It’s one of the first questions I get when South Africans hear I live in Canada now, : “What does food cost? Is it more expensive than SA?”. And it’s quickly followed by “do they have decent meat?”
Beef and venison
The third question is the easiest of the three to answer. Alberta has great beef. It easily rivals SA beef for taste and quality. And in the cities, it’s easier to get cuts of beef from elsewhere in the world – for example, authentic Wagyu or Kobe beef. Just be prepared to pay dearly for that privilege.
Now whilst the beef is easily comparable to SA, SA has a vastly larger selection of venison routinely available in the shops. In Alberta, you can typically find mule deer, white-tailed deer, elk, moose, wild boar, and bison. You might occasionally find carabou (there are three subspecies), but we’re too far south to routinely see them. By comparison, South Africa is blessed with significantly more venison choices – we have 72 antelope species, for example.
We also don’t routinely find ostrich in the shops here, unlike in SA, although there are several ostrich farms in Alberta. And unfortunately there’s just no comparison to Karoo lamb here. Much of the lamb available in the shops seems to be imported from Australia, with the pricetag to match the distance it’s traveled.
Food costs
And that price tag brings us on to the sticky question of food costs. Food costs vary pretty wildly across the length and breadth of Canada. Being as far north as we are, food typically costs (much) more than it would in Edmonton or Calgary or Red Deer. There’s simply more of a logistical challenge, and the associated cost, of getting it to us.
The other issue with directly comparing food costs to SA is the cost of living calculation. The median salary in Canada is $72,000 – or just under R1mil at today’s exchange rate. And what that is after tax varies by province, given the different provincial taxes. This makes doing a percentage-of-income-based food expenditure calculation very challenging for this mere mortal.
So instead, I normally resort to talking about what two very-comfortably-fed adults spend on food each month. Breakfasts are thin on the ground in our household – I’ve never been a fan of breakfast, and CF is normally too busy to eat it. If we do eat breakfast, it’ll typically be yogurt combined with cereal. Lunches normally consist of one or two sandwiches – whole-grain bread, cheese, ham, tomatoes, and so on. CF will usually have a fruit of some variety with lunch, unlike me. Yes, I know, I know, I really should eat more fruit…
Our primary dinner protein is chicken (specifically chicken breasts), supplemented by mince (ground beef for my Canadian friends). Very occasionally I’ll have a steak for dinner, whilst CF will have a vegetarian burger patty of some variety. We complement the protein with rice – typically basmati – or potatoes as the starch. We also have mixed vegetables – broccoli, carrots, cauliflower, beans – with most meals. We don’t stint on the fresh herbs for the various recipes I cook for us. We also get whatever snacks grab our attention on the day. I do not recommend this strategy. But I digress.
We do also tend to shop once per week, buying in bulk where we can – we only have the freezer compartment of the fridge, which limits my options a bit. But never fear, a new freezer is nearly here… We don’t specifically go to multiple stores to seek out the best prices on different items, which you could do to drive down your monthly cost – at the expense of your time and fuel. We shop primarily at Costco (for all bulk items) and Safeway or our local IGA for the remaining groceries. We usually buy home cleaning products from Canadian Tire, since Costco doesn’t usually have the cleaning products we use. This means the number my budget app spits out for food is virtually entirely limited to food/groceries.
That number is around $1,200 a month. Or just under R17,000. When we left SA we were spending around R5,500 a month for a very similar diet. So on a direct comparison, food is nearly three times as expensive where we are. If we compare it as a percentage of what we’re actually earning a month, we’re actually paying significantly less than we were in SA though. Which still doesn’t make us feel much better about it.
Some actual numbers
This might still not be all that useful, so I kept some receipts from last week’s trip. Here are what some of the comparable staples cost (exchange rate is R13,70/$1 today):
- Chicken breasts, per KG – +-$15 (varies day by day it seems)/R205,50
- 2l milk – $4,49/R61,51
- 3 x 800g loaf of bread – $7,99/R109,46 (R36,49 per loaf)
- 5kg Basmati rice – $15,99/R219,06
- Mince, per KG – $8,99/R123,16
- 1.15kg Cheddar – $14,99/R205,36
- 500g whole bean coffee – $10,99/R150,56
- 1kg carrots – $3,29/R45,07
- Butternut squash, per KG – $5,49/R75,21
- 1.2kg frozen vegetables – $13,99/R191,66
- 1kg roma tomatoes – $4,99/R68,36
- 36 cans of Coke Zero (10,5l) – $14,69/R201,25
- 1kg steak (rump or striploin) – +-$38/R520,60 (!!!!!!!)
- 1 bunch fresh parsley (+-70g) – $2,49/R34,11
- 28g fresh basil (1 box) – $2,49/R34,11
Okay, I think you kinda get the idea. Food is expensive where we are. Frankly, food is pretty expensive everywhere in Canada. We’ve been here nearly a year, and I’ve seen our grocery bills increasing month on month thanks to inflation. Hopefully food price inflation takes a breather for a little while. Let me know if there are specific things that I haven’t mentioned the cost of that you’d like to hear about.