eating "local"

[sailorboy1]

You often read comments about "eating local" in budget threads as a way to reduce costs. This phase sounds good, but what does it really mean as a practical matter?

For example lets say you are doing the East coast of the USA down to the southern end of the Caribbean. What is "local" that is going to be available and obtainable (doesn't matter what there is if it isn't easy to get from a boater stopping spot) to eat that is local and "budget" food.

In Maine lobster is "local", but even if you buy and take back to the boat to cook it isn't really a "budget" food. On the other hand there are potatoes, but you can eat those cheap anywhere just like rice and beans.

I can see eating local making sense in places that are remote enough that shipping costs really impact prices and which have a local supply of some food items. That then probably falls more into the "you eat what is available" category. Or I'm sure there are some places to stop that have enough farming that there are local Farmers type markets. But I don't believe you overall are going to find this very common in a port town.

I just think the phase "eat local" doesn't have the meaning and weight it is assumed when it gets typed and read in most of the places one is likely to be cruising.

[Tim R.]

I can answer the Maine lobster question. We have many lobster bakes with our cruising friends throughout the season. This usually includes many lobsters, mussels and some pot luck salads.

Lobsters can be gotten very cheap off the boat if you have cash in hand. We will find a lobsterman who is hauling traps nearby and go over in our dinghy and ask if he has any to sell. Last season we were buying about 20 lobsters for somewhere around $50-$60 cash. Cheaper than baloney.

Mussels we harvest for free. Pasta salad is cheap.

So eating "local" in Maine is very cheap for lobster if you go about it properly which is probably true anywhere you want to eat "local". Go where the locals go to buy food.

We also pick wild blueberries, blackberries and raspberries. All free.

BTW, we have trained a few visiting cruisers in this technique so now they can eat "local" in Maine when they visit again.

[colemj]

McDonalds and KFC are almost universally "local" and cheap.

Rotis and doubles in Trinidad, "desayuno typicale" in Central America, tacos in Mexico, etc.

But I think the real meaning behind "eating local" is forgoing the special brands of things one is used to and buying the less expensive local brands, eating goat instead of beef, drinking rum instead of scotch - those types of things.

Mark

[blackkayak]

Every island in the Bahamas has a place where the fishermen clean fish and conch. It's usually surrounded by pelicans. A few dollars will get you the "catch of the day". A pack of cigs will get you a side of Mahi.

[sailorboy1]

Originally Posted by colemj

McDonalds and KFC are almost universally "local" and cheap.

Mark

True. Two McDoubles and a glass of V-8 juice meets most of daily needs pretty cheaply.

[denverd0n]

Originally Posted by colemj

But I think the real meaning behind "eating local" is forgoing the special brands of things one is used to and buying the less expensive local brands, eating goat instead of beef, drinking rum instead of scotch - those types of things.

There's the answer, right there. It is less about specifically what you eat, and more about buying and eating what is available locally. Most especially, what is available locally outside of the tourist traps. So, when in the Bahamas, for example, don't go to the big markets in Nassau that cater to the cruise ships, but instead to the small markets in the out-islands where the locals buy their food.

[JK n Smitty]

Originally Posted by sailorboy1

You often read comments about "eating local" in budget threads as a way to reduce costs. This phase sounds good, but what does it really mean as a practical matter?

For example lets say you are doing the East coast of the USA down to the southern end of the Caribbean. What is "local" that is going to be available and obtainable (doesn't matter what there is if it isn't easy to get from a boater stopping spot) to eat that is local and "budget" food.

In Maine lobster is "local", but even if you buy and take back to the boat to cook it isn't really a "budget" food. On the other hand there are potatoes, but you can eat those cheap anywhere just like rice and beans.

I can see eating local making sense in places that are remote enough that shipping costs really impact prices and which have a local supply of some food items. That then probably falls more into the "you eat what is available" category. Or I'm sure there are some places to stop that have enough farming that there are local Farmers type markets. But I don't believe you overall are going to find this very common in a port town.

I just think the phase "eat local" doesn't have the meaning and weight it is assumed when it gets typed and read in most of the places one is likely to be cruising.

I don't think this applies as much when you are still in the states. More on when you leave. But here are a couple of things from my experience.

In York Harbor Maine last summer, I wanted to have some lobster while we were sitting on a mooring. I say a lobster guy come in and start offloading. I jumped in my dink and went over to talk to him. He sold me 3 pound and half lobsters for $10. They were going for at least $7.99 a pound in the local markets, that would have been around $35 for the same lobsters. So for about $15 my wife and I eat lobsters with butter, coleslaw and beers in the cockpit of our boat. Not a bad way to eat local.

My other experience was from the BVIs. We chartered in November which is right before the busy season. Most of the stores hadn't gotten their seasonal shipments yet. Our friend is rather picky about food. He wanted things like we have back in the states. Cereal for breakfast, almost twice the cost. White bread, almost 3 times the price and it was hard to find. But you could get fresh backed whole wheat bread relatively cheap. Hamburger meat, forget it. It was pricey and had a ton of "filler" (aka cardboard or something). Hot dogs were also expensive. So was Coke, Doritos, Cracker Barrel Cheddar Cheese, etc. But you could find fresh seafood cheap and easily, gouda cheese from Mexico, etc. If you wanted Poland Springs bottled water it was over $2 a gallon but filtered/desalinated water was $0.79 per gallon.

Another good example was rum. Captain Morgan's spiced rum cost more than it does in Massachusetts. But that is because they have to import it, from the States IIRC. However, Cruzan Rum comes from the USVI and is cheap. I actually prefer the taste. Beer is a similar story. Bud Light is more than Red Stripe, Carib or Corona.

Hope this helps.

Jesse

[valhalla360]

If you wind up in shrimping areas, those can be cheap too.

We spent a winter on the Georgia coast and hit the shrimp docks for jumbo shrimp for around $2/lb. Also, oysters could be gotten pretty cheap also.

I forget the price but we were also getting local pecans for next to nothing.

As others have said, it's going to depend a lot on where you are but yes, you can buy cheaper if you eat the local foods.

[MarkJ]

Yes, you will hear of cruisers eating "local" and for a few weeks it may be fun till you die of some dreaded disease... In Asia they will tell you they only eat at roadside stalls... But theres no way I will ever eat at some obviously unsanitary stew pot in the ashes in a roadside gutter where some old momma has sweated and snotted into the pot.

They will also tell you that eating to restaurants is cheaper than eating at home.

Total hogwash, of course!

So once you leave the good ol USA, let me repeat that so you get the Maine lobster idea out of your head: once you LEAVE the USA, you will probably shop in a supermarket and cook most often at home on the boat and go to a restaurant once or twice per week. In the supermarket, for example, will be two chickens side by side, one fat and big and grown in the USA and one smaller, whiter, and grown locally. The chicken from the USA will be EXPENSIVE and the chicken from the farm down the road will be cheap, per pound.

Extrapolate this to everything in the supermarket... I am in a French area and i bought, OK this is off my diet, some nice butter cookies for $1.50 from France. Similar cookies from the USA were $3! French wine is $5, Californian "wine" $10.... Corn meal that a local would make into sommit is $1 per ton compared to US bleached white flour at $5 per pound. Plantains, a local banana that cant be eaten without cooking is 10% of the price of a banana....

Beef here is crazy expensive, but pork is very cheap... Each country is different.

So eating local can be the food local poor people eat, or the quality food of that country, or its supply country.

Supermarket shopping is something I love so I am more than happy to go try stuff new and save some money. But I wont buy pigs snouts yuk!

Mark

[zeehag]

buy local in mexico means not seeking usa brands you are used to buying in usa and buying the mexican stuff which is better as it doesnt seem to have in it stuff that makes you feel l draggy and illified. funny thing about that. veggies are fresher and from farms and meat is actually from a carcass and has no gmos or hormones in it. grass fed yummmmmm.....lol cheese is a lil different than usa cheese..less flavor, but that is ok....it took a year for my body to feel better after ceasing the consumption of packaged in usa foods

and i am with markj..no pig snouts nor mexican meat as it is called.....oooohh..look out for that....lol..no tripas either..no, i dont DO menudo..pozole..YES, but not menudo..lol

[colemj]

Originally Posted by MarkJ

But I wont buy pigs snouts yuk!

Mark

Those kill me laughing every time I see those jars filled with pig noses pressed against the glass! How about the frozen section where you can buy bull testicles 3 to a bag? Never understood the math there.

Mark

[Blue Crab]

Coupla posters mentioned lobsters with butter. Well, everything tastes betta with butta! (I don't want to say this too loudly: blue crab tastes great with or without butter.) Who cannot catch a blue crab? Mullet are marvelous with butter so castnets pay for themselves.

A lot of folks claim they can't catch fish. Yeah? Is there anyone alive that can't catch pinfish, or grunts, or poagies or whatever by the bucketful? Nope. Little kids can do it, so can you. Of course cleaning is a pain as you're not fileting nice big slabs but we have all day and it's all but free and about as local as you can get. Simply add butter. With butter, it's tough to tell high dollar fish from free fish.

The best news: Butter is now considered by many to be a healthy fat. This changes every decade or so but it's OK now, so go for it.

Whether you have $500 or $5000 a month doesn't matter. Sometimes as pointed out above, the problem isn't money, it's access.

[Tim R.]

Originally Posted by colemj

Those kill me laughing every time I see those jars filled with pig noses pressed against the glass! How about the frozen section where you can buy bull testicles 3 to a bag? Never understood the math there.

Mark

I get the math. That's one from each bull. By the time you get the first one the bull has either killed you or run off.

[sailorboy1]

You would think that as many times as "eat local" gets quoted as a way to save money more real examples could be done. From my experience cruising in the NE "eating local" within walking distance of most places with stores etc means eating at the local pub (I prefer the Brew Pubs and like beer cruising myself"

BTW - eating "local" lobster you got right from the lobster boat is a good example of saving money, on eating lobster. But $20 on lobster for the night doesn't fit with a lot of people who say they can eat for month on $150. (and cooking and eating NE lobster on a sailboat is a messy thing)

[zeehag]

langosta here is essentially a tail only eating item.. buy a whole one snap off tail and cook. they run 130 pesos per kilo. 13 pesos to one dollar
buy them in restaurant, is akin to maine lobster pricing