separate things.

Now I just go by what a person likes and doesn't. Those often end up rather
similar to others.

"will eat anything" is a fun category. These are people you can serve blue
cheese, olives, liver, tongue, slugs, insects, brains, placenta (I'm joking)

Interesting article, thanks.

------
lokl
What is the feasibility of the postal service delivering non-perishable food
to every residential mailbox? I just received a census form in the mail, why
not dried beans?

~~~
Mountain_Skies
Similar things have been suggested before as a replacement for SNAP but there
are so many edge cases where the household receiving the food has some type of
dietary restriction that it becomes difficult to administer. It's easier to
give people money (in the form of food stamps) and let them decide for
themselves what to buy that best fits their dietary needs. Seeing that soft
drinks are the number one item purchased with SNAP benefits, we know many miss
the mark but it's still a simpler system that allows more money to go to food
instead of paper pushing.

------
pelasaco
Assuming that after layoffs, coronavirus and quarantine, the food price won't
raise...

------
kneel
Great list for the minority of people out there who have lactase persistence.

------
graycat
Been eating cheap from before the COVID-9 pandemic. Here I will contribute two
recipes:

(1) Pizza.

This pizza is good on cost and preparation time, okay to good on nutrition
(I'm thinking mostly of calories), and, IMHO, flavor.

Can make a pizza for one for about 9 cents of flour and the whole pizza for 40
cents.

For the dough for 8 such pizzas, I use 650 milliliters of water, 1 kilogram of
flour, 1 tablespoon of active dry yeast, and 1 tablespoon of salt.

For one pizza, I form the dough into a flat circle about 8" in diameter, pre-
cook in a microwave for 2 minutes, add tomato sauce, Mozzarella cheese, and
sliced pepperoni, place on a cast iron frying pan, add a cover, and cook at
1/3 power on a common, large electric stove-top burner for 14 minutes, slice,
add 2 tablespoons of grated Pecorino Romano cheese.

More details at

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20666008](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20666008)

and the responses there maybe from some people who assumed I was claiming to
do better than their favorite pizzeria.

Also more details at

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18851878](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18851878)

with a cost analysis indicating that one pizza costs 39.203 cents.

(2) Pork BBQ

At Sam's Club I got two fresh pork "Boston Butt" (shoulder) pieces.

One at a time, I put them on a wire roasting rack in a big 'granite' covered
roasting pan, placed in an oven at 221 F. About 10 hours later a fast reading
meat thermometer reported that the internal meat temperature was 195 F (I was
shooting for only about 185 F), and I declared the meat done.

Meat was soft and juicy. There was a lot of liquid in the bottom of the
roasting pan.

I used a slotted kitchen spoon to scoop the (soft) meat from the wire rack and
roasting pan into a clean plastic dishpan. From there I moved batches one at a
time to a cutting board.

There was a small, thin, clean, dry _shoulder bone_ ; discarded that.

On the cutting board, I included and mixed in the fat still with the meat.

With a chef's knife with a 12" blade, made parallel cuts about 1" apart and
then at 90 degrees again. I grew up in Memphis and there the BBQ sandwiches
were from picnic pork shoulder BBQ chopped essentially as I did it here.

From the two pieces, scooped into a total of 6 covered plastic containers,
each with 2 quarts of volume. Put 5 of those in the freezer and the 6th in the
main part of the refrigerator.

Data:

    
    
         Raw Weights:
    
              9.69 pounds
    
              10.14 pounds
    
         Costs:
    
              $11.41
    
              $11.97
    
         Cooked weights:
    
              2,466 grams
    
              2,810 grams
    
         Yields:
    
              100 * ( 2,466 /
              28.3495 ) / (
              9.69 * 16 ) =
              56.105%
    
              100 * ( 2,810 /
              28.3495 ) / (
              10.14 * 16 ) =
              61.095%
    
         Total cost per pound
         of cooked BBQ:
    
              ( 11.41 + 11.97 )
              / ( ( 2,466 +
              2,810 ) / (
              28.3495 * 16 ) )
              = $2.010
    
         Total cost per ounce
         of cooked BBQ:
    
              ( 11.41 + 11.97 )
              / ( ( 2,466 +
              2,810 ) / (
              28.3495 ) ) =
              $0.125,627
    

One sandwich can do well with 2 2/3 ounces of the BBQ or costs

    
    
         ( 2 + 2/3 ) *
         0.125,627 = $0.335
    

or 33.5 cents for the BBQ pork.

Add a bun, some BBQ sauce, some hot BBQ sauce, and some homemade coleslaw
(shredded green cabbage and bottled Ranch dressing), and have a good soft,
moist, chopped, BBQ pork sandwich.

So the effort put

    
    
         ( 2,466 + 2,810 ) / (
         28.3495 * 16 ) =
         11.632
    

pounds of cooked, ready to eat, soft, moist, chopped pork BBQ.

Let's see: At 2 2/3 ounces per sandwich, what I put in the refrigerator in the
six containers is good for

    
    
         ( ( 2,466 + 2,810 ) /
         ( 28.3495 ) ) / ( 2 +
         2/3 ) = 69
    

sandwiches!

------
johnchristopher
Wished there were pictures of final results.

------
aj7
Chicken franks, rice, and mustard.

------
mzanchi
It's sad that people in the USA have to think about how to live on 1.50 USD
per meal. You guys should vote for a more socialist government next elections.

------
TallGuyShort
I hope this serves as a wake-up call for a lot more people to spend a modest
amount of their income saving for a rainy day when this is all over. And not
just in terms of cash, but in terms of enough staples and essentials for a few
weeks of weeks of interrupted supply chains, a go-bag in case your residence
needs to be evacuated suddenly, the ability to teach your own kids stuff.
These sound paranoid to some. It's a burden for others. But look where we are
right now. And as possible apocalyptic events go, this is minor.

The desperation and helplessness I hear from people after literally days of
being affected by other people's panic and by public health orders is
completely avoidable. It doesn't matter where you live, natural disasters,
pandemics, job loss, closures of basic services and other not-THAT-impossible
events are a thing. It doesn't even have to be real. If a handful of people
THINK there will be a TP shortage, there will be. Things like hygiene
supplies, rice, etc. won't go to waste if the world doesn't end. You'll use
them eventually. Just buffer a little.

Be prepared.

~~~
jniedrauer
This is good advice for people who make a living wage. But for many people, an
emergency fund is a luxury. I remember not too long ago when I had to decide
between paying utilities and buying food. Every single month. Saving just
wasn't an option. Many of my friends and family are still in this position,
and they've all lost their jobs simultaneously.

I'm not surprised that people are scared right now, because they're used to
the anxiety of being one paycheck away from homeless for their entire lives.
And now they don't have a paycheck.

~~~
TallGuyShort
You're literally commenting on an article called "Eat for $1.50 per day". If
you can't, over years of plenty, build up a few weeks reserve then we're
having a different discussion because a mere broken bone or car battery
failure will then wipe out your independence. And yes there are people in that
situation. But most people are a little beyond that. And even those WAY beyond
that are helpless and dependent on rushed government solutions and the
preparedness of others right now.

~~~
mellavora
You might want to check official govnt stats on this. A surprising number of
american households are not a little beyond that, they are exactly there,
where a $400 expense would put them over the edge. Or, in this case, $400 in
lost income.

Looking at the person you are replying to, who for many months had to choose
between utility bill or food, please show a little compassion for how
difficult saving can be when you have an unstable income (i.e. you are a shift
worker at any of the many US companies that uses shift workers and computer
algos to only schedule people for when there is workplace demand).

~~~
TallGuyShort
It sounds like you're making my point. A $400 expense will put them over the
edge. If they can find a way to eek out 1 extra can or box of shelf-stable
food a week and put it aside. Within a year they can _easily_ absorb having to
go a couple of weeks with no trip to the grocery store because of that
expense.

I have compassion on all the people who felt absolutely fucked this week
because they had never done that.

Also I did this on minimum wage for 4 years. I'm not judging I'm giving
advice. If you disagree, I an my supply of toilet paper, rice and pinto beans
will keep on truckin'.

------
magwa101
...or how to get fat and sick on 1.50 per day.

~~~
kcmastrpc
this comment is spot on. carbs are cheap, and shitty.

~~~
erikerikson
And, at least, better than starvation.

~~~
saiya-jin
I don't get the downvotes since this is a concern to those wanting to maintain
healthy diet, there are plenty of fat and protein rich non-perishables out
there. Ever heard about canned sardines and other fish in extra virgin olive
oil? Or pure protein powder? For fats, well why not having a bit of that olive
oil? Mediterranean cuisine puts it literally everywhere. Cheap doesn't have to
mean junk food automatically. One just has to have a bit of resilience when
tastes become not so exciting.

~~~
BenjiWiebe
I'd argue that canned fish and lots of fats makes the flavors _more_ exciting.
But there are plenty of people who find canned fish gross (the idea if nothing
else.)

------
jacobush
Eggs and milk are still perishables, especially if electricity is rationed.

~~~
SlowRobotAhead
Maybe it’s just my area but I’m not seeing any rational panic buying anywhere.

My stores have PLENTY of non-perishable items, but you know what’s missing for
me?

Russet potatoes, bottled water (which will last you like a week without a
means to make more), frozen pizzas, bananas, bread, milk, eggs.

I don’t get it.

~~~
SpicyLemonZest
That sounds like pretty rational panic buying to me. We can be confident at
this point that the pandemic isn't going to sever the food supply; the threat
model is that you might get a fever, and have to stay at home for a week or
two without being able to re-up on pizza and milk and eggs.

~~~
gruez
>the threat model is that you might get a fever, and have to stay at home for
a week or two without being able to re-up on pizza and milk and eggs.

Also, not wanting to make unnecessary trips to the supermarket where you can
potentially come in contact with infected people.

------
Demiurge
What about toilet paper? Someone should add guidance how to stay hygienic when
all the toilet paper is gone. This doesn't make any sense, I have been able to
find everything, except the toilet paper, for two weeks now. This is the most
idiotic thing, why can't someone make a public announcement not to hoard
toilet paper, of all things?

~~~
belltaco
You can take a shower instead, in many places the shower is right next to the
toilet.

~~~
Demiurge
Some places. Not all bathrooms tough. I suppose a bucket/jar to fill with
water is what I'd need, and pour it down. Then, a good amount of soap to wash
hands.

~~~
jamil7
Bucket of water and a cloth would probably work, then good hand sanitation as
you said.

------
austincheney
Excellent guide and very nutritious.

On a side note I wonder how the pandemic will impact food service in the long
run from the perspective that before the pandemic many people never prepared
their own meals. Now in many areas people are for the first time limited to
groceries and produce instead of restaurants and fast food. If people continue
their own food preparation moving forward this will have interesting
consequences for nutrition, poverty, food availability, and so forth.

As an interesting example my son attends a Title 1 school which means many
students are utterly reliant on the school for meals while other meals are
almost always fast food for many of these students. How parents are not able
to afford to feed their children and yet drive new cars and give their
children cell phones is a different conversation.

~~~
bluedino
We haven't reached shortages and such yet - and we also would have to have
food scarcity for a long time to change the habits of Americans.

This will be "real" food scarcity, not the stuff manufactured by the left and
the media, with food deserts and all. I haven't seen fresh beef or chicken and
the grocery stores for two weeks now.

I doubt we'll get to the point of our grandparents and great grandparents,
where they didn't waste anything when it came to food because they grew up
during the depression.

But it will be a net positive for the country to go back to cooking their own
meals, generally eating healthier, and eating less calories overall. The USA
doesn't need to be in the top of the lists of obesity.

There may be casualties in the food and restaurant industry. But in a way we
reached peak food with how ridiculous some places and prices were becoming.

~~~
matwood
> I haven't seen fresh beef or chicken and the grocery stores for two weeks
> now.

I don't know where you are located, but beef and fish was never an issue here.
Chicken and pork sold out, but have been getting restocked every other day.

Can you explain what about COVID-19 is going to cause food scarcity in the US?

~~~
PaulDavisThe1st
What _could_ cause it would be a very high rate of infection that knocks out
20% of the workforce operating in food harvest, production and/or
distribution. Even if they all recover (likely, it seems), that would make it
hard to keep the supply chains running smoothly.

