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Learn to love the cheaper cuts of meat and learn how to cook them so they become tender.
Add more sides so the most expensive part (meat) doesn't have to be a big portion.
Stretch how one egg can fill you by making an omelet with it. I just usually do just plain cheese omelet.
Cassoroles are another...lasts for a few nights.
I make my own biscuits now....2 ingredients (heavy cream + self rising flower). Took a few tries but I can make just enough biscuits to last a day...good for lunch sandwiches or just to munch on.
I don't have alot of vises = maybe a good cigar once in a while - maybe a beer every couple months, no hard liquor so i'll be damned if i am going to use some off brand mayo ( BEST FOOD ONLY ) or cut back on the main thing that i enjoy almost every day.
Yea it pisses me off to buy a 16 buck steak but most of the time i can cut in half and share with wife. I am too old to give a crap and kids know i all die happy eating there inheritance away on streak and seafood.
Good thing we like beans at our house! I'm preparing them many different ways.
Animal products--beef, pork, chicken, etc. just too pricey for our budget most of the time. Even the old standby--eggs--are no bargain any more.
Dug out an old classic cookbook from Moosewoood and am trying out some of their vegetarian recipes. The bbq'd beans with a side green salad was a hit. Next up will make their 3 bean gumbo.
We had green pea/lentil/barley soup for lunch today. My own recipe. Has carrot, onion, celery and garlic included. Filling and nutritious.
Necessity is the Mother of Invention--yes?
I refuse to keep increasing my food budget to keep buying some of the usual foods at these high prices.
Can't say I'm suffering at all...lots of good spices & herbs make most everything delish.
Well, we do the opposite, we don't eat any beans at our house. No fillers like rice or breads either anymore. I cook everything at home, meats, chicken, eggs, vegetables, salads. My husband and I work opposite schedules so I keep the fridge full and usually have something cooking in the crock pot. If I make a turkey breast, we have that for 2-4 meals plus leftovers to put on salads. We've both lost a little weight and aren't hungry, so this is working for our health and our budget.
I almost had a panic attack a few days at the grocery store. I had to walk away from items I usually purchased. For example, paper plates. No way I can afford them now so I will wash my dishes more often. Butter, cheeses, eggs, lunch meat, and many more items have increased so much. A container of presliced lunch meat is $7 to $8 dollars. I was wondering if this keeps up how one survives. I live in town and getting chickens are prohibited. The good thing for us is we have our house paid off. My husband told me to relax and that we will make it and figure out what to do. We use to easily buy $65 a week for groceries and still have food left over. Now we spend $200 or more a week. Being retired this is nuts.
Well, your shopping habits are a lot different from mine, so I have a few suggestions. Of course, you will stop buying disposable dishes, and wash your dishes.
I don’t know how many grocery stores you have nearby, but shop for specials and plan your meals accordingly. I never buy lunch meat or convenience foods. Live on what’s on sale.
I almost had a panic attack a few days at the grocery store. I had to walk away from items I usually purchased. For example, paper plates. No way I can afford them now so I will wash my dishes more often. Butter, cheeses, eggs, lunch meat, and many more items have increased so much. A container of presliced lunch meat is $7 to $8 dollars. I was wondering if this keeps up how one survives. I live in town and getting chickens are prohibited. The good thing for us is we have our house paid off. My husband told me to relax and that we will make it and figure out what to do. We use to easily buy $65 a week for groceries and still have food left over. Now we spend $200 or more a week. Being retired this is nuts.
I spend $300 a month on groceries to feed two seniors and to provide one hot meal daily to two of my elderly neighbors.
If you are retired, you have more time to shop and more time to prepare meals from scratch. That means that you have an hour each week to look at ALL of the circulars in your general vicinity. You can easily find that by downloading the FLIPP app on your phone or accessing the website on your computer. This will give you access to all of the ads.
Every week, there are loss leaders at each supermarket that will allow you to save money.
Butter is $2.49/lb at Krogers locally and there is a $0.60 digital coupon available on the Krogers app.
Cheese (block and shredded) has been on sale at $1.67/lb at either Safeway and Krogers for the past six weeks. Safeway ran an add last week where 2# of cheese was $4.87.
Eggs have been rather expensive. I heard about the avian fli back in September and stocked up at $0.99-1.99/ dozen. Refrigerated eggs can last up to 9 months per US Army standards. Also, you can always crack the eggs into a freezer container and freeze them for even longer. We are still using up the last of the October eggs.
Presliced lunch meat in a deli is a rip-off. Over the Christmas season, Kroger was selling spiral cut hams for $1.29/lb and Safeway for $0.99/lb. I bought two hams, broke them down into 1# packages and froze them. Want roast beef? You can generally get either bottom or top round roasts for $4/lb, roast it, and cut it up for sandwiches. Want turkey? Nearly every grocery was selling whole turkeys for $0.99 or less. The breast meat is ideal for sandwiches.
I would not raise a chicken for meat. I have yet to see anyone who has kept chickens and done the true calculation of the costs to actually come out ahead. My nephew lost $900 last year raising chickens over what he would have spent shopping around.
I could go on for hours about salvage stores, shopping around, gleaning, produce salvage, gardening and the like. However, for everyone who asks me for help reducing their food budget, 90% want lower prices without doing all of the work. And it just does not happen that way.
I learned most of what I have learned about accessing affordable food from an Italian monk with whom I scoured produce warehouses as a broke college students (who fortunately did not have access to student loans) and my MIL who literally faced starvation during the Great Depression. I always thought that her stories were overblown but her older brothers all told me they were understated.
This is what I implemented for free or pennies per day many years ago when we were flat broke
1. 5 cents a day. I used a rock to grind up the flaxseeds myself in a plastic bowl. 5 cents per day and they are major NUTRITIOUS superfoods. They must be ground up
2. Free grass fed cow meat bones from the grocery store butcher. I then boil them down with a few tbsp of Apple Cider Vinegar for my calcium and amino acids. It's helped my Arthritis greatly. I make a huge batch and store in the freezer in Ziplock bags. Sometimes I use them as a Soup base just as you would broth.
3. You'll need Juicer for this but it's free otherwise.
Go to a Mom & Pop health food store and ask for the vegetables they cut off such as Beet Tops. Or Carrot tops, etc They will probably say they give them to someone with chickens, pigs, etc. for free but ENSURE you tell them you will be juicing them for yourself. You feel tired, ill, etc and want to get your greens in a few days a week. You'd be surprised that they will give you enough usually for 2-3 days. PLEASE DO NOT juice these more than 2-3 days as they do contain too many oxalates.
Beet Greens are fantastically healthy- https://www.drlamcoaching.com/blog/t...f-beet-greens/
Carrot Tops nutritional facts- https://www.organicfacts.net/carrot-greens.html
4. Visit multiple food banks. Make sure they are mobile food banks as they usually only ask your zip code in our state and how many people you have. But just in case, make up an address and name if needed. This is clearly if you are pretty desperate for food.
5. I've heard some towns have church soup kitchens
Well he isn’t discussing fasting in his post but I also simply do not believe his prior post that he spent 100.00 a month on food for two(used to be 5)entertainment and providing for elderly folks in the community. A lot of his post are unbelievable or seemly unnecessarily overly exaggerated
Exactly. He once interjected an idiotic statement into a conversation about cooking whole chickens claiming he gets 22 servings out of one chicken. Yeah, maybe if you are making soup to feed little kids or elderly people in a daycare and everybody gets a few scraps of meat in broth with a lot of rice or noodles. That's not frugal, that's straight-up cheap.
But I really think it's more like that kid who is always making faces and jumping around--just somebody looking for attention.
When you add bacon or sausage, toast, potatoes, fruit, orange juice, and coffee x7 it comes to a fair amount of money.
So --
Don't add bacon or sausage (not healthy for you anyway).
Don't add potatoes - they are not healthy for you and have little nutritional value anyway.
Don't add OJ - it is not healthy for you as it is mostly sugar.
Toast is cheap - about 20 cents per slice. Just don't make it white toast, as that is not healthy for you.
Coffee is cheap - It's about 35 cents for a mug of brewed coffee. I roast my own. Friends don't let friends drink Charbucks.
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