stealing (lots of) food

[mellowtigger]

Another possible sign o' the times reached my mailbox this morning. I mean, isn't it just nuts to be talking about almost a million dollars worth of food?  This tidbit (which I can't find online yet) from Aurora, Illinois:

POLICE BLOTTER
Meat lost, found
January 30, 2008

One truck and four trailers filled with 1,700 pounds of meat were stolen after someone cut open a fence at a business in the 2600 block of Church Road between 3 p.m. Saturday and 5:30 a.m. Sunday, Aurora police said. Total value was $818,900, police said. The trailers, still filled with meat, were later recovered on the westbound shoulder of Interstate 88, near Randall Road, police said.

I award bonus points to this story, because the food was stolen just a few blocks (zoom out once to see it) from the Fermi National Accelerator lab.

In barely related news, I realized last week at the grocery store that dried black beans actually cost more per ounce than canned/cooked black beans. How does that happen? How can it cost more to dry beans than to cook them? I already noticed long ago that fresh tomatoes (for making salsa) cost more than jars of salsa. At least with fresh veggies one can argue that it's expensive to maintain freshness during shipping.  What, though, is the excuse for raw beans being more expensive than processed?

Comments

[brianrdu.livejournal.com]

Are you comparison shopping? I buy different items at different places, because I know where they will be cheap. For me, both of those items (beans and tomatoes, which are sad anyway because they are out of season) are to be bought at my local Mexican market/tent on weekends. A 1 gallon bucket of tomatoes (roma or regular) is 4.00, and a 1 gallon bucket of frijoles negros is...um...well I haven't looked, because I can't imagine eating beans enough to buy those, but I know they are cheap.

Some guesses

[arkanjil.livejournal.com]

processed food doesn't have to look pretty, nor even match the quality of raw/organic produce. Keeping it in good shape while transporting and storing also jacks up the cost, I should think. But then, theres the fact that people buying premium organic produce have been trained that it should have a premium cost associated with it.

There's some fascinating stuff out there about the cost per calorie vs nutritious food's availability, but nothing I can link to off the cufff. Just try to shop as wisely as you can, je?