June 24, 2015

By Trudy Lieberman
Rural Health News Service

Not long ago my husband showed up with a sandwich for lunch that he bought at a local supermarket. I thought it was going to be our usual: turkey and provolone with lettuce on a hard roll, always plenty for both of us.  At $6.50, how could you go wrong?
This time the sandwich was different. It now cost $9.50 and was piled high with turkey and cheese on a roll that was much bigger than what we were used to. In short, it was awful—enough meat and cheese for four people on squishy bread that tasted more like a morning sweet roll. But the bigger serving probably looked like a good deal to a lot of people who thought only about size relative to cost and nothing about size or cost relative to calories.
After surgery on the sandwich, the two of us ate some of it and saved slices of the meat and cheese for later. My guess is most buyers would have eaten the whole thing believing they were getting great value for the money.  Maybe they were, but they were also getting at least half the calories most of them needed for the day.     Login or Subscribe to read the rest of this story.