This is very interesting when looking at prices in terms of gold. During the 19th century, US dollars were backed by somewhere around 1.5g - 1.6g of gold, which is worth around $90 today. So multiply by 90 and you start getting reasonable prices:

1833 - cheap meal for 1 shilling = $10.80 1834 - moderate meal for 15 3/4 cents = $14.18 1838 - beef steak 25 cents = $22.25 1849 - corned beef and cabbage = $112.50

and so on. A very rough rule of thumb is multiply by 100 and that's the rough price in gold today. Things weren't all that cheap and monetary expansion since the devaluation of the dollar makes these prices seem much cheaper than they are.