Help reducing grocery bill?

[Wannabefree]

I only buy sale items. We make meals out of things on sale each week and things from previous sales that we still have on hand that way we never pay full price for food items. You have to get a bit of food stored up ahead of time, but it works for us. Kind of like what SKR8PN has done, and then shop STRICTLY sale items. It was the easiest way for us to save on groceries. I make a lot of our own things like spaghetti sauce, so keep a good stock of tomato paste on hand at all times, and hit the sales hard for those items.

 

[Wifezilla]

Don't let anything go to waste! Use your freezer, dehydrate, cook in to a casserole or whatever. Just make sure nothing get tossed. If you can't, or wont, eat something, that's what critters are for!

 

[TanksHill]

I guess it depends on your style and what your family eats.

When I shop I buy seasonally and cook whats on sale. My kids eat what I make and that's that.

I now have found out when the butcher does his markdowns at my local grocery. I buy whatever I can at a discount and freeze it.

Yesterday I got 32lbs of pork sausage at .50 cents a pound.

One thing is it will not happen over night. Like skr8pn I buy in bulk and store in an extra pantry. I did not buy all this stuff at once but I add when I can.

I would start by making a list of dinners your family likes. I can probably do about 50 different meals. Then I pick the less expensive ones.

There was an article someone posted here about healthy eating not having to be expensive. Based on the Weston A Price Foundation. I will try and find the link. By following this I have been able to incorporate fresh fish back in to our diet once a week and raw milk..

That is pretty costly where we are.

One step at a time.

g

 

[lorihadams]

Okay, I'm going through this too. I have just switched to GF and am now restocking my pantry with items that won't make me ill.

I tried only going to the store once or twice a month and I just can't do it.

I now am making a dinner list with recipes and buying what I need for that week's dinners. I find that if you have a weeks worth of recipes then you don't find yourself buying whatever. Take a list and stick to it.

I don't have a lot of storage space pantry wise so buying in bulk is not something I usually do unless I really find a good deal. I don't use coupons but did just sign up for a coupon service for celiacs that I just found and we'll see what happens with that.

I stick to buying fresh food mostly. Our biggest expenses right now are milk,cheese, yogurt, fruit, and veggies. I will definitely be excited when we can put in a garden and start milking our goats. We just planted 7 fruit trees and 11 berry bushes to help with that cost.

I buy most of my bulk items frozen. Big packs of frozen veggies cause we prefer the texture of frozen to canned foods.

I try to cook some stuff in big batches and freeze it for later....like meat. If I'm gonna be cooking a lb of hamburger anyway then why not cook 2lbs and freeze the extra frozen lb for a quick meal later in the week. Same with chicken. If I'm cooking a whole chicken then I will usually eat 1/2 of the chicken for dinner and pick the rest and freeze it for later in the week for other recipes or chicken salad, whatever. I made a 23lb turkey for xmas and I have 2lbs of pulled meat that I froze for pot pie.

I find that a lot of times we tend to go out to eat when I'm too tired to cook and it ends up costing us $20-$50 each time. That is HUGE. When I think of how many meals I could have cooked at home for $50 it makes me cringe.

Try the meal list and shop according to the list. It really does help when you know exactly what meals you are going to prepare for the week.

 

[CrimsonRose]

you mentioned you buy a lot of soup at about 1.60 to 2.00 per can... Why not can your owns soup?

I typically make a HUGE stockpot full of soup... costing me anywhere from 10 to about 17 dollars (depending on what type of soup it is and if it has meats in it) Then we eat about 2 meals from that huge pot (family of 5) and I will have enough left over to can about 16-20 pint jars of soup! it will stay good for at least a year (never last longer than that around here... LOL) and you consider a pint is about 2 servings where as a can of soup is only about one serving... so total for less than 20 bucks you can make 42 cans of soup!

and that's good for you soup with fresh veggies and NO added chemicals and preservatives!

Also someone already mentioned canning your own broth and such... That has saved us a TON!

Also make your own bread! buy flower and yeast in bulk... I figured out I spend about .25 on a batch of bread that makes 2 small loaves or about 8 large sub buns.... I refrigerate it after I make it so it will stay good and not mold for about a week... A good loaf of bread at the store costs at least 2-3 dollars and it is loaded with preservatives, corn syrup and yucky stuff!

I buy our veggies at a veggie auction in bulk and then try to can all that I can... I do this till I can get our garden expanded but it's a work in progress! Anything you buy in bulk can typically be frozen or canned to help keep it from going to waste...

 

[AnnaRaven]

you haven't been on the site long with 11 posts so I don't know your style

how many are eating?
do you seriously have the cash to just buy what you want, or is the high grocery bill truly cutting into finances?

Hi. Yeah - I've been pretty active on the backyardchickens board but only recently came here.

We have 3 eating - DH, myself and a teenage boy (6'2"!) DD is 19 and goes to school up in MN.

We have the cash but are trying to save for retirement.

A little background on us:
DH is Italian (from Bologna Italy) and grew up rich. Doctor's family with money for generations. He has never balanced a checkbook, never ever "not" had money. But his mom was relatively frugal (very into sales - his dad used to joke that it's a good thing there were no sales on elephants or they'd have 3 - buy 2 get one free!) So he likes the idea of being frugal but has no clue at all how to do it.

I grew up middle-class Minnesota. Joined Army right out of highschool. Went to work right after. Supported 2 XH's and had a house of my own and raised the kids on 1 salary - mine. I have lived on foodstamps (working 70 hour weeks!) I have done the scraping by, living paycheck to paycheck and feeding the two kids and paying a mortgage. Finally met DH and got married to him a few years ago. Lived with him in Italy before we moved here to Silicon Valley for work. (DH is a geek.)

So now, the big issue is - how to control the grocery bill without it feeling like deprivation. DH is very interested in being frugal and saving up for retirement while he makes a good living now, but it's up to me to do it. First, I have to remember to never take him shopping because he grabs random **** and does impulse buys.

you can cut in so many ways.

#1 just don't buy it

#2 use some coupons combined with sales, buy 1 get 1 etc

#3 grow your own if you are the more SS type

#4 buy more generic equivaent products

#5 buy less cleaners etc and buy one cleaner that "can do it all" or use simple homemade products

I do tend to buy generic when it's available. And I don't need cleaners cuz I don't clean. Seriously - my cleaning is primarily ASW (homemade blend of Ammonia, dishSoap, Water). I try to buy at sales.

I've recently started trying to buy online for delivery from Safeway because I can get sale-only stuff and avoid impulse buys that way.

My normal is $80 to 100 per week for 3 of us

I buy what I truly want

when I go "more crazy" it is like $120-130 (buy some needless things along with wants and extra stock up items if sale is great)


but the other day, I spent $175
I bought some dog toys (yea I know), extra good treats for the cat, (why? they are barn cats but I like a few of them and I felt generous), stocked up on some meats that the prices were great, bought tons of out of season fruits that I was itching to eat,

and that $175 was with $33 in savings LOL so I spent alot but next week will be like $60 for some items I just need when I go.

Wow. That's incredible.

I've gotta start stocking up on meats - the problem is, we're picky about meat. We don't eat much but what we do eat, we want to be organic, freerange, grassfed, etc. So I tend to buy it at farmers market or CSA or the like, but then it's more expensive per pound. Time to investigate buying a side of beef I think, if I can find some at a reasonable price per pound.

You love flowers. Don't buy them at the store. Stop by your local florist and see what they have "just going out of good"
I can easily get a giagantic bouquet of "almost anything beautiful" for like $3-7 and that gets me the best of the best. yea the life is shorter maybe by a day or 2, but the price means I can "have it all" and enjoy beautiful flowers all the time. (or grow your own of course lol)

We don't buy flowers at the store often - so this isn't a common expense for us. But that's a great idea.

wine---well if you can hit a sale on your fav, then stock up big time. if you are a true winner, lol, then hit some local vineyards. they sell by discount on cases. NC has alot of vineyards towards the mountains, who knew, lol. the give great tours and sell great wines.

We buy wine when it's on sale, or 10% off for 6, or by the case. My Italian DH hates American wines - they're too "oaky". But we don't buy expensive wine - most are under $10 and even the "expensive" stuff we buy is under $20. I did manage to get him to cut down on alcohol consumption a bit - he'd gotten a bit out of hand last winter. Now, he gets 2 servings of alcohol a night - 1 glass of wine with dinner and 1 aperitif or 1 after-dinner drink, etc. I pour out the glasses and cork the bottle and put it away. So a bottle of wine lasts two days instead of him drinking it all while sitting around in the evening (which he used to do).

Liquor, I try to buy at Costco in the big, cheap bottles. But sometimes, if there's a sale at a grocery, I'll grab a bottle of stuff I know we use.

But I do try to categorize that under alcohol, not under groceries. I just have to be more careful about doing that...

but if you want to cut a bill---you can easily. You know how to do it, ya just have to want to do it...lol

I'm a pretty good cook. And DH has gone from eating out every night (before we got together) to eating out only a couple times a month. As long as I can feed him as well as he'd eat out, or better, he doesn't feel deprived and we can save the money from eating at restaurants by eating at home. So believe it or not, I'm already saving us a lot of money just by cooking instead of going out to eat. Also, I hate HFCS and added sweeteners, so we rarely buy prepared foods.

I got into the European habit of grocery shopping every day and now I've been slowly weaning myself out of that habit. I found that the more often I go to the store, the more I spend. So I've been cutting that out. I have a pretty good pantry going now - the holidays was a good time to stock up on broths and veggies and stuff we use.

My biggest issue is that I have no idea what I'm spending money on so I don't really know where I can cut back or where I can save. I know we're eating *healthy* and *well* but I don't think we're eating frugally. I *thought* we were doing pretty good but now that I've got a year's worth of records on mint, I feel like I was totally delusional!

So before I make changes, I want to understand where my money is going. How do I keep track of it so I can figure out where I can save?

DH is a numbers guy - if I can show him where I'm saving money, he'll be happy.

Wow - that got long. Sorry. Hope it helps.

 

[AnnaRaven]

I find that a lot of times we tend to go out to eat when I'm too tired to cook and it ends up costing us $20-$50 each time. That is HUGE. When I think of how many meals I could have cooked at home for $50 it makes me cringe.

Try the meal list and shop according to the list. It really does help when you know exactly what meals you are going to prepare for the week.

I've been saving a lot from cooking at home rather than going out to eat. But I'm terrible at sticking to weekly meal plans. I've tried that - I buy for a week of meals and then don't cook the stuff or cook something else... At least the chickens are there to help take care of any fresh veggies that go bad now. And I compost stuff too.

 

[AnnaRaven]

you mentioned you buy a lot of soup at about 1.60 to 2.00 per can... Why not can your owns soup?

I typically make a HUGE stockpot full of soup... costing me anywhere from 10 to about 17 dollars (depending on what type of soup it is and if it has meats in it) Then we eat about 2 meals from that huge pot (family of 5) and I will have enough left over to can about 16-20 pint jars of soup! it will stay good for at least a year (never last longer than that around here... LOL) and you consider a pint is about 2 servings where as a can of soup is only about one serving... so total for less than 20 bucks you can make 42 cans of soup!

and that's good for you soup with fresh veggies and NO added chemicals and preservatives!

Also someone already mentioned canning your own broth and such... That has saved us a TON!

Also make your own bread! buy flower and yeast in bulk... I figured out I spend about .25 on a batch of bread that makes 2 small loaves or about 8 large sub buns.... I refrigerate it after I make it so it will stay good and not mold for about a week... A good loaf of bread at the store costs at least 2-3 dollars and it is loaded with preservatives, corn syrup and yucky stuff!

I buy our veggies at a veggie auction in bulk and then try to can all that I can... I do this till I can get our garden expanded but it's a work in progress! Anything you buy in bulk can typically be frozen or canned to help keep it from going to waste...

You can can homemade soup? I never thought of that. I've never really canned much of anything. I freeze stuff a lot. I make pasta sauces in big quantities and freeze it in small packages. But stock is so bulky when it's frozen that I've never considered doing it up in bulk cuz I really don't wanna take up room in the freezer for it when there's other stuff that could go there. But canned homemade stock... can you do that?

The canned soups are mostly there as a healthy convenience food (which is why it's more expensive) for when I'm not up for cooking or for when I'm gone and DH needs something he can just nuke on a weekend. DH doesn't cook and doesn't eat leftovers. If there's leftovers, he'll just go out and get something instead. (Leftovers aren't a big Italian tradition.)

 

[lwheelr]

I agree on making your own soup - you don't even have to can it. Just use a crock pot and start it in the morning, it is done by evening. If you have lean meat, you can toss it right in and it will cook completely in the pot - I cut it up finer than commercial stew meat so it goes further (kitchen shears do a fast job of that). It doesn't need to be time consuming, and it does not need to mean that your family cannot eat what they like.

The key to good beef based soups is onion, and a little bit of tomato juice - canned tomatoes, a bit of tomato sauce, etc. You can use soy sauce in them to give them a bit of meaty flavor too, and avoid having to buy boullion or broth. Otherwise, salt.

The key to good chicken soups is a dab of butter, a bit of poultry seasoning, onion, and salt.

Either way, a good variety of veggies makes it more flavorful - start with celery and carrots, but add cabbage, peas, green beans, etc, depending on what you want the soup to taste like. Barley is good in beef soups, just takes about an hour or so to cook. If you are going to let it cook all day, toss in a quarter cup of whole wheat too.

Ok, don't just watch what you already spent. And don't just write up a list.

Create a list in a spreadsheet - categorize your groceries. Make some extra columns beside the name of the grocery item:

St = Store - where you can usually get the best deal on that item (this helps you plan the trip better)
Avg Pr = Average Price - what you normally expect to pay for it, so you know if it is a good deal
Qty = Quantity - how many you need this trip
Cst = Cost - how much you plan to spend this time

At the bottom of each Cost column, do a total on that column. Then to the right of the last Cost column, do a grand total on all the Cost columns.

Usually it will take about four major column groups to list all the things you ordinarily buy, and you'll just fill in the amounts you need each trip, and the amount you expect to spend for them - erase the the cost on the ones you don't need that time. Leave a few blank lines in each category so you can put in unusual items that you only get now and again.

You now have a self-calculating shopping list, that will help you set a goal and stay under it. This works great, because you can juggle the items on the list, and the amounts, BEFORE you are in the store, so you can plan it out ahead when you have time to think about it and reason it out. Print it off and head to the store.

When you use it, then you'll be able to snap up sale items because you will KNOW when a sale item is a good price. Also, if you plan on spending $3 to get two cartons of eggs, and eggs are on sale for $.99 each, you know you can get three instead of two, and gradually accumulate an effective storage on things you frequently buy.

Costs do keep rising. You can't control that. You can only control how you respond to it.

One thing to keep in mind - prices are not always what they appear to be.

I can get white pasta for 50 cents a box. I pay $1 a box for whole wheat pasta. It would seem that I am spending twice as much... But...

My kids fill up twice as fast on whole wheat pasta as they do on white. We can feed the whole family on half a box of whole wheat pasta, where it takes a whole box of white. Many whole foods are that way - they are higher in nutrition, so the body is satisfied sooner.

Another thing we do, is I have a cupboard in my room (our bedroom is off limits to our kids). I keep the special stuff there. Dried fruit, dry cereal, travel snack foods, any sweets, etc. Those are special things in our house, so anything that I know they might just gobble down, is put where they HAVE to ask to get it. This was especially important when the kids were younger. Now they respect those requests better so it isn't so crucial.

We count some items also - I buy fruit for the kids, and they are allowed two servings a day (my kids have Crohn's, they require two servings of fresh fruit a day). They are allowed one measured serving of dry cereal a week (for Sunday mornings when time is short) - the rest of the time they have toast, potatoes, oatmeal, or other less expensive choices. I just buy the right amount, and tell them what the limit is, and they then control when they have it themselves.

It just makes me sick that I used to feed a family of 9 (including teens), on about $350 a month - at a time when the USDA said that it should cost about $80 to $120 per month per person. We ate fairly well, with a lot of variety.

Now, it costs us about $800 per month for five people, plus $150 per month for animal feed. Part is because we have to buy a lot of organic items, but part is just because food costs more. But at the same time, the USDA says it costs between $175 and $345 per month per person.

We shopped once a month for about 15 years, until our income became too erratic to do that. It is a fact that when you shop less often, you spend less, get more, and learn to plan better and make do better. The fewer times you get into the store, the less you tend to spend overall.

Meals out also push costs WAY up. Even grabbing a burger once a week can blow the budget.

 

[JRmom]

If you are finding some of your CSA veggies going bad, don't throw them out! I have a 1-gallon bag in my freezer that all my vegetable scraps go into - onion ends, carrot and potato peels, celery, etc. If you see you're not going to be able to use something before it goes bad, add it to the bag. Once the bag is full, make your own vegetable stock - I get 4 quarts from a 1-gallon bag of scraps. Then the scraps go into the compost.

I never, never, never throw out a carcass. Into the stock pot it goes and I make my own broth. I cook with broth at almost every meal, so this saves me a ton of $$$ over the year.

Eating "in season" will save money. By the time you get tired of whatever fruit/veggie is in season, the next season is here.

Someone already mentioned baking your own bread, but how about your own noodles? Cheap, easy and much better tasting!

Meal planning - this is the only way I stay on track and only buy what I need. With a list in hand I'm not tempted to add extras to the cart.