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I am in total shock.... - Page 2  

post #21 of 37
Quote:
Originally Posted by josybear View Post
we eat seasonally. it's winter, so we have a lot of soups. chili or minestrone or potato soup... they're ubercheap and very healthy. we usually have apples, but we use them sparingly and don't buy much else by way of fruit. if we get fresh veg it's usually broccoli. otherwise it's frozen veg and canned tomatoes and all the produce i froze and canned last winter.
i have a few very affordable recipes on my blog, just click the smilie in my siggy and select 'recipes' from the right-hand menu, partway down the page.
Its cheaper (here anyway) to buy a 6 pack of applesauce- or a large jar, Then a bag of apples. It keeps longer too when you buy it in sauce.
post #22 of 37
Bunnyslippers,
I love the quote in your siggy. Who said it?
post #23 of 37
I don't necessarily agree with those who said "it's not hard" - it depends on a lot of factors, such as your location and also your current lifestyle and household planning experience.

I would hate for someone to come here and ask a very good question to help their family and feel bad being told that what's difficult for them is easy for others.

In my experience, it's a process, and no single answers. A PP had a very nice list of techniques to eat healthy at lower costs. I'm not sure if I missed it, but while I saw visiting farmers' markets on there, I didn't see joining a CSA.

In my town, produce (and food overall) is very expensive. As near as I can figure, getting fresh, local and totally organic food from my CSA costs the same or less than conventional produce at the store. In some areas it will cost more. In some it will cost a lot less.

Here's an idea for a winter meal if you'd like to try it. I'd pair this with some warm bread out of the oven. The ingredients are cheap in winter.

"See in the dark" carrot soup (so named because it's rich in beta carotene)

About 5 carrots, peeled and sliced
About 4-5 fist-sized potatoes, peeled and sliced (or cubed)
1 medium onion, sliced
1 tablespoon butter (margerine ok)
About 6 cups of milk
1/2 or 1 teaspoon salt (to taste)
1 teaspoon caraway seed (or another spice if you prefer)

1) In a large sauce pan, heat the butter on medium heat

2) Add sliced onion and sautee until just soft. Add caraway seed a minute after starting the onions.

3) Add milk, potatoes and carrots. I personally like to take a bit of the milk and run the carrots through the vitamix (or blender) to puree them.

4) Bring to a boil (on medium heat), and cook until the potatoes are soft, about 15 or 20 minutes.
post #24 of 37
Also, I think it's more important to eat a bigger variety and quantity of fruit and vegetables, than to eat the very best ones. So if saving money by using canned and frozen ones means you eat more, that's better than eating fewer fresh ones. KWIM?
post #25 of 37
These are things that I've found to help lower our grocery bill:

Join a CSA. Here they run year-round, but I know that's not the norm in colder areas. If you can't find a year-round one, then join one (or choose the size) that gives you more than you can eat, if possible, and freeze/can/dry/preserve the extra for the colder months. I went from spending $50-80/wk on organic produce at the farmer's market to $30 by joining a CSA. In exchange for that savings I get no say in what's in the box, but it was worth that trade-off to me. At this time of year, the "in season" produce I'm getting from the CSA is apples, pears and citrus. Cabbage and all it's relatives, leeks, winter squash, potatoes and greens. If you can stick to buying those items fresh until the weather warms up, and buying anything else frozen or canned, that may also help with your budget. Shopping seasonal may not be as much fun or as much variety, but it's much easier on the pocketbook.

You say you don't buy meat, but even just using meat, use less. Look for recipes that use meat as a flavor (like curries, stir-frys, casseroles, etc.) instead of the center of the meal (like a steak or a roast). If you're buying meat, buy larger cuts of meat and cut them up yourself, either raw or cooked, and make them stretch. We're learning to stretch meat by mixing it with lentils here. In some cases I've replaced it entirely by lentils... but I have to remember to add fat when I do that or it's not as filling.

Know your price points. Most people do this by keeping a notebook. Write down everything you buy regularly and then write down how much that item costs at each store (regular price, not sale price). That will tell you which store(s) you should be shopping at.

Buy in bulk. Whether that means finding a store with a good bulk selection to buy 5# at a time, or if it means joining a co-op to buy 25# at a time. I did my bulk shopping the other day and spent $75 to get enough grain product (oats, rice, porridge, etc.) and legumes (beans, lentils) to last for several months... I'm shooting for 6.

Now, doing the above (joining a CSA and buying in bulk) only left me with 3 other food expenditures to worry about weekly... milk, eggs and meat. I go shopping weekly to buy those 3 things, as needed. Because I buy each one from a different place, it's actually easier on me... I know I'm "here" for 1 thing, so only 1 thing goes in my bag. That's really cut down on my impulse buys.

Non-food items do not get purchased at the grocery store. That's what Target is for (or the drug store, or whatever). Unless they're on sale/special, non-food items are usually more expensive at the grocery store than at the drug store. We make periodic trips to Target (I shoot for 2x/year), where we buy laundry soap, toilet paper, paper towels (before we switched to cloth), shampoo, shaving cream, soap, etc. And going less often means we also save because I'm already stressing about how much I'm going to spend, I'm not thinking about impulse buys (that sounds silly, but it works for me).

Another thing you can do is sit down with a spreadsheet program and type up your receipts. Item, number, amount spent and category (i.e. produce, canned, dairy, eggs, convenience items, household items, etc.). Sort by category and you can see how much you're spending on each one. Then you can try reassessing whether or not that's a reasonable amount to spend on that one category. Like if you're spending $50 on convenience items, but if you were to make them yourself you could spend $5 on ingredients. Or if you're spending $100 on produce, then maybe you really don't need to buy grapes from Chile, etc.

HTH
post #26 of 37
I totally understand where you are coming from. My husband never manages to really understand how much food costs.

In winter we eat a lot of root vegetables, turnip, cabbage, parsnip, carrots.

Plan your meals for the week. I don't plan breakfast but I do plan for lunch, supper, snacks and my husbands bag lunches.

Use a cost book. It takes some time to get used to but it will save you money, especially if you have room to buy ahead.

Plant a little garden if you can in the summer. Concentrate your energy on the most expensive things.

I use powdered milk for baking and cooking, and for drinking I mix it in equal parts with fluid milk. I wonder a bit about the whole drying process, but the cost savings are substantial.
post #27 of 37
I'm not disagreeing with Cristeen as far as CSAs - we love ours - but, even in some colder climates (we're in Pittsburgh, PA), some CSAs do run year round, or nearly year round. Ours stores hardy veggies in a cooler, and has a small greenhouse, and offers optional "winter veggie boxes" every few weeks until the veggies run out...they've occassionally had them all winter long. Definitely worth looking into.

Learning to can/preserve can be worth it. The initial expenditure might be a bit expensive, especially if you're canning veggies/meat (really need a pressure canner for that), but, you can keep tons of veggies/meat like that, so, if you buy them when prices are low, you're sure to have a supply through the winter. And, like other things, this is a process. I concentrated on a few specific items this year, and will add a few more next year. In lieu of that, buying normally pricey items in season, or picking them yourself (such as berries), and then freezing them yourself is a good way to keep costs down.

Start a stockpile. Make a list of what you regularly eat/cook with, and then purchase extras when those items are on sale. If you use canned tomatoes (or whatever), buy a few extra when they're on sale. This saves in a few ways - one, you've bought them at a lower price to begin with. Two - you have the items on hand, so you won't need to run out to pick them up, saving you gas, time, and money. Shop from your pantry first, so to speak, when planning your meals.

Pick one convenience item each week or two, and learn to make it yourself. Say, frozen pancakes or waffles (or whatever). Cook a batch up at home from scratch, IQF them, toss in freezer. Pop in toaster like "premade" ones. It really doesn't take that long...I can make up 2 dozen whole wheat pancakes in about half an hour on the weekend, and I control the ingredients, so I know it's healthy.
post #28 of 37
Quote:
Originally Posted by chiromamma View Post
Bunnyslippers,
I love the quote in your siggy. Who said it?
Thanks, there is more to it. Ill have to find the paragraph and the author. I copied it down in case anyone ever asked

The quote starts off with 'Those who are eager for thier children to display thier intellectual abilities' then I think it brings in the part of the quote that is in my sig.
Anyway, Ill dig it out and post it. I found it very inspiring and positive. It helps me breath when I feel like I am not keeping up with the Jones'.
post #29 of 37
Quote:
Originally Posted by BunnySlippers View Post
Thanks, there is more to it. Ill have to find the paragraph and the author. I copied it down in case anyone ever asked

The quote starts off with 'Those who are eager for thier children to display thier intellectual abilities' then I think it brings in the part of the quote that is in my sig.
Anyway, Ill dig it out and post it. I found it very inspiring and positive. It helps me breath when I feel like I am not keeping up with the Jones'.

Its from the Oak Meadow kindy intro thingy
post #30 of 37
CSA is only worth it if your family is not picky. We loved our CSA but we did waste a lot of veggies. Not everything can be preserved. In my family nobody eats any lettuce or salad mix, and we were getting about two heads every week.

Almost every grocery store here has online flyers. I check every week before shopping and make up a list. Sometimes you can print out some coupons. Here are a couple links to the big ones. Many stores, even the ethnic shops, bakery, meat shops, and small organic markets have online flyer. Check the ones you go to often for deals.

www.superstore.ca
www.saveonfoods.com
post #31 of 37
Quote:
Originally Posted by Poddi View Post
CSA is only worth it if your family is not picky.
There are a variety of things that could make a CSA not worth it to a particular family, and that's definitely one of them. You also have to understand about eating seasonally, and not expect asparagus year-round.

BUT some CSA's let you choose your produce (the two CSA's local to us do). I know that's not true everywhere - but I just wanted to say it was worth it to check out at least, even if you don't think your family is going to be into turnips and rutabaga.

One local CSA gives you a bag every week and you just fill it up.
The other one has defined certain amounts of food - such as a head of lettuce, a half dozen eggs, 2 medium eggplants, etc - as a "unit" and depending on the size share you bought, you choose 5, 10 or 15 units for your weekly share.
But on the other hand, my friends living in NYC got their share mailed to them, and they had zero say in it.
So there are different ways of doing it. Always worth it to check out, anyway.
post #32 of 37
Quote:
Originally Posted by laohaire View Post
BUT some CSA's let you choose your produce (the two CSA's local to us do). I know that's not true everywhere - but I just wanted to say it was worth it to check out at least, even if you don't think your family is going to be into turnips and rutabaga.

.
Yep. Our CSA allows you to put a short list of items you don't like, along with a list of items you prefer, and, if you don't like, say, beets, they'll give you extra potatoes or squash or whatever that week. Plus, ours offers large sizes of certain items during the season, like, 1/2 bushels of beets, apples, tomatoes, etc. Ours will even let you get a refund if there's a week you're out of town (as long as you tell them about a week ahead of time).

You do really have to check the CSAs out, though, and find out the policy.
Localharvest has reviews of the different CSAs and whatnot.
post #33 of 37
Quote:
Originally Posted by laohaire View Post
BUT some CSA's let you choose your produce (the two CSA's local to us do). I know that's not true everywhere - but I just wanted to say it was worth it to check out at least, even if you don't think your family is going to be into turnips and rutabaga.
Quote:
Originally Posted by katheek77 View Post
Yep. Our CSA allows you to put a short list of items you don't like, along with a list of items you prefer, and, if you don't like, say, beets, they'll give you extra potatoes or squash or whatever that week. Plus, ours offers large sizes of certain items during the season, like, 1/2 bushels of beets, apples, tomatoes, etc. Ours will even let you get a refund if there's a week you're out of town (as long as you tell them about a week ahead of time).
:

Our CSA gives you the option of choosing not to receive certain things. For us, that was turnips and rutabagas. Instead they'll sub in whatever else they have on hand. Since I don't care what else I get so long as I don't get those, that's fine with me.

They also have the option of you calling up a few days in advance and adding to your order. Like right now Meyer Lemons are in season (coming to an end), and I'm debating calling up and ordering a box of them with my delivery this week. So if you're planning a get-together and want something in particular (that they have on their list of available produce), you just give them a couple days notice and they add it to your delivery. Which is a great option if you're going to be canning.
post #34 of 37
Meal planning, and buying strictly what's on my list helps. Plan meals around what you already have in your kitchen. I usually spend about $150 for our family of 4 on groceries per month. Don't be pre-made or boxed foods. Buy in bulk. Make extra for leftovers (and eat the leftovers!)
post #35 of 37
Quote:
Originally Posted by unlegal View Post
Meal planning, and buying strictly what's on my list helps. Plan meals around what you already have in your kitchen. I usually spend about $150 for our family of 4 on groceries per month. Don't be pre-made or boxed foods. Buy in bulk. Make extra for leftovers (and eat the leftovers!)
This helps me a lot. Planning for leftovers and then EATING those leftovers (instead of throwing away what was once perfectly good food ) saves me a lot of money, esp. since it's just me and the DH, so any recipe really will feed us at least twice.

I second everybody's suggestions of "the cheaper produce!", frozen veggies, etc.

Good luck!

P.S. It could be worse, at least you didn't spend one MONTH's pay in TWO WEEKS, which is how I first read your post!
post #36 of 37
Quote:
Originally Posted by unlegal View Post
Meal planning, and buying strictly what's on my list helps. Plan meals around what you already have in your kitchen. I usually spend about $150 for our family of 4 on groceries per month. Don't be pre-made or boxed foods. Buy in bulk. Make extra for leftovers (and eat the leftovers!)
150 per month???

I'm not worthy
Details please!
post #37 of 37
Sales and coupons. Today one of our local stores had a good sale with lots of fruits and veggies on sale. I bought a bunch of celery for $.90, salad for $.90/bag, blueberries for $.90 for the little container (blackberries were $.90 also but they were out), carrots were $.90 for a 1lb bag of the baby ones (ds likes these), bananas $.59/lb, grapes $1.29/lb, green peppers for $.50/each (for big ones), frozen veggies I got really really cheap and even free for a couple bags with coupons combined with sales at a store that also doubles coupons up to $.50.

It can be done
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