Posted on 05/24/2010 3:06:08 PM PDT by HungarianGypsy
Let us put the blame where it started. On this thread PJ-Comix made a statement about saving money on food.
Which in this time is always a good thing. Do you coupon? Shop the ads? Buy things at the scratch and dent store? How do you saveon your grocery budget?
My favorite Aldi’s purchase is the 99 cent fresh Dole pineapples. Yum.
You feed a family of 7 on $100 a week?
I know. Least I keep trying to. I miss the $200/week budgets.
You might be surprised what you can buy on line. join Amazon Prime and shipping is free or close to it. they have a pretty good supply of many foods. there are many others with low prices and generally low shipping.
We have wally world, costco and sams club for big box stores.
dried beans and cabbage (not together)...little red pepper and salt.... MMmmm Good... (and cheap)
Cheerios for breakfast, Cabbage soup everyday for lunch,, beans and chicken for supper... I can eat for about $20/week!
I’m very proud and yet ashamed to admit that I’ve cut our food budget from $800+ a month to <$250 a month. There’s 3 of us including a 4 year old. We are not overweight and we aren’t big junk food eaters. But, we were shopping for groceries all the time - buying expensive, fancy foods we didn’t need ($50 for 2 high-end steaks for example), didn’t ever eat, or stuff we just paid way too much for. Now I use coupons and search all the local grocery ads and match up sales with coupons. We have the money to spend, we just realized it’s incredibly stupid to spend it when it should go in savings.
That’s got to take amazing cooking talent!
Please ping me when you post a/any recipe.
The dressing was: plain yogurt, buttermilk, garlic, ground peppercorn, and blue cheese. The most expensive ingredient was the blue cheese for $2.00 and some change. Cost all together as much as a refrigerated brand and got twice as much out of it. That was made because my family aren't mayo fans and I knew I needed something of that texture, so decided on the yogurt.
Fresh and Easy's discount items help a lot.
I grocery shop five times every two weeks. Costco every payday for meat, eggs, and to restock my bulk purchase. Then I sit down and plan out at least 10 meals from my costco shop. Dinner that day will be rotisserie chicken or fish. Then twice a week I do a fill in shop from Aldi’s, Marc’s, or a local grocer, depending on how sales look. I fill in what I need for my menu, buy any reduced meats, and in season fresh produce. I spend $800 a month for a family of six, including diapers, laundry, and cleaning supplies. When the budget presses, I can cut this to $600 a month by forgoing bulk buying, though not for long.
There is a fairly new Aldi about five minutes from us, but we usually pass it by, on our way to Kroger, Walmart Supercenter, or Food City. The Aldi just doesn’t seem to have as great a price advantage as I thought they would.
We watch for when we can combine coupons with sales, and generally knock about 30-40% off our grocery bill.
A few tomato plants are coming along nicely, and this time of year is great for taking advantage of farmers market produce.
I almost forgot this tip. For old folks (like me), check to see if one of your grocery chains offers a senior discount. Our Kroger gives 5% on Wednesday. Needless to say, we are there on Wednesday. Every little bit helps.
Even I am an old folk, I don’t think they’ll believe me. :)
For the past 25 years I have sat down with the Sunday sale papers and plotted out the grocery shopping around what is on sale. I always try to buy meat as it is on sale and stock up on it then.When I find coupons worth using I use them when the items are on sale but many times they are only offered on convience items and junk food which I generally don’t buy.
For starters, cut out all prepared food. We also buy a minimal amount of meat, since only my husband still eats it.
I’ve found that stir fry is great...because you can basically dump everything that’s left over into the wok.
Trader Joes sells frozen fruits/ pineapple and berries for half the price of the supermarkets. That’s our big splurge...cause we throw it into a bullet blender and make yummmy deserts that taste like fresh served sorbet with no added sugar.
Do I?
How about when I can't and have to pay full price for something, I get the DT's.....
Does Ralph’s still double coupons? And up to how much? There was also one store in the L.A. area that used to TRIPLE coupons once or twice a year.
You don't need to even do that now. Just check out the online coupon forums and they figure this all out for you...often days in advance of the actual sale. Check out HotCouponWorld.Com.
Way too much. She should be able to do it for no more than $50.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.