Nearly everyone I tell that I don’t use a fridge responds, “You must shop every day,” or asks how often I shop, implying that they think it must be frequently.

I’ve been answering by pointing out that apples and eggplants don’t need refrigeration, nor do most whole fruits and vegetables. Most of the produce in this picture will stay edible for weeks without refrigeration. Several will keep months or longer if fermented. Meanwhile, look at the second picture below.

Nearly all the produce in the picture below will start decomposing as soon as they aren’t refrigerated. They’re worse in nearly every way: less fresh, more polluting, more fragile, more depleting, etc. Notice that you can’t directly see or touch produce or anything living. In the picture above, you could plant many of the plants and grow new ones from what you bought. In the picture below, all you can touch is plastic, which is poisonous.

As best I can tell, most Americans buy produce like below, not above.

When did you last prepare a meal from scratch?

That nearly everyone responds so similarly in an environment increasingly resembling the lower picture above tells me that few Americans prepare meals from scratch, or at least in the classes that I speak with.

When did you last prepare a meal from scratch—that is, from ingredients that didn’t come in packages? An easier level might be if any ingredients came packaged, didn’t have ingredient lists or nutrition labels?

I’d love to learn the fraction of Americans who have prepared at least one meal from scratch in the past week, month, or year.