Dominos
Am I the only who is fascinated by the unintended results of telling people they need to stay at home? I think it is so interesting following the various domino effects. For instance, yeast. Evidently yeast has been in short supply on store shelves. (I buy instant yeast in bulk, so haven't tried to buy any in a store in forever.) I know people are doing a lot more baking in their free time. I've never seen quite so many pictures of baked goods in my Facebook feed. It seems that yeast manufacturers have never had quite the demand spike they are experiencing right now. While they can increase production, they run into their own difficulties with shortages. The material they use to package the yeast so that they can sell it to stores is hard to come by. It seems jars are made in India, but due to the worldwide quarantine the factories which make the jars are closed. If a product cannot be packaged, it is difficult to sell it. Meanwhile, fresh yeast, a type of yeast normally sold to restaurants and bakeries because of its short shelf life, has had very low demand... much, much less than usual when restaurants were going full force.
I keep reading story after story about various commodities which can be difficult to find on store shelves due to a significant increase in demand. The whole thing makes me realize just how much people were eating out and not preparing food in their homes. I find this both interesting and baffling since we are feeling as though we are living high on the hog if we eat a restaurant meal once a month. It's just not in the budget.
The other shopping behavior that I am intrigued by is the sudden general interest in what some might consider to be 'old fashioned' homemaking skills... canning and preserving, keeping poultry, wheat grinding, and sewing are the ones that leap immediately to mind, mainly because I am immediately affected by it. I am also a little annoyed because it has caused prices to go through the roof for things that were generally reasonable.
For years I have been wanting to buy a pressure canner so that I could start pressure canning low acid foods; the things my steam canner cannot safely process. With J. not driving thirty miles to work and back every day, our gasoline bill has been non-existent, so I finally had some room in the budget to buy one. (It arrives next week!) Of course, it took some doing to actually locate one since the type I wanted was sold out in many places. And just now I ordered the regulator weight I need for it, a small piece of equipment that usually sells for less than ten dollars. The only I could find was twice that, and that was a store that prides itself on its ridiculously low prices. Finally, I really wanted what is considered to be the pressure canning "bible", the Ball Complete Book of Home Preservation. It seems to be currently out of print. That's okay, I often choose to buy used books because they are less expensive. Well... usually. I've seen outrageous prices for it today as I searched. The average used price seems to be in the $150+ range, with the highest price over $500! I'm sorry, but that's insane. I'll live without it.
I'm also glad that I wasn't planning on buying chicks this year. They, too, are in short supply. One hatchery wrote that they have had a 600 percent increase in demand over previous years and they can't keep up. I even had someone contact me the other day asking if I had any ducks for sale. Not duck eggs, but the actual animal. I can honestly say that was a first for me. (And no, I didn't sell any of our ducks.)
Finally, I got the email saying that it is time to put in my semi-annual bulk order at the end of the month. I was thrilled because there were a few things in my pantry which were starting to look a little low. I'm also down to my last bag of wheat, so need to stock up on that as well. But, yikes! Normally, for the past decade or so, I've spent somewhere in the range of $32-$40 dollars for a 50 pound bag of wheat berries, depending on what the harvest was like the past year. With all the other craziness, I took a quick look at wheat prices. I was not too happy to see that this year, I will be paying $48 for a 50 pound bag of wheat. What the heck? I'm not aware of any natural disasters happening with the wheat crop. It's just crazy.
Part of me is thrilled that the wider public is becoming interested in these things. They are good skills to have, and personally, I think that making things for yourself is more healthy both emotionally and physically. But I did enjoy my little bubble of unusualness that the prices which went with that.
I keep reading story after story about various commodities which can be difficult to find on store shelves due to a significant increase in demand. The whole thing makes me realize just how much people were eating out and not preparing food in their homes. I find this both interesting and baffling since we are feeling as though we are living high on the hog if we eat a restaurant meal once a month. It's just not in the budget.
The other shopping behavior that I am intrigued by is the sudden general interest in what some might consider to be 'old fashioned' homemaking skills... canning and preserving, keeping poultry, wheat grinding, and sewing are the ones that leap immediately to mind, mainly because I am immediately affected by it. I am also a little annoyed because it has caused prices to go through the roof for things that were generally reasonable.
For years I have been wanting to buy a pressure canner so that I could start pressure canning low acid foods; the things my steam canner cannot safely process. With J. not driving thirty miles to work and back every day, our gasoline bill has been non-existent, so I finally had some room in the budget to buy one. (It arrives next week!) Of course, it took some doing to actually locate one since the type I wanted was sold out in many places. And just now I ordered the regulator weight I need for it, a small piece of equipment that usually sells for less than ten dollars. The only I could find was twice that, and that was a store that prides itself on its ridiculously low prices. Finally, I really wanted what is considered to be the pressure canning "bible", the Ball Complete Book of Home Preservation. It seems to be currently out of print. That's okay, I often choose to buy used books because they are less expensive. Well... usually. I've seen outrageous prices for it today as I searched. The average used price seems to be in the $150+ range, with the highest price over $500! I'm sorry, but that's insane. I'll live without it.
I'm also glad that I wasn't planning on buying chicks this year. They, too, are in short supply. One hatchery wrote that they have had a 600 percent increase in demand over previous years and they can't keep up. I even had someone contact me the other day asking if I had any ducks for sale. Not duck eggs, but the actual animal. I can honestly say that was a first for me. (And no, I didn't sell any of our ducks.)
Finally, I got the email saying that it is time to put in my semi-annual bulk order at the end of the month. I was thrilled because there were a few things in my pantry which were starting to look a little low. I'm also down to my last bag of wheat, so need to stock up on that as well. But, yikes! Normally, for the past decade or so, I've spent somewhere in the range of $32-$40 dollars for a 50 pound bag of wheat berries, depending on what the harvest was like the past year. With all the other craziness, I took a quick look at wheat prices. I was not too happy to see that this year, I will be paying $48 for a 50 pound bag of wheat. What the heck? I'm not aware of any natural disasters happening with the wheat crop. It's just crazy.
Part of me is thrilled that the wider public is becoming interested in these things. They are good skills to have, and personally, I think that making things for yourself is more healthy both emotionally and physically. But I did enjoy my little bubble of unusualness that the prices which went with that.
Comments