organic/healthy on a budget?

"Slow food". It's a term to describe old fashioned home made food. Make it all yourself. There are tons of recipies on the web for whatever you want. It's amazing how much money people spend on junk food (food they didn't even think was junk) but think organic is too expensive. I don't know if you already cook this way, but it has made organic a reality for us.

Also, find buying clubs and coops in your area. I just created a coop and the savings is great. You have to buy in bulk, but we have 7 mom's splitting cases and it has been a great experience.

My local large chain grocery store is stocking more and more organic products. They have their own brand and it's not normally local, but it's organic and it's affordable. Like a large can of organic tomatoes for $1.50 compared to a can half the size from Muer Glen at twice the cost. Tonight we are having home made organic tomato soup with grilled cheese sandwhiches made with organic raw cheese, ds will have organic peanutbutter (no dairy). The whole meal will cost me about $6 for a family of 5 and it's all organic.

Think simple suppers too. This is hard for me. Simple soups, sandwhiches, quasadilla's and so on. Save the big meal for Sunday supper. Plan ahead so you know where your budget lies and then maybe you can splurge on that special treat.

Hi all

I am a stay at home mom too, and while dh makes a really good wage, things have been really tough the past month (can we say new tranny in our Jeep--OUCH!!! plus, we had some other unplanned expences) so we are back to 'cheap eats' ok.... inexpensive. I picked up the NT book and I made the roman lentil soup that was well received--with requests for more! It says it serves 8, but our family of 3(4 when dss is here) had 3 dinners and I had a couple lunches out of it--filled my huge pyrex bowl. We had it with bread and butter for dinners and I had it with liverwurst sandwiches for lunch (yumm!!) Sooooo since $$$ is tight (1 have less then 100 to shop on for 2 weeks, and I want to try and keep it around 60-70 for emergency cash) I am doing dry bean soups. I am making the lentil soup probably 3 times (once with curry to change it up), a pea soup made with frozen peas, mushroom soup, black bean soup and I am going to make a round of chicken stock from wings. I have been wanting to get back to baking my own bread too, so this will be a great time to get back at it... I am thinking about picking up some sausages (not breakfast!) for meat for a couple of nights, to have with the soups. Unfortunatly, when money gets tight, meat is the first thing to go. DH had times of extreme poverty when he was growing up (at times, living in a tent with his mom on federal forest land), so soups don't bother him.

ok... so I rambled on about my menu for the next 2 weeks or so--but like others have said, base your menus around soups, oatmeal/whole grain for breakfasts, eggs for protien, check out the farmers markets, plan out your menus. I plan about 2.5 weeks of menus at a time.