Saving Money on Groceries
There are a million posts on saving money on groceries. There are people who manage to feed a family of six for $300 a month! So inspirational and yet so unattainable! With our debt free in three journey, we slashed our budget in January and have settled on $350 a month for groceries with an additional $50 in a grocery stock-up category.
Our stats: Two adults and one three and a half year old. Our home is in Seattle. AlienDaddy is the breadwinner, I’m the hearthwinner (aka stay-at-home Mom).
When we started seriously budgeting in January, I was really surprised – ok, I was shocked with how much money was flying out our window in groceries. The single items weren’t expensive, it was death by $5. We were spending an average of $700 a month and I was at the grocery store at least 4 times a week and throwing out a lot of wasted food on garbage day.
The biggest change was meal planning. After about a month, it became both easy and fun. I’ve actually started trying new recipes from my Pinterest list. Once a week, I sit down, shop my freezer, fridge and pantry, look at the circular ads, make my shopping list and head to the grocery store.
Grocery store prices vary wildly around the area. After shopping the sales in circular ads, I’ve found for general shopping, Winco is the best. Now for meat, I’m all about Albertson’s. After a couple of weeks of going to the grocery store, I realized they mark their manager’s special (soon expiring meat) down 50% in the middle of the week. Seeing as I’m taking it home and either cooking it that night, the next night or putting it in my freezer, we’ve been able to save a lot, A LOT of money and eat really well. One of my saving graces are freezer packs – repackaging the meat into pre-cut smaller packages. Makes for an easy stir fry dinner when I either forget or get too busy to follow the meal plan.
While I’m on the topic of grocery shopping, I have to give props to two other stores, Grocery Outlet and The Dollar Store. Seriously, you can find some great deals. Grocery Outlet you have to keep a close eye on the expiration date of their specials (I’ve made that mistake before). But the Dollar Store you never know what you’re going to find. Last week there were full-size bags of Craisins, Sun-dried tomatoes, pizza and italian pesto sauce for a DOLLAR!
When I went grocery shopping today, I tried something new. Since I’m back on the cash budget, I have $75 for groceries this week. After meal-planning, I decided to imagine everything cost $5, from a bag of carrots ($1.99) to the bag of mozzarella cheese ($5.99). When I got to the register, even with a couple of additions I forgot to put on my list, I walked out paying only $45 for my week’s worth of groceries. Woo Hoo!
The stock-up budget is an essential to help keep you on track. After you’ve been shopping for a while, you have a pretty good idea of what is a great price. For example, pasta with no sale is usually around $1.50 at the grocery store. When it goes on sale for $1 for a box of pasta, I’ll buy it if I’m desperate, but every two or three months, the price jumps down to $.69 sometimes with the right sale, down to $.50. When that happens, I use the stock-up budget to, well, stock up. You get the drift.
Designating a Leftover Pizza Night once a week isn’t technically grocery shopping, but I’ve found to really help cut down on the effort of menu planning as well as using up leftovers not quite enough for a full meal. Leftover Pizza night is exactly what it sounds like, leftovers on pizza. The dough is as simple as putting all the ingredients in your mixer then covering the bowl with Saran Wrap. Use whatever sauce you have available. I’ve used everything from pizza sauce to gravy (Thanksgiving). We’ve had Teriyaki pizza, BBQ Pork, an amazing Greek leftover pizza with potatoes and corn and on those weeks there aren’t leftovers we’ve even tried a hotdog pizza (it was just so-so) and a plain cheese and tomato pizza. If you aren’t into pizza, you can also do the same with quesadilla. A little salsa and sour cream and you are set to go!
Truth is, not one of these ideas are earth-shattering changes but they have taken a lot of the food stress off of me. I’m not running around at 5pm madly trying to figure out what we’re going to eat. Our budget is about $350 happier and we’re eating much better because I take a little time to plan. Try it out and let me know if it helps you and your budget, too!
