You literally have the most expensive possible options for every single one of those
Food is absolutely getting more expensive, but they equally bought a rod for their own back buying all the premium brand stuff.
Spoiling yourself is all well and good, but they shouldn’t complain something expensive was expensive haha
Of course. look treating yourself is nothing bad, however it is going to cost more for it.
To be fair I live in a part of the US that is poorer than average and isn’t really a nice place politically. I can spend 60-80 dollars for a weeks worth of food, and I eat a lot of food.
2.50/ patty for plant protein??? Vegans are suckers.
The only thing that bothers me about your statement is how much my tax dollars pay to subsidize your stupid meat addiction.
Less than 1% of the world are vegans though. So 99% of people paying that are using it. Quite rare for more things in governance.
We’re all paying for things others benefit from. And yeah, I’m 100% against subsidizing meat. But the reason your food is expensive is because the vegan demographic is considered to be easily over charged for “specialty” overly packaged marketing heavy food products.
Also: people buying organic meatless groceries at Whole Foods-Amazon store won’t save the planet. Ever.
I’m not a vegan, but that’s not the right way to think about subsidies. It’s not about whether someone is a “meat eater” or a “vegan”. It’s about incentivizing consumption. The person eating meat once or twice a week subsidizes the person eating meat everyday. The more meat you eat, the more money society pays. Many people would cut back on eating meat if they had to pay the true cost.
But vegans are direct evidence that meat and animal products are not a necessity and are purely a choice. That choice is wasteful, has ethical implications towards animals, highly polluting and far less healthy.
So what is the subsidy for? It’s like subsidising candy, cigars or alcoholic beverages. It doesn’t make sense anymore with the knowledge of today.
Just because a group of people who have to massively inconvenience themselves and spend four times longer eating their daily calories than someone who gets their protein from meat can do it doesn’t mean that meat is suddenly a “choice” and not necessary.
That’s like saying because some people can ride their bicycles everywhere that cars and public transit are “purely a choice.” You think everyone can live life like you, and have no conceptualization that most of humanity doesn’t live in your location with access to your grocery options and your lifestyle.
That’s before we even get into things like how vegan men often suffer from ED and eating meat virtually instantly cures them. Good luck putting on any muscle as a vegan unless you have no job and can spend all day shoveling buckets if quinoa and lentils down your throat for six straight hours.
Germany’s strongest man has been vegan for years, and holds multiple world records. I have very little patience for stupid misinformation. It just makes your comment worthless.
You’re sure that it has nothing to do with the fact that he’s a professional bodybuilder/strongman and makes so much money from competitions that he can afford to spend all day eating food and working out? Which I directly accounted for?
I have a vegan friend who eats pretty normally and does olympic weightlifting for fun, he’s pretty jacked. I couldn’t find anything to back up your ED claim, any sources?
Also sure, not everyone can eat like everyone else. But you’re telling everyone to make all their own food from scratch and if you’re doing that then a vegan diet is one of the most affordable ways to do it. I love cooking all my own meals from scratch and I just use vegies and mostly whole foods. and no you don’t need to spend every waking hour eating lentils, I usually don’t even eat lunch and I maintain my weight and muscle just fine. You can’t just make up stuff about vegan diets and pretend you’re right. It’s silly.
Why is it that in order to become vegan, you need to lose all sense of perspective and critical thought?
Its insane to me how completely out of touch every vegan I talk to is with their neighbors.
why is it that you’re a big dumb poopy head?
I mean I agree it’s a radical break with what is considered the norm. But it’s a fast growing ethical sentiment that we are not treating our fellow earthlings with the respect they deserve. So if anything a vegan acts from more compassion, more inclusivity. And the fact that this sounds to you as if vegans are out of touch, just speaks to how much you are out of touch with this growing sentiment. It’s not as if vegans are acting from some kind of misguided ethical principles. The fact that we lay bare that the unjust treatment of animals is a choice, turns this around. It puts the onus meat eaters to justify their actions. But then they come on forums like this and complain about how we are out of touch and lost perspective and critical thought. It’s just not true.
Youre breathing sand, ostrich.
Vegetarians don’t benefit.
“Meat addiction” lol
You’re right, it’s more like a religion.
Cope
I refuse to cope. I shall instead die of grief. The end.
Because of your indifferent attitude. Your meat will now become more expensive than plant based meat, so you can eat your words
I get a ten pack of beyond patties that are half the price.
This guy is just a sucker.
Buying prepared food is expensive.
The only thing prepared is the *coffee cake.
Veggie burgers are also prepared, and bread is also ready to eat.
Lol, you’re out of your mind! A frozen patty is not “ready to eat” and is not prepared. You know that… Come on, you know if you order a burger anywhere it will arrive cooked and hot, all components assembled and actually ready to eat. Anything less, and it’s not “prepared”.
A patty, ready to be cooked means that it has been prepared. If it was a kit with all constituent parts and instructions informing you how to achieve patties, then it would not be prepared.
You sound like you’ve literally never cooked before.
That’s relatively cheap…
You’ve got 8 buns there so buying 4 more patties would take the whole thing to $28 for 8 burgers and cutting the danish into 8 slices which is probably the serving size anyway. Or $3.50 per burger and slice of danish.
And you grabbed the most expensive versions of things too.
But no toppings (lettuce, tomato, cheese, onions etc.) So a plain burger and a piece of Danish for 3.50 isn’t exactly great value nutritionally. But yeah this could be done cheaper and probably could have gotten at least some store brand cheese too.
All of that might be another $2 total. Produce is generally dirt cheap.
They could also make their own homemade black bean burger patties for far cheaper than $2.50 a patty too. Premade stuff is expensive.
Idk where I’m at 1 tomato is $1. Head lettuce $2.50. Onion $1. Cheese $5. Depends on where you live.
Yes, they need those veggie toppings on their veggie burger.
Can’t tell if you’re being facetious but I like veggie burgers and they are better with toppings imo.
I think people who are just weirdly anti vegetarian/vegan just assume they’re like celery patties or some shit that taste like celery but the whole “burger” thing kinda makes it obvious they’re supposed to taste like faux beef.
Hur dur, “can only add toppings to meat burgers” Hur dur
“Why would I put tomato in a salad when it already has lettuce?”
“Veggies” are not a single undifferentiated category.
- Fancy brioche buns, not normal burger buns. Brioche is typically the most expensive bread off the shelf.
- Fancy veggie burgers, of course they are expensive lol, that’s fancy vegan stuff
- Don’t pretend that is a Danish singular. That’s a huge fuckin Danish, that’s the equivalent of 4 Danishes easily lol
I hate when people buy fancy bespoke food and are like “why do my gluten free vegan free range burgers cost so much?”
If you want to be vegetarian/vegan, go buy normal vegis, don’t complain about your super fancy “takes a bunch of extra work and has very low demand” food being expensive.
Yeah, that’s not a danish, that’s an entire cake. It’s 14 ounces.
Yeah fuck me for wanting a gluten free burger, as if being gluten-free was my choice
You can eat gluten-free, vegan, etc without eating like a hipster. That was @pixxelkick’s whole point. Actual hamburger patties are gluten-free.
OP spent $19 to feed four people a veggie burger on a brioche bun, and a pretty good sized piece of cake in the shape of a Danish… Like half a square foot of the stuff.
While not cheap overall, each person is eating for less than $5. And they’re eating better than you could taking that $5 to any rte food store.
Not sure what the problem is here.
You miss the point. Food should not even cost this much. Even crappier “normal” food costs too much yet is still unhealthy. And OP could have specific food needs, you don’t know. So why should he have to pay more for a basic need.
Rice and beans is food
What is the objectively correct price for this food?
Artisan brioche buns. Plant based burgers are more expensive then the real thing for some reason (and full of salt). That Danish is a ripoff.
The reason is that the US spends a ton of money subsidizing the beef industry. Beef would be a hell of a lot more expensive if they didn’t.
True~ish. Farmers get subsidies in general, not just ranchers. But this is also Hamburger we are talking about. If the meatless patties were to replace the steak in a steak sandwich, they’d be more comparable in “price for function” comparison. The meat in hamburger patties is recovery from more expensive cuts and is basically designed to be cheap while the meatless patties are specifically designed to replace them.
It’s like building a small fence with pallet wood vs. what you’d buy at a lowes or something. Neither is gonna be priced at the premium of a boutique lumber mill or restaurant, but their inception doesn’t startvevenly.
Seeing as how most farmers don’t make much at all for their products, I wonder who those subsidies actually go to.
as always: big corporations headed by extremely rich people
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It’s so sad how many posters would rather blame OP for spending an extra dollar on better bread and veggie patties rather than actually acknowledge the blatant price gouging on food. The idea that everyone should only be buying the cheapest ingredients is just stupid. No one is living a fulfilling life eating nothing but cheap beans and rice everyday, and food prices have been ridiculous for a while now.
I miss the good ol days where inflation was so low, you could pick fruit off a vine/bush/tree and it was free
Nowadays, you have to pay HOA just to get a smell of that community cherry tree
The point is that it’s all processed and premade, that’s why it costs so much. Make your own beef patties with ground beef and some seasonings, just bake a damn dessert for once and stop getting the fancy artisanal bread and just go with whole wheat.
Nothing about that requires eating rice and beans, you just don’t want to accept that some shit requires effort and when you outsource that you pay more.
Yeah food costs an insane amount, but you don’t have to buy the “we did the work for you” tier of food if your income can’t handle it. You’re not entitled to having everything done for you. Learn to goddamn cook.
I can rarely find a pound of ground beef for under $9 now unless buying in massive bulk. Even produce has gotten insanely expensive in the last few years. Sometimes the raw ingredients are so expensive it’s cheaper to buy the processed shit… Idk how anyone less fortunate can stay sane in the grocery store. Buying raw ingredients and cooking isn’t a cheat code to save money.
I don’t know where you are but a one pound package of 90% lean ground beef at my supermarket (Kroger) in Denver is $4.97
Same store, Gardein® Ultimate Plant-Based Burger Patties, package of 2 (8oz total) is $4.99
I’m in the SF bay area. Like I get that it’s high cost of living and high wages, but even so doesn’t justify such a huge price difference. I guess just some pretty crazy price gouging
The people that work in your grocery store need to afford to live in your high cost of living area, too. That means the stores have to pay them more which means they have to charge more. The same goes for the drivers that deliver the groceries to the store, the people that work in the warehouses of the suppliers, etc. It’s higher cost of living all the way down.
The same store was doing fine on half the price of groceries three years ago. How can the poor mega corporation grocery store ever survive? Doesn’t anyone ever think about the poor stock? And no, wages haven’t doubled since then
You aren’t looking hard enough. California has decent prices on lots of food because the farm is only hours away. There’s no $9 ground beef unless you get it from the farmer’s market. Also, just go to Berkeley Bowl.
I go to Berkely Bowl for niche ingredients I can’t find anywhere else, and the produce is often cheaper and better quality, but meat seems roughly the same and everything else in the store has at least a $1 markup. Also I’m not going to sit in an hour of traffic after work just to maybe save a buck on meat while immediately offsetting that saving in the gas it took to get there. It’s not always as easy as “just go to Berkely Bowl bro”.
Prices have objectively increased in the last three years that can’t be attributed to COL increases or inflation. The only thing left is profit.
The biggest saving would actually be the buns I would bet.
You could make your own 8 burger buns for like 10 cents.
There is nothing unfuflfilling about beans and rice. This is the staple diet of almost a billion people. We are just so far removed from reality that we think of a healthy diet as a terrible punishment.
You did not understand my comment very well. Beans and rice are great staple foods, I love them. A well rounded diet involves more than just beans and rice.
Beans and rice yummy
fartsinfarts againmyoh my another one bites to dusttummyOn a more serious note didn’t early humans live a hunter gather life style eating both meats fish plants and vegetables I mean there’s alot of evidence that shows that our ancestors lived hunter gather life styles also I’m fairly certain that most people didn’t just eat beans and rice for billons of years
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunter-gatherer
https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/resource-library-hunter-gatherers/
When a bad hunt means your kids starve plants seem like a much safer option.
Human ancestors had a varying diet that was regional and included bugs and wild plants and yes some animal protein. There are some estimates that they regularly consumed like 100g of fiber a dayLiterally all modern evidence points to the healthier tribal and nomadic humans having animal-based diets.
Healthier teeth, healthier skin and hair, longer lifespans, better musculature.
I mean that was my original point but I don’t think I portrayed that correctly at all early humans lived hunter gather life styles I think that’s quite obvious at this point especially with all the scientific evidence pointing toward it plus moving around alot across continents and having to go out and hunt fish and forage for there food meant that they were way healthier stronger and fitter as you said as there getting a healthier diet and lots of exercise
what op said that for billons of years we lived of “beans and rice” which makes no sense whatsoever although I could be wrong I know beans on there own have a good selection of the nutrients you’ll need to sustain yourselve but im not to sure on rice plus I’m fairly certain you can’t eat rice and beans forever you’ll have to supplement it with something as well
Plus I haven’t read anywhere about humans sustaining themselves for billons of years on just a diet of beans and rice
It’s alright, we know what you mean.
I actually said a billion people live on it, but why let reading get in the way of a defensive rant about meat.
And why actually bother to listen to and connect with another human being when you can snap back with a snarky comment instead?
The above persons whole comment is a reaction to something completely different from what I said. Was there an attempt to listen and connect on their part? Not really.
Well, those are some fancy burgers… Worth the money if you have it, IMO, but not something I’d buy on a budget. I usually get the Morningstar Farms chipotle black bean burgers, which Costco sells in a big box for a good price. They aren’t trying to be indistinguishable from meat (which isn’t a priority for me anyway) but they’re greasy (in a good way) and delicious.
Plus the Morningstar burgers have the rare advantage of being microwaveable. (I suppose you can technically microwave anything, but they’re good after being microwaved.) I’m not just saying that because I’m lazy - I have a little electric grill I can use, but I don’t need to for them and it’s nice to save a little bit of time that way.
Morningstars don’t even need to be eaten like a hamburger. A little red wine vinegar, a few drops of olive oil, and a light sprinkling of Italian herbs turns that into some gourmet shit.
Morningstar burgers are the best ones I’ve tried
Beyond burgers are gross. Impossible are the best
Buhhhhh beyond is just nasty, I’ve tried preparing it a bunch of different ways and it always comes out nasty. There’s just some flavor I can’t cover no matter how much seasoning is on there. Eventually you just cover it in hot sauce so you don’t waste food.
My main issue with it is the texture. Maybe something in the flavor too, but it just feels odd in my mouth. Impossible I basically can’t tell it’s not meat.
I think the other side that doesn’t get explored very often is how convenience food makers have gotten everybody hooked and unable to cook anymore.
Now that that is generally locked-in behavior in our society, the price goes through the roof.
I know people that literally do not know how to make rice because it’s “too hard”.
We should acknowledge that grocery prices have gone up in that price-gouging is rampant. We should also acknowledge that most of people’s money spent at the grocery store is to exchange hundreds of dollars of extra money, for minutes less preparation.
In this picture of this person paid $10 for a pound of “burger”. A pound of ground beef or tofu is a third that price. It takes a minute to slap a couple patties together or to slice off a few slabs, dry them and fry them.
I really feel like we need to enhance this conversation. I think a lot of people don’t want to have it because they want to have the convenience but not the price and it’s just not sustainable anymore. I think people need to look at their own dietary lifestyle, and consider what they’re trading for that convenience.
A pound of ground beef or tofu is a third that price.
I understand what you’re trying to say here. But I just wanted to add, making a vegetarian/vegan burger is not as simple as grinding up a pound of tofu and sticking it together to fry in a pan. I’m not saying you have to buy some of the “no meat” brand burgers to make a nice vegan patty but simply substituting some meat with natural unprepared tofu and expecting a great tasting result is IMHO where a lot of people get their aversion to tofu (and often derived to all meat alternatives) from. (Source 15years of vegetarian eating and cooking) The fact that ready made vegan patties exist and taste great these days is awesome for someone like me who sometimes just wants to make a stupid simple tasty burger.
Tl;dr: Tasty vegan patties aren’t that simple.
I agree that people should be encouraged to cook more (I love doing it when I have time and it hits me). But simply declaring “nobody can cook anymore” and demanding people that might not have the time to prepare a home cooked meal in between their first and second job is not helping.
Of course the convenience of fast food and ready made meals is one of these classic situations where an “invention” that makes our life simpler and more convenient is a good reason why we don’t need all that time we save to ourselves anymore. i.e. you don’t need a lunch break when you can just microwave something up and eat it while continuing your work.
Sorry got kind of a long winded bit here. Hope it makes sense
How about a different angle; enjoy the veggies as they are and forget the emulated meat puck. This isn’t a dig at you, just a general statement of how I always found it weird there are so many vegetarian and vegan food tring to emulate a meat stick or patty. Veggies are wonderful all by themselves why not enjoy them for what they are instead of competing with something it’s not. My 2 cents.
Sometimes you want a veggie burger. There’s nothing wrong with that.
The point is that you spent 2+ decades of life eating meat focused and centered meals, and “just dont eat the meals you spent your whole life enjoying!” isnt actually a coherent or actionable thought for normal people.
If I had to cut flour out of my diet, Im going to look for good tortilla alternatives like corn. Im not going to shrug and never eat tacos, burritos, and other meals Ive known my whole life.
You know how people put spices on meat because they want it to taste more like plants?
sometimes people want to put spices on vegetable protein in order to make it taste more like meat, or fill a similar role in a dish.
People who avoid meat because killing pointlessly is wrong don’t hate the taste. It’s as weird as being like “people on a diet shouldn’t make healthy desserts, they should appreciate low calorie veggie bowls for what they are”
I agree with you for the most part but a pound of ground beef for under 4 bucks?! Where I live it’s rarely less than $8 lb, but definitely a high cost area. Even chicken is usually more than $6 per lb now.
Even a damn tomato or onion is more than a dollar these days and bell peppers are $2 each!
Same
It’s only really fair to compare when you consider the price at OPs store.
Myself, I’m looking at the cost of the burger patties and I know that in my region the price of 1 lb of ground beef relative to this convenient product would be 1/3rd
Yes, but also this isn’t strictly a case of “convenience food makes price go up.” OP is making veggie burgers, not beef burgers, so you really should be comparing “Gardein pre-packaged veggie patties” to “black beans + brown rice + bell pepper + onion + mushroom + eggs + chili powder + cumin + bread crumbs etc” that you’ll mash into your version of a DIY veggie patty. The pre-packaged ones will still probably be more expensive, but at least you’ll be comparing apples to apples.
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Yes, it “is” a case of convenience foods make the price go up.
Obviously I was not comparing apples to apples because I chose beef as the comparison which is vastly more expensive than the constituent ingredients of the prepackaged food.
I can make those burgers myself for about 1 to 2 dollars of the veggie/legume/rice ingredients so let’s get real here.
I’m just not sure what we’re all arguing about any more. We all largely agree with one another, but the comments in this thread are all over the place
- Are we trying to make an argument against the outrageous price of pre-packaged food (which we all agree have gotten out of hand)? If so, we should be comparing frozen veggie patties against their non-pre-packaged counterparts, not against beef or sandwich bread or whatever else people keep bringing up in the comments.
- Are we trying to argue that OP is dumb for picking the most expensive options on the shelf if they’re going to complain about price? Because yeah, everyone already knows that a 70% lean turkey burger on Wonder Bread is going to be cheaper than Kobe beef on an artisanal brioche bun with truffle butter. Veggie burgers have always been expensive because they required years of R&D to make them palatable since they have to survive the freeze & thaw, sit on the shelf for months, and be viable as a boxed product (unlike our home-made versions). What’s worse, they’re still niche enough that they don’t benefit from economies of scale. It’s old news.
- Are we trying to argue that inflation is going nuts right now (which we also already agree on)? Because if so, OP picked a dumb collection of ingredients to make that point since I doubt many people have an instinctive feel for how much Gardein used to charge. Show us the price for beef & bargain buns today, then compare that to what a burger used to cost and then we’ll talk.
My point was just that if you’re arguing the first one, then actually pick comparable ingredients for your comparison instead of beef.
What a sucker, seed packets to grow your own Barley and wheat come out to 0.0003c per seed! Just grow your own crops NOOB
Is there a frugaljerk community yet?
Man, you said it jokingly and I truly chuckled but more and more the frugal community turns into that for the simplest things like, I don’t know:
OP: I love my Dr. Browns cherry diet soda brings as it’s my little piece of heaven and sincerely would like to find alternatives as is crazy expensive compared to cherry vanilla Dr. Pepper, that doesn’t taste as well, what can a dude do to get ahead of this?
Community : I’ve started bartering homemade syrups with neighbors for other home-grown or homemade items. It’s a fun community-building activity and we all save money, you just need to grow organic non GMO crops of cherry or other fruits and gather for harvest once a year to get the sugar cane and fruits to make the syrup.
Community 2: I’ve recently scouted all 223 bodegas supermarkets and drink emporiums in my town and took note of the price of individual cans, next week I’m going to the distributor to place an order equivalent to a sizeable amount of all cans on display to corner the market and resell the cans I have at an exuberant markup that will cover my habit and imagine all that I’m saving by buying in bulk!
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I get a sack of rice, a couple avocados, dry beans, frozen broccoli and corn, lime or two, bunch of spices if you don’t already have. Whatever Mexican spices recipe online but definitely get smoked paprika it’s straight up drugs. This will cost more than the burger set in the picture but it makes more meals.
Instant pot rice, instant pot seasoned beans with a second inner pot, 1/8 of tall wide mouth mason jar each of rice and beans, arbitrary amount of broc corn and cubed avocado leaving about 1/8 of jar as air, tablespoon or so of lime juice. Cool the jars and freeze once cool. I use plastic lid rings with silicone insert since the metal ones get rusty when used like this. I’ll prep like 40 of these in one session but that’s definitely using a bigger budget so I don’t have to do it as often.
My recommended rice is long grain brown with about 1/16 to 1/8 of the amount cooked being wild rice mixed in. They both take the same amount of time to cook when mixed, but it’s a decent amount longer than white rice. I usually put an arbitrary splash of sake or gin in the water for cooking the rice but it’s largely a habit from copying grandpa.
I take a frozen jar to work with me in a lunch bag and it doubles as an ice pack for whatever else I want in there. I aim for it to be thawed enough to shake it and mix it before microwaving. For at home I thaw it in the fridge the day before. When I didn’t have a microwave I just steamed the whole jar in the instant pot.
Jars and instant pot + accessories were all things I waited for sales on. It can be done without instant pot but it’s probably the safest way I can think of to cook things and fuck off without worrying about it burning the house down. Jars are merely the cheapest I could find in decent quantity and dishwasher safe.
This is probably the cheapest with highest output volume food option I batch prep. I also do things like potato leek and/or squash soup, or potato cheese and soy bacon soup (I’m not actually vegetarian or vegan but it’s a real pain cooking all the bacon needed and cutting meat is tiresome), and some other stuff that has been hit or miss that I only tried once. I keep them all in a chest freezer and I take out whatever I feel like eating as an easy microwave meal, unless I’m running low and need to reserve them for work lunches.
1/8 of tall wide mouth mason jar each
Americans really will use anything but the metric system /s
Lol I’m actually Canadian and prefer metric, but these jars have weird and inconsistent volume so I just eyeball everything and the last one that has a different amount from the others is the one I eat on the spot.
Interesting. What does the alcohol do for the rice?
Danish was a fair choice but your buns and burgers were premium stuff, expect premium prices Mr. Ultimate burger
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I mean, most people don’t have an Aldi’s nearby, would be great though.
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Ugh, you will be driving for quite a while if you live on the west half of the country. I wish we had them in Canada as well, groceries are insane up here.
Add Trader Joe’s to the map and it will look a bit better. They’re both owned by the same people and have similar offerings, from what I’ve seen.
They are owned by two companies that happen to be called Aldi, but they aren’t the same company. I think Aldi was started by two brothers who had a fight and split in 2. So the two Aldis are legally separate companies
Not everyone has a car.
I’m so used to NYC food prices that $20 for four meals seems like a steal
Yeah I moved to Seattle a few years ago and the cost of everything here has ruined my sense of what is expensive or not. I’ve definitely paid more for less than shown here
$4.50 more and a smaller piece of dessert and they could have got a meal for 8 with probably a better veggie patty. Could have saved $1.50 to go with the cheapo buns, but the Sara Lee, while equally processed (I am not judging… they look pretty good), are a small investment to improve the dinner.
I’m in Vietnam having a peek about. Just ate a light, 4 course meal with beers for two for about usd $6… It was incredible.
The world is indeed out of balance.
I miss Vietnam a lot. Great food and people.
If you had bought normal store brand buns instead of artisan brioche, they are a third of the price. You are paying 2.50 per veggie burger pattie instead of a bit more or less than a dollar per pattie in morning star and great value brands. 5 dollars for a Danish that size is not ludicrous, but I bet you could have shopped around better for that too. You could have cut the total price in half at least if you were paying attention to prices and brands. Not saying that prices aren’t getting out of hand, but it doesn’t look like you even tried.
