The Sunday Steep #7: Why don't we value food?

Also: sourdough success and Autumn reading

Sep 22, 2024

Happy first day of autumn, friends! I am currently beset by pears. I hope you’re experiencing abundance in your life (and would welcome pear recipes.)

Last week I devoured the book How To Be A Tudor, written by historian Ruth Goodman, where I encountered this statistic: in Tudor times, the total cost of food added up to around 80% of a household’s income.

Eighty. Percent.

To put this in context, consider that, according to the USDA, in 2022 and again in 2023, American households spent 11.2% of their income on food - and that number is the highest it’s been in three decades, with grocery costs going up enough that we’re all feeling the pinch.

Numbers like these are interesting to me because how much money we spend (or are willing to spend) on a thing tells a lot about what we value. And that’s not a judgment of individual personal budgetary choices. People do what they can with the resources they have, inside a system they didn’t create - and I have been in the position of feeding a large family on an extremely tight grocery budget with no room for a surprise increase on a gallon of milk. I understand why even a one-percent rise in overall food costs can feel devastating.

But it still holds true that we, as a society, no longer value food the way the Tudors (or probably any era prior to mass industrialization) did. Most of us don’t spend all day, or some days, any time at all thinking about how to grow, source, prepare, and preserve it. You could say we’ve moved beyond mere survival, and celebrate that as a positive development - and largely, you’d be right. Yet, the persisting cheapness and abundance of food for longer than most of us have been alive has also somehow hidden this fact: we still need it to survive and thrive.

Another report published by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) found that, in 2023, Americans spent 26% of their income on housing and 13% on transportation. We live in a culture that celebrates appreciation in real estate values and tolerates a high cost of vehicle ownership - yet groans (or panics) when food takes a slightly higher piece of the pie. Maybe that’s because we just want and expect food to show up, without having to give it much thought or attention.

Or maybe it’s because, on some deep-down level, we know we can’t do without it—and rising costs remind us of how little we understand this extremely under-valued resource.

In this week’s episode of The Tea’s Made, I talked with farmer and author Shannon Hayes. Shannon described her commitment to her family farm and the decisions that led her from academia back to farming, and we also spent some time reframing the “cost of food” conversation. What if we considered the value of food instead?

I’d love to hear what you think about the cost vs. the value of food. How does this tension play out in your own household, with your own budget?

In my mug:

A morning sunrise view from the corner of the sofa - the perfect place to enjoy my first cup of tea of the day.

While cleaning the other day, I thought to open a pretty floral canister that is usually perched on my office shelf for decoration. Imagine my delight when I discovered it was full of sample-sized pouches of tea! I’d stashed them in the canister when we moved, way back in 2022, and some of the samples were already a year or two old by then. But since the container was airtight, they fared just fine.

My favorite discovery: Elements black tea blend from Plum Deluxe Tea, a black tea with hibiscus, almond, and cloves, for a warm, nutty flavor that feels perfect to celebrate autumn. I looked online and it doesn’t look like Plum Deluxe is currently offering this tea, but their herbal Autumn Almond Chai (with rooibos) or the Autumn Vibes Black Tea both seem like they would have similar flavor profiles. Looks like I’ve got some shopping to do. And yay for rediscovering secret tea stashes!

In my hands:

I finished the second in this pair of fall-inspired cloth napkins, made with easy stick-and-stitch patterns. Since I only found two matching yellow napkins when I picked these up at a vintage shop last year, that officially concludes this project - so it’s time to move on to something else! Any suggestions on what I should stitch next? Leave a comment and let me know.

In my kitchen:

I’m happy to share that I’ve finally produced several passable loaves of sourdough bread! The imperfectly beautiful golden loaf pictured here is a 50/50 spelt and white flour loaf. I have found spelt a bit easier to work with than whole-wheat. I used this recipe but almost hesitate to share it because I wound up altering almost every part of the recipe except the amounts of flour and salt used. Everything, from the rise time to the amount of handling to the water needed, was different from what this recipe prescribes - and that’s because, as I wrote last week, sourdough is a living thing that behaves very differently based on a whole lot of factors a recipe can’t predict. I’m learning to go with that flow and listen to what each new loaf is telling me. It’s been a lot of fun and occasionally frustrating - but deeply satisfying, all the same.

I also made a proscuitto-pear-rosemary-pecan focaccia, which didn’t rise quite as much as I’d hoped, but tasted great anyway. Focaccia seems to be a bit more forgiving, and came together faster than a loaf of bread - maybe a good place to start if you’re just tiptoeing into sourdough baking.

On my book stack:

The first day of autumn feels like a great time to dive back into The Comfort of Crows by Margaret Renkl. Summer got away from me a bit, and I didn’t keep up here with the So-Slow Book Club we launched together last winter - but I don’t think there could be a better season than fall to read a seasonal nature book, do you? Fall always seems to me like the most season-y season of all. Week 1 is entitled The Season of Making Ready, which seems like such an appropriate sentiment to welcome autumn.

Okay friends, I’m a little late getting this Sunday Steep out, so I’m going to end here. Would love to hear what’s on your mind, in your cup, in your hands, in your kitchen or on your bookstack this week. Leave a comment, or if you’re reading this in an email, just hit “reply” and say hello!