[kelnos]

That doesn't sound that weird to me. Two things:

I expect most people aren't shy about buying several weeks worth of meat and freezing it. Quality doesn't drop off that much. Quality differences are more noticeable with frozen vegetables, but I suspect a lot of people are fine with those too. Then there are frozen microwave/oven dinners and things like that, as well as non-perishable/shelf-stable items.

A household that exclusively cooks all their meals might make 7-10 grocery trips per month, but I expect that most people don't do that, and even those who cook all their meals probably don't rely on fresh meat & veggies for every single meal. And note that they don't cover people who go out to eat at restaurants at all in that list, so they're not accounted for anywhere.

On a side note, regarding your surprise at the purchases being large: most Americans, especially those who live in rural or suburban areas, don't do the kind of daily or near-daily stops at small convenience stores to pick up a few quick things that you see in dense cities. They drive to the grocery store, load up as much as they can fit in their cart, fill up their car, and go back home.

[bayonetz]

On the frozen meat point, I'd bet large sums of money people can't distinguish between fresh and frozen-within-3-or-so-months meat. In fact, frozen meat can be reliably made even tastier than fresh if you cook it straight fron the freezer with no thaw. It's a cool little hack really. By cooking from frozen you get more time to sear, char, and crisp the outside of the meat while the inside doesn't overcook. It's next to impossible to get the right mix of seared/charred outside but tender lightly cooked inside with the normal thickness stock cuts (~1inch) you get at grocery stores. With frozen, can do it no problem everytime. On that note, another trick, if you must cook without freezing, is to just get a custom thickness cut. For example, I need a 2-3inch NY strip if I want to grill straight from the refrigerator and get the right outside to inside done-ness.

[noir_lord]

> Quality differences are more noticeable with frozen vegetables.

Heavily depends on the vegetables, frozen peas often taste way better than ones bought from the local market (not always but often) and come without the time taken to shell them, same with things like carrots etc.

The price difference is pretty insignificant when factored against the convenience (for me at least).