Food For Thought: Can You Imagine?

Re-visiting the inner aisles of the grocery store

What’s the first thing that comes to mind when I say “canned food”? 

If you’re my age (mid 40s, ahem) you might think of canned tuna, childhood casseroles with cream-of-something-or other soup, and Spaghetti-Os.  You might also think of mushy canned peas with your meatloaf, your grandfather’s sardines on toast, and the school food bank drive. 

The nutrition influencers advise admonish us to stick to the outer aisles of the grocery store.  It’s “less processed” and has “fewer chemicals” and is “healthier” and “more natural” than what’s lurking in the inner part of the store.

But it’s not that simple, is it?

It’s true that the inner aisles of the grocery store are where you find packaged cookies, Technicolor cereal, and questionable pasta in a can.  But’s also where you’ll find tomato paste, beans, brown rice, and peanut butter.  The apparently “healthy” perimeter of the grocery store is chock full of chicken nuggets, sweetened yogurt, and deli meat – things that are, in and of themselves fine, but definitely “prove” the apparent health rule in terms of showing it to be deeply flawed.

But what’s to actually like about canned food? Isn’t fresh produce just, you know, better? In a word, no.

Canned food is often more nutritious

Canned food, because it’s picked and processed at its peak, is often more more nutritious than the out-of-season produce gracing your local market much of the year. I live in Canada and while there are some greenhouse tomatoes available year-round, there’s really no such thing as a decent fresh tomato save for about eight weeks in the late summer. Fresh sweet corn? Even more rare a treat. The produce that does end up at the stores out-of-season has invariably travelled a long way and has been losing its flavour, nutritional value and good looks for a week or more.

Canned food is convenient

Dinner can be on the table faster if you don’t need to wash, peel, and cook vegetables and fruits. You don’t need to wrestle and clean a fish to have a salmon sandwich. The early adopters of food in cans were military who had neither the time nor space to soak and cook beans in a field kitchen or a ship’s galley. And while I’m not a big advocate of them, the canned creamed soups do have a place in a busy cook’s pantry - they can turn “I don’t know what the hell to make for dinner” into something edible faster than you can pull up a delivery app on your phone. Your Grandma was on to something with those casseroles.

Canned food can be environment-friendly

No, I haven’t lost my mind. While cans are heavy to transport, they are also compact and far less prone to spoilage than fresh items. Cans sit neatly on your shelves until you want them and don’t leave a brown slick of compost water at the bottom of your vegetable crisper. Canned food doesn’t require refrigeration or attract pests and is shelf-stable at most regular household temperatures. If you pick up a case or two of your favourite canned staples you may even save yourself trips to the grocery store. And when you’re done you can toss the can in your recycling bin.

Canned food is thrifty

On a unit cost basis, canned almost always beats fresh. And if you factor in picking up a case of canned goods on sale you can save even more. You’ve got to spend money on food - there is no way around it. If you can trim your grocery budget you’re saving after-tax dollars, making a penny saved quite a bit more than a penny earned. What’s more, when you waste less due to spoilage you’re saving even more money.

Are there some downsides to canned goods? A few perhaps, but they’re manageable. Read labels and choose the right products for your needs. Tuna packed in oil or in water? Fruit packed in juice or in water? Choose lower or no salt vegetables and beans where you can, and for the love of all that’s holy skip the tomato products with added “herbs and spices” - they don’t add anything useful to your cooking and inevitably contain a lot of salt and sugar.

And if you’re concerned about bisphenol A (BPA), many countries have taken steps to reduce and/or eliminate BPA in high-risk products. Check your local regulations and don’t be afraid to ask questions. And use common sense too - don’t buy or use cans with serious dents (the little dings in the rim that jam your can opener aren’t serious), bulges or leaks. Keep your canned goods from freezing and don’t store them directly next to a heat source. For the most part those dates on the can are a guideline, not a safety warning. Most canned food is perfectly safe (if not quite as tasty) well beyond any best before or “expiry” information.

So let’s be honest about canned food. Any life hack that makes it easier and cheaper to eat healthy is worth a look, even if it’s not as Instgrammable as a trip to the farmer’s market. And lest you think that canned food is boring, check out the dish I made above - it’s lightly adapted from this recipe for Spanish Braised Chickpeas with Tuna and Olives (I added a can of artichokes too!) Almost everything is out of a can and it’s delicious!

Next time you’re shopping for groceries take a walk though those middle aisles of the grocery store before you stop by the pricy produce section or the fancy fish and meat counter - you might just find the inspiration for you next meal. Can you imagine that?