Hi, we're Michael and Mollie, the husband-and-wife team behind The Hangry Economist. We met on a dating app called Coffee Meets Bagel, went on our first date in an eclectic Belgian restaurant nestled in a lantern-lit alleyway, and built our relationship on the barstools of a cozy neighborhood Irish pub steps away from Mollie's DC apartment. Sharing meals and new food experiences brought us together.
We didn’t cook much in those early days—we were working and living an hour away from each other, and cooking didn’t fit into our schedules. But a back injury in late 2018 forced Michael to start eating an anti-inflammatory diet, so we started exploring new foods and diets at home. Our lifestyle changes gradually healed Michael’s back (and got rid of his chronic heartburn!), motivating us to continue finding healthy ways to eat our favorite foods.
When we got married in 2019, we had mastered healthy eating, but we weren’t planning meals in a budget- or time-friendly way. Mollie was commuting an hour to work each way and we were trying to save for a house, so our old way of doing things just wasn’t working anymore. We started planning our meals each week, figured out how to use leftovers and overlap ingredients, and developed meals that took 30 minutes or less to make.
After being stuck in quarantine together for a year, we mastered the art of eating healthy-ish on a budget, and started The Hangry Economist to share what we've learned with others. The site is named after Mollie, an economics enthusiast (and self-proclaimed curmudgeon) who works in public finance by day and eats by night. Michael isn't an economist (he works in IT management and rambles on the phone a lot), but he does get hangry. Come for the recipes and budgeting advice, stay for our hangry antics.
Happy eating,
