We had no money for groceries once and had very little food. I cleaned the fridge out praising the Lord for filling it up. The next day a friend called my husband and asked if he wanted to go get a bear carcass on the back side of Snowy Mountain. A Hunter killed it the day before, skinned it and left the carcass. They hiked there which was a long rigorous hike, cut the meat up and packed it out in pack baskets. My fridge was filled with about 30 pounds of bear meat. It siustained our family until we got paid. God is good to me.
I'm currently making (and eating) sweet potato chips from what we harvested a couple days ago. We eat a fancy type of sweet potato from my husband's country that are expensive to buy here in the US. So, I bought some, sprouted them, popped them in the ground this year with the goal of growing 60lbs of them. We have only harvested half and it came to 74lbs. These things cost about $3/lb usually. So I have a ton of sweet potato fries in the freezer, mashed sweet potatoes in the freezer, currently making these sweet potato chips, plus curing as many as possible to eat fresh. I'm two weeks away from having another baby, so I'm excited to have a bunch of ready-made sweet potatoes. So yes, garden!
Absolutely. We sold a large house on a small amount of land and bought a small house on several acers. We planted about 1/2 an acre of fruit trees and an acre of veggies. Using vertical gardening, staggered planting and indoor hydroponics allows me to provide all the vegetables and a good amount of the fruit my family needs all year. We had 250 pea plants this spring and another 250 this fall. We planted sweet potato in buckets because the voles got them in raised beds last year. Its the best thing we have done financially and health wise. It's also tons of fun. And work.
1. Drink water or iced tea (coffee in the morning) - no money spent on sodas. 2. Plan your meals around what is on SALE in the flyers, not what people "want" to eat that week. If you pick up an extra of the sale item and put it in the freezer, pretty soon you'll have enough tucked away that you CAN fix what the family "wants" to eat b/c you'll have a sale pkg in the freezer already. Do the same with canned goods - pick up an extra 5 when they are on sale. Doing a little stockpiling can help you live out of your pantry and freezer when the end of the month comes and you don't have extra money because other unexpected expenses have come up. 3. For items not on sale, shop the lowest cost stores like Aldi, Sams, and Walmart. Unfortunately, Aldi does not list local prices and all specials in their weekly flyers, so you actually have to go IN to the store to get the best deals. Aldi checkers also have the ability to cut the price on a bag of something is one of the items is bruised or bad - just ask. You also have to check volume b/c a lot of Aldi items are smaller and in smaller sizes - good for cash flow, but not necessarily the cheapest overall. 4. A Walmart Plus membership ($100 for the year or $13,99 per month) is well worth it. You can get totally free pick-up any time, free delivery, and prices for Walmart Plus members are sometimes lower online than they are in the store. There are major benefit with Walmart + including lower gas prices and two major TV streaming services for free for movies and programs. 5. Always compare prices. The savings are sometimes remarkable. Again, a Sams membership will have a lot of advantages to save money. Overall, Sams is the lowest in price, but you do have to buy in bulk - but this is a good way to stockpile and rotate through what you use. For example, I plan to buy one large item of paper goods every two weeks, not all of them at one time. I have those, as well as cleaning supplies, on a rotation. Napkins and kleenex this week, paper towels next time, toilet paper the next, etc. 6. Sams, Walmart, Target, and Amazon all price match with each other - do your pricing homework! 7. Don't disregard the Dollar Store which does have many similar items to the grocery store. Their zip loc bags are great and foils are much cheaper. Yes, the aluminum foil is thinner, but do you really need heavy duty that often? Don't forget the cards, party supplies, and gift wrap, too! This keeps you from spending money on stuff that will just end up in the trash. 8. Make your own household cleaners - lots of DIY sites online. I've been making my own laundry detergent for years for a great savings - it costs only about 6 cents a load. (Finely grate 6 ounces of Fels Naptha soap, mix with 2 C Borax and 2 C washing soda (not baking soda) - mix thoroughly and keep in an airtight container. Use 2 tablespoons per load - bottom of a top loader or dispenser tray in a front loader. Vinegar is a great fabric softener and removes extra soap, as well as disinfects - and the slight vinegar small will go away in the dryer or if something is line dried. Both of these can be used in the new H-E machines. Fels Naptha is a great stain remover - rub on the dampened spot and launder. 9. Always cook at home and make two at a time and freeze one for when you are too tired to prepare. 10. Spend some time after shopping doing the time-consuming prep work - chop and store vegetables, chop up a rotisserie chicken, etc. Store in zip loc bags. AND, WATCH YOU TUBE VIDEOS - SO MUCH INFORMATION OUT NOW ON HOW TO SAVE ON GROCERIES, SPECIFICALLY!
All the man hours you spend researching the sales and going to 4 different stores for every week (plus all the gas driving to those places) basically just nullifies going to your most convenient store and getting everything in one place.
@@transistor3115 Maybe for some people and at the beginning. But now I know what items are going to be the best price at which store and I also shop all the prices (except Aldi) at home. All of these stores are extremely close not only to my home, but very close together (Aldi is right across the street from Sams and Walmart.) Because I do pickup at Sams and Walmart, I do a quick shop at Aldi and then do my two pickups and am literally home inside an hour.
I purchased a quantity of my favorite meat usually at about a $1.60 a pound. I spend one afternoon batch cooking all of the meat and putting on end sandwich bags with 1 twisty for about 5 bags.. I get a 5.1% return on my money from BMO.alto savings account
For 1 person I spend about $50 a month on groceries..do not buy ultraprocessed food.. I soak my own navy beans and literally eat beans and rice with some eggs and a Romaine lettuce salad..fresh fruit.. I get bananas for 8 cents each..
Roughly $120K in my portfolio are in tech/TSLA stocks, can I get an advice on any other stocks that I can acquire to diversify my reserve across multiple markets while creating a comprehensive portfolio allocation that balances my concerns of risk aversion and returns that meet yearly inflation...
the strategies are quite rigorous for the regular-Joe. As a matter of fact, they are mostly successfully carried out by pros who have had a great deal of skillset/knowledge to pull such trades off.
True. Having the right financial planner is invaluable. My portfolio is well-matched for every season of the market and recently hit 90% rise from early last year. I and my CFP are working on a 7 figure ballpark goal, though this could take till Q3 2024.
Is there any chance you could recommend who you work with? I've wanted to make this switch for a very long time now, but I've been very hesitant about. I'll appreciate any recommendation.
My CFA Julianne Iwersen-Niemann a renowned figure in her line of work. I recommend researching her credentials further... She has many years of experience and is a valuable resource for anyone looking to navigate the financial market...
I just googled her and I'm really impressed with her credentials; I reached out to her since I need all the assistance I can get. I just scheduled a caII.
@nourishedheiress We do a lot of veggies, lean protiens, and rice or a pasta for a change in pace. To be fair, I do buy frozen veggies to help prevent spoilage sometimes. But we make soups, stir fry, egg dishes, potatoes au gratin, ect
Just a note on ordering groceries online - it's great unless you're wanting fresh produce, at least for me. If I'm buying lettuce or herbs (as I do weekly, because I have a rabbit and guinea pig and greens are a necessary part of their diet), I'm not trusting the store employees to pick the freshest stuff for me. When it comes to produce, even for myself, I need to be the one to choose it.
@@aquarius2 hey, you shouldn't have them if you're not going to give them what they need. I'm currently climbing out of debt, but my debt isn't their fault. The only area of my life where I haven't cut back is on them. Pets are family!
Agreed; I like to pick out my own stuff. I don't like the Instacart shopper habit of dumping my produce into their basket/bin without a produce bag, either. I'm also not fond of having people with no foodhandler's license handling my produce. No requirement to wash hands. I'm happy to do my own shopping though.
My first stop at the grocery store is the clearance bins . At my local IGA store, they have clearance in several ateas of the store and I check them all! Mgrs specials, sales, coupins digital and regular help me save at other stores. Yes, I shop at more than one and as they are close to each other it is worth it to me.
Most people tend to make the same 15 meals. When you look at keeping ingredients for those meals stocked at all times, it makes grocery shopping easier and cheaper. I take the amount budgetted for groceries each week with me in cash, which keeps me from overspending. Since I'm buying the same things all the time I know what they cost in my grocery store (next one is 50+ miles away, and not really cheaper, so I don't have to choose which store to go to). I check out the stores sale flyer online to see if there are any sales items that I want to get. I bring my own grocery bags as the store takes off 5 cents for each bag that they don't need to supply. I write my grocery list into different categories: Out of, Almost Out Of, Sale Items I want. I write amount I have to spend at the top of the list. My town has a dollar tree so I go there first and if they have an "Out of" item I need at the same quality and a lower price (Columbia pasta is a good example) then I buy it there. Then I go to my regular grocery store and shop first for the "out of" items, then the almost out of items, and then if I have enough money left the sales items that I want to get. This way I am just restocking the same items into my pantry, fridge, and freezer to be used as ingredients that I can use to make meals I already know how to make and like to eat. If I run out of one ingredient I don't run to the store to get it, I just make other meals out of the ingredients I have on hand knowing that it won't be too long until the next weekly grocery shop. I sometimes will skip the weekly grocery shop if I feel adequately stocked and instead use my budgetted grocery money to order items online from Target (when their price is the same or cheaper) where my debit red card gives me an additional 5% and free shipping. This lets me have back-ups of items in the pantry. I've reduced my grocery spending by more than half by rethinking my cooking and shopping to follow this format. Before I would get an item because it was on sale and then have to buy more items to be able to use the sale item. Now I just stick to the same 15 meals and get my diversity beyond those meals when I eat with friends or family outside my house. When I have a place to garden I also grow stuff that fits into those meals. Also anything calling for ground beef, pork, or turkey you can use half the amount of meat and replace the other half with beans...buy the beans dry for ~$1/lb and cook up then freeze in 1 cup quantities, then pull out to replace half of your ground meat.
Meal plan once a week based on sales in the flyer. Make a list and only shop once a week. Stock up on staples when they are on sale. I rarely pay full price for staples. Never pay full price for meat.
When I was in college, I used a Kroger card that my mom gave me. I never really thought much about it until I went to shop on a Wednesday, and I got a 5% senior discount! Wednesday became the new grocery day lol.
I have a friend who shops Kroger. She takes cash and gets a Kroger gift card for herself and then shops with the card on the days they have extra fuel points for shopping with cards, so that helps her gas bill. However, I only shop Kroger for the sales - they are a lot more expensive otherwise. Lots of their non-food items can be bought at the Dollar Tree.
@@Trustbutverify2651 I don't really care for Dollar Tree. Either the items are very low quality, or the quantity is so small it's really not a great value. If I was on a tight budget, I'd stick to Aldi and Wal-Mart. But since I have a lot of kids, I now do most of my shopping in bulk at Costco. I do agree that shopping at Kroger you need to prioritize shopping the deals or you end up paying more than at Wal-Mart.
Great…you use a discount that you are not eligible to use…then…pow…the discount is misused and it goes away…I am 72, my mother is 96…we no longer get the Kroger discount…in fact we both still work
@@virginialangford6257 Why so much anger? Young people need the discount. I've been a mother my entire adult life. I became an empty nester the end of last year. I'm still not old enough to qualify for the discount. But now that I'm older, my kids are grown, my mortgage is paid off, and I have lots of savings.....I'll qualify for the discount in about 13 more years. OLD PEOPLE HAVE HAD A LIFETIME TO GET THEIR FINANCES IN ORDER!
The guy who talked about eating the same thing each day is on to something. My absolute biggest hack for both financial savings AND healthy eating is to figure out three or four meals that you like that are healthy and have a low cost per serving. And then just keep eating them on a loop without adding something new or mixing things up. Hot take, but it's people's quest for variety that derails both grocery budgets and diets. Find something healthy and cheap that you like, and then just take the win. You don't need to make it complicated by reinventing the wheel every day.
I use Adli for fruits and veggies and Sam's Club for everything else. I also check weekly sales at Fresh Thyme. Freezing food, drinking tap water, and meal prepping is literally how i got out of debt.
started by meal prepping a 80 breakfast burritos then next payday 80 lunch burritos, then next payday we did 48 breakfast sandwiches and repeated until we had a freezer full. Now we have 2 freezers and have introduced other meals and each pay period we meal prep a dish to eat for breakfast or lunch. its a lot of work but it saves money and allows for a lot of variety of foods. But I now have 2 stand alone freezers as well as the one attached to my fridge lol
@@jacobawojtowicz we do 2 costco packs of tortillas (each costco pack is 2 20 packs). For breakfast we buy 15 doz eggs from the chef store and about 15lbs of chicken (breast or thigh) along with 10-15 potatoes and the costco shredded cheddar bags (2pack). Then we crockpot the chicken, use a huge wok to make scrambled eggs, and cube the potatos and cook them in the oven. Then we assembly line build them. Each one gets wrapped in tin foil and put into a gallon zip lock bag (about 7 per bag) then labeled and stored in the freezer. Heating up we use an air fryer set to 400 for 30 minutes from frozen. I suggest saving about 120 extra for the first couple batches because it is an investment at first but now we only spend 500 on groceries per month and have months of food banked. It also helps with overall health because you control your portions and ingredients. I did this along with getting into working out big and its worked wonders. If you want to know what we do for lunch burritos i can share that too
@jeehill9592 well my reply didn't post I guess. I would love the lunch one please. Probably tomorrow night doin the breakfast ones. What size tortillas? 400 for 30 mins seems large
I have a safeway near me and the last 2 months they had .99 for chicken! Needed to click the coupon on the app, linked to your phone number. I'm feeding a family of 5. This was a huge saver!
Awesome thoughts. Thanks! I have the main thing that I'm cooking become a multitasker. I'll cook a bunch of ground beef for chili. The chili becomes chili spaghetti on day 2 and then chili burritos on day 3. Bulk ground beef for the save. I'm cooking a brisket on the grill this weekend. Chicken breasts go on the grill after I'm done cooking and the grill is still hot. This works great with charcoal. I'll make chicken salads. And then chicken salad. Both kinds. :) Set timers if you need to while you're eating your dinner to remind you when to flip the chicken.
A big bag of Kirkland chicken nuggets is basically the price of a 12 piece nug at Chick-fil-a. We buy Chick Fil A sauce at Walmart and they are virtually indistiguisahble from actually getting nugs at the restaraunt. Out kiddos gobble them up and we eat out less as a result.
"same meal" hack I figured out starting off adulthood - "stir fry" is really really versatile. Keep a pre-cut mix of veggies, some protein and carb options and have some sauces, you end up with like 20 different meals you can make in about 20 minutes. Chicken, tortillas and salsa - bam, fajitas. Eggs, maybe some toast - Omelette. Tofu, rice and basil sauce? Thai stir fry. Beef, pasta and tomato sauce - not sure it's got a name, but it's certainly a meal.
@@Krueger444 I do ground beef with peppers, onions, and sometimes broccoli, served over rice. I just use stuff like Worcestershire, soy sauce, garlic powder, etc. for seasoning. 1.5lb of ground beef, a couple of peppers and an onion make enough food for me for usually four or five meals with rice. Rice is cheap AF ($5 for 5lb at Walmart) and you can usually find ground beef reduced if you look. It's one of my staples. You can also do ground turkey or chicken, or chicken breast or thighs cut into pieces. Pan meals are great, economical, and usually easy to clean up after.
I call these my garbage disposal meals lol I throw in whatever veggies I have to use up and some kind of protein and voila Tonight’s meal was ground beef, scrambled eggs, mushrooms and diced cabbage with salt, pepper, onion, garlic, ginger and soy sauce Delicious!
Look closely at your main grocery store’s weekly flier. See what’s on sale, and meal plan around the best deals. A little investment in time can really pay off, but it does benefit you to have a good sense of what normal pricing is and what is a good deal. Last week, I watched my grand total ~$137 tumble down to ~$81 after sales and coupons were figured in. I probably spent about 90 minutes to save almost $60.
“Shop your home,” meaning plan meals around the food you already purchased, including food your purchased at a discount to save money. Freezer meals! Not the premade ones, but the ones you make yourself. Grab some freezer storage bags, look up tutorials/grocery lists online, and make your own. You can freeze 4 or more servings together for family meals, or individual servings for singles/couples or to have ready to take for lunch. Get all the cooking out of the way at once at eat several times.
This is a must for me! I shop weekly grocery flyers and know prices in my area ( Central California). I rotate daily pantry, back up pantry, and stocked freezer to meal plan
I want clip of the last bit George said so I can share just that bit. I know inflation is real, but I hear so much complaining about how expensive groceries and gas are...just budget and make more strategic choices. Not all the time is this true for everyone...but there are ways to survive the inflation and even save!
One thing you can do, regarding fruits, is buy ones that are smoothie-friendly (berries, nectarines, etc.), because you can freeze them when they're a little past when you'd want them fresh out of the fruit drawer, and then pull them out of the freezer for a smoothie anytime. If you aren't particular about the fruits you use in smoothies, you can expand beyond the normally smoothie-friendly types too (though I have found pears and apples often ruin the flavor).
The "online order & pick-up" has some pitfalls. I don't trust some stranger selecting my fresh produce & fresh meat. Also, if they are out of an item you want, you may well not get the substitute item you want.
I recommend shopping around. Don’t set yourself to one grocery store. We keep kosher so there are much less expensive places to buy meat than large grocery stores. Also produce stores tend to sell vegetables much lower than the standard grocery store. Also buying generics really does help especially on staples (think, marinara sauce, spaghetti, rice, bread, etc.
Sale prices at the more expensive stores can be lower than the 'cheap' store so keep an open mind. Be sure to account for your time and gas when assessing if it's worth the trip or not.
You actually spend on average 19% more using cards instead of cash. Cash back is a game they're hoping you'll play. They're making billions off of people.
In AZ, we have a company called Borderlands produce rescue. They rescue produce that is going to get dumped in the landfill. It is good, but it needs eating within a day or so. Local composters and farmers get the stuff that can't be sold for free.
Before I watch the video I want to share what I do: 1. I always try to buy fresh and/or close products. Buying a good product that satisfies and fills you up in the long run tends to save you money. For example, tomatoes are in season right now, so buying them at the local market often costs less and is also tastier. A plate of pasta with tomatoes is very cheap and fills you up and satisfies you. If I want to eat potatoes, I start with raw potatoes and cook them myself. Raw potatoes cost much less per kilo than bags of chips from the supermarket, they are much tastier and fill you up much more. In short, always start from the simplest raw materials... it may happen that they are even more expensive than ready-made products, but generally the cost per kg is lower and, even when it is not, generally you still save in satisfaction and when you are satisfied you tend to consume less. Over the years I have stopped buying snacks, cereals and even sweet cocoa like Nesquik (I admit I make the latter at home). The idea is to always try to get the most fresh and most recognizable products. Ultra-processed foods are often full of fat and sugar which leads to imbalances and health problems in addition to not adequately satisfying hunger. It's not lik eI've stopped eating snacks altogether, but I usually make them at home, so I still have to put in a bit of effort (which leads me to eat them less often and enjoy them more), plus I control what I put in them and the cost per kg is often lower anyway. 2. It is essential to have an idea of what you want to do with fresh products during the week. Buying to then freeze or, even worse, to then let it go bad and throw it away is a waste. Two things are essential to understand: you don't have to buy a product even if it is on sale. You don't have to buy a product to put it aside for a long time (with some exceptions, for example I make tomato sauce in the summer and consume it during the winter... a seasonal product that you know you will consume is fine to freeze). The other thing is you don't have to have everything in your pantry. If you miss an ingredient you can still make a dish without it or replacing it with something similar. 3. I try not to save too much money on food. The budget is intentionally slightly higher than the standard because eating badly is bad for both your mood and your health. In the end, however, by adopting these simple guidelines I have still reduced my spending a lot. Because always starting from food in its simplest form means that I still have to put in the effort to cook it (which leads me to evaluate well what I want to eat) and to often pay much less (even in an inflationary phase the simpler a food is the less it increases in price, because those who make derivative products increase prices both for the increase in the price of raw materials and for all the extra work). But my 3rd point still stands... I would rather spend a little bit more on a good pasta brand or a good steak that I enjoy rather than on anything else... because spending money on good food make my life easier. And if a steak is really too expensive, there are cheap pieces of meat that simply need to be cooked for a few hours to dissolve the connective tissue... the result will be very tender meat that cost much less than a steak but is still delicious. But let's also take an example: today I ate some excellent voiello bronze-drawn pasta with pieces of buffalo mozzarella, some very sweet cherry tomatoes and a drop of extra virgin olive oil. I could have saved money by buying low-quality pasta, normal mozzarella and using generic oil... but I would have enjoyed the dish much less and the savings would have been minimal, not being satisfied then I would have maybe eaten an extra snack and the savings would have been zero or even negative, but I could have worsened my health. That's the reason you want to avoid saving too much money on food, but still try to get the most basic ingredients.
GREAT IDEAS. GOD GGAVE US WHA WE NEED TO SURVIVE, MOST WHOLE FOODS ARE RIGHT OUT OF THHE GROUUND OR OFF A TREE. WE DO NIOT NEED ASTEAK EVERYDAY, IT BAD FOR HEART. STEAK CAN BE A TREAT, FISH AND CHICKEN AND PORK CHOPS ARE LEANER SOURCES OF PROTEIN, BEANS ARE CHEAP ANS GOOD PROTEIN.
It is hilarious to see these comments that say "We only shop online to spend less money". This is basically the same logic, as saying "We never carry a balance on our credit card, so that we can still have the bonus points." Let me tell you something... I work as a software developer and have done e commerce for the last 10 years. Sorry to disappoint you, but these online shops are designed to make you spend more. Here is the kicker: You might be part of a test group for a new feature, where the grocery store chain tests out how to make you buy faster. They are running these tests all the time. They are constantly optimising the online shop, so that you spend more. Bottom line: Keep shopping online and picking up, but don't fool yourself to be that much smarter than people, whose literal job it is to tempt you into buying stuff you didn't plan for. It is the same story as with credit cards.
Buy whatever beef is on sale and grind it yourself. I can often buy chuck roast and have ground beef for 3.50 per pound and way healthier than the cheap ground beef.
What my wife and me do is we making healthy dinner and what is left over we eat the next day as lunch.. that way we get two healthy meals and we have almost no food wast. Also we use most the tips mentioned already like buying online, we do have delivery as we don’t have a car. We pay the delivery for 3 months as this is giving us discounts. Also make sure to use discounts on foods, don’t buy to many foods that expires fastly and use cashback apps
For meats instead of calculating the price per ounce, I focus on the price per gram of protein. That cheap meat isn't necessarily cheaper if you're eating meat for protein, as most people are.
microwaved potatoes and sour cream + some cheese on toast fills you up and has enough protein to be eaten once a day every day of the week if you have to
If things get bad I’ll go to Jennifer’s house? Nope! A lot if people have this attitude. I teach others how to grow and preserve their own food. Growing indoors and outdoors all year long saves so much money! I have a seedling sale that pays for all the seeds, fertilizers and garden tools so my produce is just the labor. It’s a great anti- depressant, a physical and mental work out every day. You get better quality food. This is a skill you want to learn before you need to depend on it. When we go to war there are ALWAYS food shortages. Growing and preserving food, cooking your own food I are skills that are just plain smart to develop now. The more people in a community who have theses skills, the better off the entire community will be.
Bingo, been growing a bunch of our own veggies for years now and I still have a lot to learn. I'm comfortable enough now that I can grow enough food for my family with potatoes. I have several 8ftx16ft raised beds and many 4ftx8ft raised beds. Time to learn is now, not when things go south.
I'm with you! I'm still trying to get comfortable with pressure canning, though. We filled an acre with fruit trees and veggie beds. We'll finally get to harvest our 2 20-foot Asparagus beds this next season.
I bought a home in the suburbs last year...never had a yard before. I have a garden and greenhouse, this is my second year and I'm still pretty darn lost...feel like I'm following all direction but not really having yield.
The reduced meats is awesome. I’ll make a quick 10-15 min trip to the store, find what is reduced and cook it that night and plan a dinner around it. Kind of like a game and saves money!
Know the prices at your favorite stores. As well, make grocery shopping list and only buy what is on the list...I use an app on my phone, this helps me stay on track
I recently started doing the meal prep companies. I personally like better quality food so doing this cut my expense from 450-500 to 380. That may not seem like a lot but we don’t have to spend hours shopping and cooking, unless we do the meal kit ones which spoils save us an extra $100 (we will do this once we get a little more time). Anything we need to buy one off we go to discount grocery stores like grocery outlet. You can also buy coupons online from companies. You pay like .10 per coupon but save $2 + per item With the meal preps/kits they have crazy new offer bonuses. And when you try to cancel or do cancel the rejoin bonus is even better. Just rotate these
When calculating cost per serving, don’t forget to be realistic about what you (or your family) will actually eat. If you will only drink a half gallon of milk before the expiration, then it isn’t a good deal to buy a full gallon because it’s a slightly lower cost per ounce. This also goes for those items that you (or family) might eat all of, but would be fine with a smaller portion- yeah, family sized bag of tortilla chips, I’m talking about you!
I manage to save when shopping for groceries by going to Costco business Centers and purchasing whole chickens, whole ribeyes, whole strip loins, and whole pork loins and pork butts etc. takes a little more time but my family eats well and saves a lot. I even got to where I make our own homemade smoked bacon and sausage. Last time I made bacon I got it to where the price per pound was around $4.66 instead of $12-15. And I had a little over 9lbs of bacon for roughly $42. Last time we stocked up on chicken we ended up with around 114lbs of chicken for $1.49per pound. And all the scraps and bones we used to make homemade chicken stock which we canned and froze for later. Sometimes just putting in the extra effort goes a long way with saving you a few dollars.
George, that guy eating out may have been joking. However, I was prescreening a home buyer (who had credit challenges) and I was offering up hacks on saving on groceries and she said something along the line of, we don't spend that much on groceries so we're good there. We eat out a lot. 😱 needless to say, they have not become homebuyers last I checked.
Same. To help my adult kids kick the habit, I got an air fryer and the items they would order for the freezer. It is cheaper, and better, to make from scratch, but when they don't want what is made, they can pop it in the air fryer.
@@Twinkie989but what does an air fryer have to do with any of that? An air fryer is just a tiny convection oven. Like a microwave oven is just a tiny oven
I will say this… ive gotten into the habit of buying holiday/seasonal items when they go on clearance after the season ends. It cant be done for everything… like if you want that fall scent from bath and body you just might as well get it now… they never do clearance. But it works great for a TON of holidays… every once in a while ill allow myself to get a full price item mostly because i figure it wont be one of those things that sticks around until clearance… but with a lot of this stuff, you’re better off waiting.
My wife and I spend around $500/month with no eating out except for 6 times/year when her family gets together for lunch at a local restaurant. This last time was $30 including tax and tip but as always compared to our home cooking from scratch eating out is an expensive disappointment. My goal isn't necessarily to spend the least amount on groceries but to make the best meals at a reasonable cost so we shop and stock up on weekly sale items at our small town grocery store, our local butcher and the one supermarket in the city that we drive right past. Everything goes on sale on a roughly 6 week rotation. We prefer buying in-season fruits in quantities we can use before they go bad as it's significantly less expensive than frozen and tastes much better. Take those Chic-filet sandwiches for instance. We buy boneless chicken breasts for $1.99/lb, pound them to a uniform thickness (not super flat), season them with kosher salt, freshly ground black pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, paprika and toss them on the grill. Fresh bakery rolls from our small town grocery store that are baked in-store, lettuce, tomato slices and I'll whip up a batch of dijonnaise. Now, I've never eaten at Chic-filet but I guarantee it's not better than these sandwiches and the chicken is great in wraps as well. Why copy cat when you can do much better. Sunday nights we rotate between a whole chicken (99 cents/lb), beef roast ($3.99-$4.99/lb), another whole chicken and a pork loin roast ($2.49/lb) with baked potatoes that cook along with the meat and frozen veggies. It's meant to be an easy but delicious Sunday dinner with Monday night leftovers and sandwich meat for several days. We'll mix in a bone-in half ham for 99 cents/lb and whole turkeys for the same low price when they go on sale too. During the pandemic after watching a PBS special on supper clubs I decided to come up with "Supper Club Dining at Home". I was already making NY strip steaks and bone-in pork chops from our local butcher once per month each so these were a natural to expand on. Starting at 4pm I go into the kitchen to make the relish tray (no restaurant can beat it), salads and salad dressing from scratch which we then leisurely enjoy until around 5:30pm. I found a fantastic UA-cam video of classical music with a slide show of European art, architecture and nature which is fantastic to have on low in the background. I head back into the kitchen to make the main course with a sauteed mushroom and onion pan sauce and a nicer side like popovers, twice baked potatoes or hash browns, etc. By the time we're all done we're well fed and super-duper relaxed...far surpassing even the best supper club or finest restaurant and no drive home! I also expanded my made from scratch pizza that's better than any pizzeria around into a "Friday Pizza and Movie Night". I put on the 80's music videos while I make the dough and while it's rising I cut up the veggies, saute the Italian sausage and onions, mushrooms then make the sauce and grate the mozzarella and finally make the pizza/s. While they're baking it's a cartoon short from the 1930's and while we eat the pizza I start the main feature. About halfway through I stop the movie for an intermission when it's back to the 80's music videos while I make popcorn or kettle corn from scratch on the stove top to munch on while we finish the movie. It's WAAAYYYY better than going out for pizza and a movie which was a staple for us way back when it was a lot cheaper, lol. Then there's "Soda Shop Desserts", with shakes, sundaes with made from scratch sauces and sodas with home made syrups. I found another UA-cam video with 50's music and a slideshow of 50's cars, soda shops and other 50's pics. We even have vintage glassware that we bought at various garage sales a decade ago when the generation that had them were downsizing. We like Breyer's ice cream which is frequently on sale for $2.49-$3.49...a few months ago we even score some for $1.99! So many ways to save...why buy 1.55oz Hershey bars at $1-$4 each when semi-sweet chocolate chips go on sale for $1.99/12oz bag, taste better, have almost 4 times the cacao and are roughly the equivalent to 8 Hershey bars that would be $8-$32 depending on where you buy them. These days I prefer having an ounce rather than 1.5oz so they go even further. Skip the convenience foods, things that are bad for you like soda, juices, store bought treats with bad sweeteners/fats and baked dessert goods, etc and you'll save big while getting to skip most of the store and shopping quicker. Obviously I can go on and on but you get the idea.... Cheers!
My husband and I also spend closer to 650 a month on food and we are not extravagant shoppers. We try to buy organic vegetables when we can and limit the amount of meat. I don’t know how people can do it for less than 500 a month. We always buy organic chicken and try to go for grass fed beef when we want beef. My husband is 70 and I’m 63 so we’re trying to do what we can just stay healthy!
@@barbaramulligan8161 It's important to check which vegetables are most important to eat "organic" rather than non-organic. Some are not - so do the research online. In addition, most people are unaware that a product has to be labeled 100% organic to actually be organic. If not, anyone can use that label. Truly organic vegetables are generally much smaller than ones not organically grown. If you have an Aldi, they have great sales every few weeks on grassfed beef at $3.49 a pound - you can't beat that price anywhere, so when they do, we stock up. Aldi has a limited selection, but also focuses on organic and gluten free for a lot less money. The best way to cut down on groceries is to search the weekly stores for the "loss leaders" and BOGO sales and stockpile (NOT prepping) on what is a really good buy. That's really the only way to save significant money. The best help in terms of staying healthy is to watch your WATER source.
Wow! Where do you live? I haven't seen prices like that in 25 years. I cook from scratch, no manufactured prepackaged foodstuffs. Tried for years to have a decent garden. Far too hot and 100+ for months on end, so I stopped and found a mom and pop produce and dirt cheap. I can grow herbs and a great way to add flavor without calories .
I write a grocery list and take a calculator (phone or tablet). I also shop many stores for sales, the cheapest place for specific items and look for marked down items.
4:22 I’m sorry but if someone is making lasagna for $15 and it’s feeding 4 people “several times”… they’re not making lasagna. They’re making something without meat and cheese. Last time I made lasagna, buying all the ingredients, it cost a touch under $60. This was long before the pandemic/inflation had its hand in the game of price. It was a standard pan, where you can cut it into 8 healthy portions… or 16 tiny portions. Lasagna is not cheap to make… at all.
I make lasagna for less than $15 for a full 13*9 pan. We use ground turkey instead of beef or lentils and make it stretch with shredded or minced veggies like carrots, zucchini, mushrooms, onions, etc. And instead of ricotta I use cottage cheese. Things can be as expensive as you make them.
@@lillynevers7305 sounds like you’re making a ground turkey casserole, layered in the style of lasagna. Cottage cheese, imho is not a substitute for ricotta. It doesn’t break down and remains curdled doesn’t have the same mouth feel or even close to the same flavor of ricotta. Also, you’re forgetting the fresh parmesan and fresh mozzarella. Both are also in lasagna with the ricotta.
@@Ashkeyjaye2001 Lasagna can absolutely be made for around $15-$20 Ground beef 4.50/lb Ricotta $2.48 15oz Lasagna noodles $4.00 Jar of sauce $2.00 cheaper if you make your own and tastes better! Mozzarella $3.75 16oz Plus Misc seasonings, eggs, any veggies you’re right around $18 ish There’s absolutely much higher quality ingredients you can use other than great value brand, however that’s not the point. Stop being a drama queen and over exaggerating…
Making simple meals it home is always cheaper than restaurants and takes out food. And you know what you are eating. One tip with leftovers. Never have leftover chicken unless you are going to eat it cold. The texture and taste are ruined with reheating. Unless you overcooked it the first time, and then it was all ready ruined. Some people are so worried about food poisoning that they regularly ruin every meal that they cook.
I think there is probably enough water in the chicken for the initial cooking. The first time cooking most likely you cook out most of the water. It will be juicy meat that first time but you won’t have enough water in chicken for any reheating. The ruined texture and taste is because the chicken is dried out from reheating. If there is a way to keep chicken moist during reheating it will probably taste the same as the first time cooking.
Here was my hack when the kids were home before making my grocery list I would write out a week's worth of menu. Then I would make my grocery list accordingly. I never got good enough to include coupons or sale items but I always shopped at the cheaper stores. Unfortunately one of those stores was the Big W and oh my gosh I love Aldi!
I do the opposite from you. I look at the sales flyers on Wednesday and then plan meals around what is on sale. I don't worry about coupons except digital ones for that week - they save a lot, esp when you can get five items at the sale price.
Why? They are being paid per hour just like everyone else? I'm confused why there is so much tipping for simply doing their job. I don't tip my ups driver and they deliver to my door😂
Nice to see Food 4 Less make the cut. Just last week I picked up a 2.5lb bag of York Peppermint Patties off their clearance rack for $5.94 because they were set to expire...next month! Deal of a lifetime.
Been cooking at home for 15 years and been cooking almost every meal at home since the pandemic. It requires experience, time and effort to learn how to shop and how to cook. You should around how much all your ingredients should cost. Trader Joe's is great for pantry items, frozen food, ready prep meal, SOME veggies and SOME fruits, nuts, eggs, dairy. It's expensive for red meat (no onsite butcher). Aldi's is cheap for most produce and snacks but their meat is garbage tier and they have tons of stuff that is average price (meats etc). Big box grocers like Ralphs have the best tradeoff between quality and price for meats. READ your weekly ads and build your meals around WHATS ON SALE. It may make sense to take a trip to your Latino market or a Middle Eastern market like Super King but you have to know what's on sale and what's a good price. Takes time and experience. Also batch cook your food. No one got time to cook every meal. Also eating the same thing every meal will burn most people out, so people who scream "rice and beans" is not realistic and a bunch of BS nonsense.
@@pamsmith1665 Yet you are filling up your time watching UA-cam videos and commenting... Keep that mindset of "I have no time to learn life skills" mentality. You can take the easy way out in life and continue be a bystander in life and make excuses, or your can make time to learn and grow.
@@inigomontoya4135 you are so obnoxious to assume you know anything about me. Please remind me of what you are being so judgmental about. Because may I remind you, that you gleamed this knowledge from watching UA-cam?
Pretty judgemental about someone you dont know. I retired from a very busy career in the medical field. I dont need to find something to do. I am quite busy caring for my horses. Involved in veterans therapy for veterans and special needs kids on horseback. Also fundraising for animal shelters. I hope you feel foolish because you are...@inigomontoya4135
My grocery hack 1. Grow a garden. Pays for itself if you’re bad at it. Grocery hack 2. If you’re a bread eater bake your own bread, costs less and has less to no preservatives.
I use rebate apps like fetch, receipt pal and Ibotta. I save all of my points/cash back all year and that's our Christmas present fund. I take advantage of sales and clearance items as well. We also at least have a use it up meal per week. Even if everyone one eats something different. I garden and put up what I can.
Not the fun option, but Vegetarian meals made from scratch are extremely cheap. Pasta Primavera can make several meals while costing only around $5 of ingredients.
I hate left overs. I buy exactly what we need. I go to the meat counter and buy 1 chicken breast, 1 salmon. I can make 4 meals for two people with that. It cost me like 15 bucks for use to have protien everyday
My local kroger has ground beef store brand for 8.99 wow i pretty much quit eating beef its brutal out there aldi and sams club bout only place i shop at now
My wife and I budget $600/month on food groceries (does not include household and toiletries). We live in Florida in a very expensive part of Florida. We don't shop at the most expensive grocery stores, and we stay on budget. We buy bulk when possible and keep our meals very simple. It is just wildly expensive here. $6 for 1 pound of ground beef is insane. We used to spend more though and did bring it down from over $800/month when we were shopping at more expensive stores etc. I keep a running tab in my calculator as we are shopping and I add everything up so I know where we are at. That has been the most helpful. We also make bulk meals that will last us for the week to help keep costs down. It's all about what is really valuable to you
When we were broke newlyweds we shopped with a calculator. It wasn't to stay on budget. If $50 was all we had we stopped when the total got close to $50. The shopping list often was left uncompleted.
More of a health tip than a money tip, but stick to the outside of the store. That's where the fresh foods are. The aisles contain all the super processed foods. Obviously there are exceptions, like coffee and condiments, but it's a good general rule to follow. Also, a lot of the best sales tend to be on the end caps.
Make your own bisquick mix you can use much better ingredients (organic flour and real butter) and it’s much cheaper! I got a sourdough starter and make a no knead sandwich bread, just stir the ingredients and let sit overnight
I'm still trying to figure out the difference between Aldi's or Grocery Outlet. Which one better? Do they serve different purposes? Do you guys shop at both? I would greatly appreciate some of y'all's input
Buying in bulk at Sam’s Club and making several different dishes using that item. Having a well stocked pantry before inflation helped us..we did this by using coupons, apps, rewards, gift cards. We also have several raised beds. We can and freeze everything..butter, cheese, cream cheese, sour cream etc. This is how we live easily on one income. Tripling recipes saves you time, money and energy. You clean up once, turn the over on once and use the dishes once..less dish washing!
Look local, our farmers market is sometimes cheaper on produce in bulk seasonally, so we stock up and spend a day with a friend processing. Also local butchers, if you have them are often cheaper to buy from if you're purchasing cuts that are not "fancy" stew meat, ground, roasts, and fat cuts are less than half the cost that they are at the Walmart down the road! And cheaper if you buy a half cow, and discounts for buying 10lb or more
@@PinkieJoJo I have heard and seen that. Our town has 2 Aldi 15 min apart one store is a lot more expensive than the other. Sorry you have to drive 30 min to save money.
Eat less meat, buy the reduced items, comparison shop. Eat at home, don't throw away food. No pop, alcohol, or cigarettes. Drink water or homemade iced or hot tea. Dried beans, rice, pasta. Tina, Al's wife
Bear meat does indeed freeze well. The flavor of your bear meat is actually highly dependent on the season when they are hunted and their diet. Generally, bear meat is described as having a rich, gamey taste, often compared to a combination of beef and pork with a slightly sweet undertone. This sweetness comes from the bear's diet, especially if it feeds on fruits, berries, or grains. Bears that primarily consume fish can have a more pungent, fishy flavor, which may not be as appealing to some. The texture of bear meat is typically dense and somewhat coarse. It is a fatty meat, which can contribute to its moistness when cooked properly, but the fat also has a strong flavor that some people find overpowering. When overcooked, bear meat can become tough and dry, so it requires careful preparation. The best cuts tend to be slow-cooked in stews or braised, which helps break down the meat's natural toughness and enhances its flavor. Bear meat must also be fully cooked to avoid the risk of trichinosis, a parasitic disease.
Publix is generally a more expensive grocery store, but I like the BOGOs on bread, coffee or Duke's mayo. I get the 16 oz jars because they get used up faster than the 30 oz (yup, no longer 32 oz) jars.
I try to make it a challenge to go to the grocery story as little as possible so I use whatever i already have. Also my grocery store has a discount section
I stopped going grocery shopping at Walmart. I've found that ingredients (flour, frozen vegetables, eggs, etc...) are more expensive at my local Walmart than my local grocery store. I had a friend who was so sure that I was wasting money not shopping at Walmart that I made a deal with her to shut her up. She went grocery shopping with me and then we immediately took my receipt to Walmart so she could show me how I was wasting money...every single item I bought was cheaper at my local grocery store. While in my local grocery store she kept pointing out the cost of convenience items being higher than Walmart, but I don't buy those things I buy ingredients. We did the same with her shopping and since she buys things like frozen pizza, frozen burritos, premade salad mixes, etc...her shop was cheaper at Walmart. The items that we were simply ingredients (like eggs and cheese) were more expensive at Walmart. She now gets her convenience foods at Walmart and her ingredients at the local grocery store but keeps track of the prices at each store to ensure she's buying each item at the place giving her the best deal.
Keeping track of sales and sale prices makes a difference. For example, I know that canned black beans are $1.99 each, $1.25 on sale (same price as $tore) so I when I was at Costco and did the math, the case came to $1.09 per can. I know dried beans are cheaper but there is a lot to be said for convenience. This sounds counterintuitive but I buy salad in a bag, salad kits often go on sale for $3 a bag. Yes, it's cheaper to buy all the ingredients and make your own, but for just two people that is a lot of produce waiting to go bad, plus all those bottles of dressing take up space in our little fridge. I often add left over meat to the salad or canned beans and have a very inexpensive meal that's healthy and quick.
We spend a lot more on groceries . $450 dollars was what we spent maybe 5 to 10 years ago. Our groceries bill is over $1,000 a month especially because of inflation. Kids can eat through $450 dollars in one to 2 weeks depending on their age. Baby formula is an arm and a leg these days. A lot of meats are over $4 dollars a pound. In the old days maybe $2.50 to $3.50 a pound for chicken and ground beef.
We had no money for groceries once and had very little food. I cleaned the fridge out praising the Lord for filling it up. The next day a friend called my husband and asked if he wanted to go get a bear carcass on the back side of Snowy Mountain. A Hunter killed it the day before, skinned it and left the carcass. They hiked there which was a long rigorous hike, cut the meat up and packed it out in pack baskets. My fridge was filled with about 30 pounds of bear meat. It siustained our family until we got paid. God is good to me.
I hate killing for sport
Me too. But it fed people who really needed it so
I'm currently making (and eating) sweet potato chips from what we harvested a couple days ago. We eat a fancy type of sweet potato from my husband's country that are expensive to buy here in the US. So, I bought some, sprouted them, popped them in the ground this year with the goal of growing 60lbs of them. We have only harvested half and it came to 74lbs. These things cost about $3/lb usually. So I have a ton of sweet potato fries in the freezer, mashed sweet potatoes in the freezer, currently making these sweet potato chips, plus curing as many as possible to eat fresh. I'm two weeks away from having another baby, so I'm excited to have a bunch of ready-made sweet potatoes. So yes, garden!
Absolutely. We sold a large house on a small amount of land and bought a small house on several acers. We planted about 1/2 an acre of fruit trees and an acre of veggies. Using vertical gardening, staggered planting and indoor hydroponics allows me to provide all the vegetables and a good amount of the fruit my family needs all year. We had 250 pea plants this spring and another 250 this fall. We planted sweet potato in buckets because the voles got them in raised beds last year. Its the best thing we have done financially and health wise. It's also tons of fun. And work.
1. Drink water or iced tea (coffee in the morning) - no money spent on sodas.
2. Plan your meals around what is on SALE in the flyers, not what people "want" to eat that week. If you pick up an extra of the sale item and put it in the freezer, pretty soon you'll have enough tucked away that you CAN fix what the family "wants" to eat b/c you'll have a sale pkg in the freezer already. Do the same with canned goods - pick up an extra 5 when they are on sale. Doing a little stockpiling can help you live out of your pantry and freezer when the end of the month comes and you don't have extra money because other unexpected expenses have come up.
3. For items not on sale, shop the lowest cost stores like Aldi, Sams, and Walmart. Unfortunately, Aldi does not list local prices and all specials in their weekly flyers, so you actually have to go IN to the store to get the best deals. Aldi checkers also have the ability to cut the price on a bag of something is one of the items is bruised or bad - just ask. You also have to check volume b/c a lot of Aldi items are smaller and in smaller sizes - good for cash flow, but not necessarily the cheapest overall.
4. A Walmart Plus membership ($100 for the year or $13,99 per month) is well worth it. You can get totally free pick-up any time, free delivery, and prices for Walmart Plus members are sometimes lower online than they are in the store. There are major benefit with Walmart + including lower gas prices and two major TV streaming services for free for movies and programs.
5. Always compare prices. The savings are sometimes remarkable. Again, a Sams membership will have a lot of advantages to save money. Overall, Sams is the lowest in price, but you do have to buy in bulk - but this is a good way to stockpile and rotate through what you use. For example, I plan to buy one large item of paper goods every two weeks, not all of them at one time. I have those, as well as cleaning supplies, on a rotation. Napkins and kleenex this week, paper towels next time, toilet paper the next, etc.
6. Sams, Walmart, Target, and Amazon all price match with each other - do your pricing homework!
7. Don't disregard the Dollar Store which does have many similar items to the grocery store. Their zip loc bags are great and foils are much cheaper. Yes, the aluminum foil is thinner, but do you really need heavy duty that often? Don't forget the cards, party supplies, and gift wrap, too! This keeps you from spending money on stuff that will just end up in the trash.
8. Make your own household cleaners - lots of DIY sites online. I've been making my own laundry detergent for years for a great savings - it costs only about 6 cents a load. (Finely grate 6 ounces of Fels Naptha soap, mix with 2 C Borax and 2 C washing soda (not baking soda) - mix thoroughly and keep in an airtight container. Use 2 tablespoons per load - bottom of a top loader or dispenser tray in a front loader. Vinegar is a great fabric softener and removes extra soap, as well as disinfects - and the slight vinegar small will go away in the dryer or if something is line dried. Both of these can be used in the new H-E machines. Fels Naptha is a great stain remover - rub on the dampened spot and launder.
9. Always cook at home and make two at a time and freeze one for when you are too tired to prepare.
10. Spend some time after shopping doing the time-consuming prep work - chop and store vegetables, chop up a rotisserie chicken, etc. Store in zip loc bags.
AND, WATCH YOU TUBE VIDEOS - SO MUCH INFORMATION OUT NOW ON HOW TO SAVE ON GROCERIES, SPECIFICALLY!
All the man hours you spend researching the sales and going to 4 different stores for every week (plus all the gas driving to those places) basically just nullifies going to your most convenient store and getting everything in one place.
@@transistor3115 Maybe for some people and at the beginning. But now I know what items are going to be the best price at which store and I also shop all the prices (except Aldi) at home. All of these stores are extremely close not only to my home, but very close together (Aldi is right across the street from Sams and Walmart.) Because I do pickup at Sams and Walmart, I do a quick shop at Aldi and then do my two pickups and am literally home inside an hour.
Google"2 ingredient recipes "..or Google "3 ingredient recipes ".
I purchased a quantity of my favorite meat usually at about a $1.60 a pound. I spend one afternoon batch cooking all of the meat and putting on end sandwich bags with 1 twisty for about 5 bags.. I get a 5.1% return on my money from BMO.alto savings account
For 1 person I spend about $50 a month on groceries..do not buy ultraprocessed food.. I soak my own navy beans and literally eat beans and rice with some eggs and a Romaine lettuce salad..fresh fruit.. I get bananas for 8 cents each..
Do an inventory of what you already have, meal plan around that and fill in the gaps from the store.
Roughly $120K in my portfolio are in tech/TSLA stocks, can I get an advice on any other stocks that I can acquire to diversify my reserve across multiple markets while creating a comprehensive portfolio allocation that balances my concerns of risk aversion and returns that meet yearly inflation...
the strategies are quite rigorous for the regular-Joe. As a matter of fact, they are mostly successfully carried out by pros who have had a great deal of skillset/knowledge to pull such trades off.
True. Having the right financial planner is invaluable. My portfolio is well-matched for every season of the market and recently hit 90% rise from early last year. I and my CFP are working on a 7 figure ballpark goal, though this could take till Q3 2024.
Is there any chance you could recommend who you work with? I've wanted to make this switch for a very long time now, but I've been very hesitant about. I'll appreciate any recommendation.
My CFA Julianne Iwersen-Niemann a renowned figure in her line of work. I recommend researching her credentials further... She has many years of experience and is a valuable resource for anyone looking to navigate the financial market...
I just googled her and I'm really impressed with her credentials; I reached out to her since I need all the assistance I can get. I just scheduled a caII.
Eating simpler helps. We occasionally have a roast but tonight we had potato soup ( garden potatoes) and home made biscuits. Really tasty, easy.
I wish I spent $475 a month!
Exactly. Just for two people, we spend at least double that.
@XennialGuy ... wait really? I have a family of 4 and we do less than $500
Are you in a major city?
@@mariejones7332what kind of meals do you like to make?
@nourishedheiress We do a lot of veggies, lean protiens, and rice or a pasta for a change in pace. To be fair, I do buy frozen veggies to help prevent spoilage sometimes. But we make soups, stir fry, egg dishes, potatoes au gratin, ect
Do you have a large family or something?
I do curbside pick up, and only same items. Staying out of the grocery store stops impulse purchases, equals saving money! 💰
Just a note on ordering groceries online - it's great unless you're wanting fresh produce, at least for me. If I'm buying lettuce or herbs (as I do weekly, because I have a rabbit and guinea pig and greens are a necessary part of their diet), I'm not trusting the store employees to pick the freshest stuff for me. When it comes to produce, even for myself, I need to be the one to choose it.
Thanks for treating your pets well 🙏
@@aquarius2 hey, you shouldn't have them if you're not going to give them what they need. I'm currently climbing out of debt, but my debt isn't their fault. The only area of my life where I haven't cut back is on them. Pets are family!
@@BohoBunMom that’s awesome 🐰 ❤️ good luck on your debt free journey!
@@aquarius2 thank you!
Agreed; I like to pick out my own stuff. I don't like the Instacart shopper habit of dumping my produce into their basket/bin without a produce bag, either. I'm also not fond of having people with no foodhandler's license handling my produce. No requirement to wash hands. I'm happy to do my own shopping though.
My first stop at the grocery store is the clearance bins . At my local IGA store, they have clearance in several ateas of the store and I check them all! Mgrs specials, sales, coupins digital and regular help me save at other stores.
Yes, I shop at more than one and as they are close to each other it is worth it to me.
Most people tend to make the same 15 meals. When you look at keeping ingredients for those meals stocked at all times, it makes grocery shopping easier and cheaper. I take the amount budgetted for groceries each week with me in cash, which keeps me from overspending. Since I'm buying the same things all the time I know what they cost in my grocery store (next one is 50+ miles away, and not really cheaper, so I don't have to choose which store to go to). I check out the stores sale flyer online to see if there are any sales items that I want to get. I bring my own grocery bags as the store takes off 5 cents for each bag that they don't need to supply.
I write my grocery list into different categories: Out of, Almost Out Of, Sale Items I want. I write amount I have to spend at the top of the list. My town has a dollar tree so I go there first and if they have an "Out of" item I need at the same quality and a lower price (Columbia pasta is a good example) then I buy it there. Then I go to my regular grocery store and shop first for the "out of" items, then the almost out of items, and then if I have enough money left the sales items that I want to get.
This way I am just restocking the same items into my pantry, fridge, and freezer to be used as ingredients that I can use to make meals I already know how to make and like to eat. If I run out of one ingredient I don't run to the store to get it, I just make other meals out of the ingredients I have on hand knowing that it won't be too long until the next weekly grocery shop.
I sometimes will skip the weekly grocery shop if I feel adequately stocked and instead use my budgetted grocery money to order items online from Target (when their price is the same or cheaper) where my debit red card gives me an additional 5% and free shipping. This lets me have back-ups of items in the pantry.
I've reduced my grocery spending by more than half by rethinking my cooking and shopping to follow this format. Before I would get an item because it was on sale and then have to buy more items to be able to use the sale item. Now I just stick to the same 15 meals and get my diversity beyond those meals when I eat with friends or family outside my house. When I have a place to garden I also grow stuff that fits into those meals.
Also anything calling for ground beef, pork, or turkey you can use half the amount of meat and replace the other half with beans...buy the beans dry for ~$1/lb and cook up then freeze in 1 cup quantities, then pull out to replace half of your ground meat.
Meal plan once a week based on sales in the flyer. Make a list and only shop once a week. Stock up on staples when they are on sale. I rarely pay full price for staples. Never pay full price for meat.
When I was in college, I used a Kroger card that my mom gave me. I never really thought much about it until I went to shop on a Wednesday, and I got a 5% senior discount! Wednesday became the new grocery day lol.
Good tip.
I have a friend who shops Kroger. She takes cash and gets a Kroger gift card for herself and then shops with the card on the days they have extra fuel points for shopping with cards, so that helps her gas bill. However, I only shop Kroger for the sales - they are a lot more expensive otherwise. Lots of their non-food items can be bought at the Dollar Tree.
@@Trustbutverify2651 I don't really care for Dollar Tree. Either the items are very low quality, or the quantity is so small it's really not a great value. If I was on a tight budget, I'd stick to Aldi and Wal-Mart. But since I have a lot of kids, I now do most of my shopping in bulk at Costco.
I do agree that shopping at Kroger you need to prioritize shopping the deals or you end up paying more than at Wal-Mart.
Great…you use a discount that you are not eligible to use…then…pow…the discount is misused and it goes away…I am 72, my mother is 96…we no longer get the Kroger discount…in fact we both still work
@@virginialangford6257 Why so much anger? Young people need the discount. I've been a mother my entire adult life. I became an empty nester the end of last year. I'm still not old enough to qualify for the discount. But now that I'm older, my kids are grown, my mortgage is paid off, and I have lots of savings.....I'll qualify for the discount in about 13 more years. OLD PEOPLE HAVE HAD A LIFETIME TO GET THEIR FINANCES IN ORDER!
Avocados once ripe will stay fresh in the fridge for at least 2 weeks. I stock up when these are on sale.
Tasty and so good for you.
They don't turn brown?
@@hogue3666 not until the 3 week- 1 month mark
The guy who talked about eating the same thing each day is on to something. My absolute biggest hack for both financial savings AND healthy eating is to figure out three or four meals that you like that are healthy and have a low cost per serving. And then just keep eating them on a loop without adding something new or mixing things up. Hot take, but it's people's quest for variety that derails both grocery budgets and diets. Find something healthy and cheap that you like, and then just take the win. You don't need to make it complicated by reinventing the wheel every day.
YES BUT EVEN DOCTORS WILL TELL US THAT WE NEED DIFFERENT FRUITS/VEGGIES ETC TO HAVE EHALTHY BALANCED DIET.
Beans and rice! You can mix it up with different spices and veggies and get totally different meals even though it’s basically just beans and rice!
My fiancé and I make a lot of refried beans and those go a long way.
Playing house already?
My #3: Make your own yogurts, pickles, sauerkraut and breads.
Make a list. So you aren't throwing stuff out. Meal plan every weekend
I use Adli for fruits and veggies and Sam's Club for everything else. I also check weekly sales at Fresh Thyme. Freezing food, drinking tap water, and meal prepping is literally how i got out of debt.
started by meal prepping a 80 breakfast burritos then next payday 80 lunch burritos, then next payday we did 48 breakfast sandwiches and repeated until we had a freezer full. Now we have 2 freezers and have introduced other meals and each pay period we meal prep a dish to eat for breakfast or lunch. its a lot of work but it saves money and allows for a lot of variety of foods. But I now have 2 stand alone freezers as well as the one attached to my fridge lol
🤯 how do you meal prep EIGHTY burritos. Not sure that would fit in my whole kitchen. How long are they good for?
@@jacobawojtowicz we do 2 costco packs of tortillas (each costco pack is 2 20 packs). For breakfast we buy 15 doz eggs from the chef store and about 15lbs of chicken (breast or thigh) along with 10-15 potatoes and the costco shredded cheddar bags (2pack). Then we crockpot the chicken, use a huge wok to make scrambled eggs, and cube the potatos and cook them in the oven. Then we assembly line build them. Each one gets wrapped in tin foil and put into a gallon zip lock bag (about 7 per bag) then labeled and stored in the freezer. Heating up we use an air fryer set to 400 for 30 minutes from frozen. I suggest saving about 120 extra for the first couple batches because it is an investment at first but now we only spend 500 on groceries per month and have months of food banked. It also helps with overall health because you control your portions and ingredients. I did this along with getting into working out big and its worked wonders. If you want to know what we do for lunch burritos i can share that too
@@jeehill9592 if you don't mind. I'm screenshotting these :)
@jeehill9592 well my reply didn't post I guess. I would love the lunch one please. Probably tomorrow night doin the breakfast ones. What size tortillas? 400 for 30 mins seems large
$5 Costco/Sams Rotisserie chickens are the best grocery budget hack evah!
Ew. Those are full of stuff you don't need. So gross. They smell nasty too
Imagine the life that poor chicken went thru.
Big thing for me, buy foods when they are in season. You can get 6 ears of corn for a dollar
And buy jarred sauce and soup in the fall. It's half off.
No you can't
@@pamsmith1665 weird because I did at Kroger 😅
@@RELPOWER something is weird because that never happened unless you bought field corn which is processed into animal feed.
I have a safeway near me and the last 2 months they had .99 for chicken! Needed to click the coupon on the app, linked to your phone number. I'm feeding a family of 5. This was a huge saver!
Awesome thoughts. Thanks! I have the main thing that I'm cooking become a multitasker. I'll cook a bunch of ground beef for chili. The chili becomes chili spaghetti on day 2 and then chili burritos on day 3. Bulk ground beef for the save.
I'm cooking a brisket on the grill this weekend. Chicken breasts go on the grill after I'm done cooking and the grill is still hot. This works great with charcoal. I'll make chicken salads. And then chicken salad. Both kinds. :) Set timers if you need to while you're eating your dinner to remind you when to flip the chicken.
A big bag of Kirkland chicken nuggets is basically the price of a 12 piece nug at Chick-fil-a. We buy Chick Fil A sauce at Walmart and they are virtually indistiguisahble from actually getting nugs at the restaraunt. Out kiddos gobble them up and we eat out less as a result.
"same meal" hack I figured out starting off adulthood - "stir fry" is really really versatile. Keep a pre-cut mix of veggies, some protein and carb options and have some sauces, you end up with like 20 different meals you can make in about 20 minutes. Chicken, tortillas and salsa - bam, fajitas. Eggs, maybe some toast - Omelette. Tofu, rice and basil sauce? Thai stir fry. Beef, pasta and tomato sauce - not sure it's got a name, but it's certainly a meal.
Yeah, it’s got a name
@@Krueger444 I do ground beef with peppers, onions, and sometimes broccoli, served over rice. I just use stuff like Worcestershire, soy sauce, garlic powder, etc. for seasoning. 1.5lb of ground beef, a couple of peppers and an onion make enough food for me for usually four or five meals with rice. Rice is cheap AF ($5 for 5lb at Walmart) and you can usually find ground beef reduced if you look. It's one of my staples. You can also do ground turkey or chicken, or chicken breast or thighs cut into pieces. Pan meals are great, economical, and usually easy to clean up after.
I call these my garbage disposal meals lol
I throw in whatever veggies I have to use up and some kind of protein and voila
Tonight’s meal was ground beef, scrambled eggs, mushrooms and diced cabbage with salt, pepper, onion, garlic, ginger and soy sauce Delicious!
Look closely at your main grocery store’s weekly flier. See what’s on sale, and meal plan around the best deals. A little investment in time can really pay off, but it does benefit you to have a good sense of what normal pricing is and what is a good deal. Last week, I watched my grand total ~$137 tumble down to ~$81 after sales and coupons were figured in. I probably spent about 90 minutes to save almost $60.
“Shop your home,” meaning plan meals around the food you already purchased, including food your purchased at a discount to save money.
Freezer meals! Not the premade ones, but the ones you make yourself. Grab some freezer storage bags, look up tutorials/grocery lists online, and make your own. You can freeze 4 or more servings together for family meals, or individual servings for singles/couples or to have ready to take for lunch. Get all the cooking out of the way at once at eat several times.
This is a must for me! I shop weekly grocery flyers and know prices in my area ( Central California). I rotate daily pantry, back up pantry, and stocked freezer to meal plan
I want clip of the last bit George said so I can share just that bit. I know inflation is real, but I hear so much complaining about how expensive groceries and gas are...just budget and make more strategic choices. Not all the time is this true for everyone...but there are ways to survive the inflation and even save!
One thing you can do, regarding fruits, is buy ones that are smoothie-friendly (berries, nectarines, etc.), because you can freeze them when they're a little past when you'd want them fresh out of the fruit drawer, and then pull them out of the freezer for a smoothie anytime. If you aren't particular about the fruits you use in smoothies, you can expand beyond the normally smoothie-friendly types too (though I have found pears and apples often ruin the flavor).
The "online order & pick-up" has some pitfalls. I don't trust some stranger selecting my fresh produce & fresh meat. Also, if they are out of an item you want, you may well not get the substitute item you want.
not only do we order online, we also have it delivered... we figured we would spend on gas doing the grocery runs and having it delivered was cheaper.
I recommend shopping around. Don’t set yourself to one grocery store. We keep kosher so there are much less expensive places to buy meat than large grocery stores. Also produce stores tend to sell vegetables much lower than the standard grocery store. Also buying generics really does help especially on staples (think, marinara sauce, spaghetti, rice, bread, etc.
Definitely one of the better George kamel shows!
Sale prices at the more expensive stores can be lower than the 'cheap' store so keep an open mind. Be sure to account for your time and gas when assessing if it's worth the trip or not.
Using my AMEX BCP credit card and getting that 6% cashback is how I am saving some cash alongside discount hunting and coupons.
You actually spend on average 19% more using cards instead of cash. Cash back is a game they're hoping you'll play. They're making billions off of people.
@@mistycharlesehley4544 You gotta eat. Game them back. Pay it off twice a month and rake in the dough.
In AZ, we have a company called Borderlands produce rescue. They rescue produce that is going to get dumped in the landfill. It is good, but it needs eating within a day or so. Local composters and farmers get the stuff that can't be sold for free.
Before I watch the video I want to share what I do:
1. I always try to buy fresh and/or close products. Buying a good product that satisfies and fills you up in the long run tends to save you money.
For example, tomatoes are in season right now, so buying them at the local market often costs less and is also tastier.
A plate of pasta with tomatoes is very cheap and fills you up and satisfies you.
If I want to eat potatoes, I start with raw potatoes and cook them myself. Raw potatoes cost much less per kilo than bags of chips from the supermarket, they are much tastier and fill you up much more.
In short, always start from the simplest raw materials... it may happen that they are even more expensive than ready-made products, but generally the cost per kg is lower and, even when it is not, generally you still save in satisfaction and when you are satisfied you tend to consume less.
Over the years I have stopped buying snacks, cereals and even sweet cocoa like Nesquik (I admit I make the latter at home). The idea is to always try to get the most fresh and most recognizable products. Ultra-processed foods are often full of fat and sugar which leads to imbalances and health problems in addition to not adequately satisfying hunger.
It's not lik eI've stopped eating snacks altogether, but I usually make them at home, so I still have to put in a bit of effort (which leads me to eat them less often and enjoy them more), plus I control what I put in them and the cost per kg is often lower anyway.
2. It is essential to have an idea of what you want to do with fresh products during the week.
Buying to then freeze or, even worse, to then let it go bad and throw it away is a waste.
Two things are essential to understand: you don't have to buy a product even if it is on sale. You don't have to buy a product to put it aside for a long time (with some exceptions, for example I make tomato sauce in the summer and consume it during the winter... a seasonal product that you know you will consume is fine to freeze).
The other thing is you don't have to have everything in your pantry. If you miss an ingredient you can still make a dish without it or replacing it with something similar.
3. I try not to save too much money on food. The budget is intentionally slightly higher than the standard because eating badly is bad for both your mood and your health.
In the end, however, by adopting these simple guidelines I have still reduced my spending a lot. Because always starting from food in its simplest form means that I still have to put in the effort to cook it (which leads me to evaluate well what I want to eat) and to often pay much less (even in an inflationary phase the simpler a food is the less it increases in price, because those who make derivative products increase prices both for the increase in the price of raw materials and for all the extra work).
But my 3rd point still stands... I would rather spend a little bit more on a good pasta brand or a good steak that I enjoy rather than on anything else... because spending money on good food make my life easier.
And if a steak is really too expensive, there are cheap pieces of meat that simply need to be cooked for a few hours to dissolve the connective tissue... the result will be very tender meat that cost much less than a steak but is still delicious.
But let's also take an example:
today I ate some excellent voiello bronze-drawn pasta with pieces of buffalo mozzarella, some very sweet cherry tomatoes and a drop of extra virgin olive oil.
I could have saved money by buying low-quality pasta, normal mozzarella and using generic oil... but I would have enjoyed the dish much less and the savings would have been minimal, not being satisfied then I would have maybe eaten an extra snack and the savings would have been zero or even negative, but I could have worsened my health.
That's the reason you want to avoid saving too much money on food, but still try to get the most basic ingredients.
Wow this is so good 😊!!! Agree 👍
GREAT IDEAS. GOD GGAVE US WHA WE NEED TO SURVIVE, MOST WHOLE FOODS ARE RIGHT OUT OF THHE GROUUND OR OFF A TREE. WE DO NIOT NEED ASTEAK EVERYDAY, IT BAD FOR HEART. STEAK CAN BE A TREAT, FISH AND CHICKEN AND PORK CHOPS ARE LEANER SOURCES OF PROTEIN, BEANS ARE CHEAP ANS GOOD PROTEIN.
It is hilarious to see these comments that say "We only shop online to spend less money". This is basically the same logic, as saying "We never carry a balance on our credit card, so that we can still have the bonus points."
Let me tell you something... I work as a software developer and have done e commerce for the last 10 years. Sorry to disappoint you, but these online shops are designed to make you spend more. Here is the kicker: You might be part of a test group for a new feature, where the grocery store chain tests out how to make you buy faster. They are running these tests all the time. They are constantly optimising the online shop, so that you spend more.
Bottom line: Keep shopping online and picking up, but don't fool yourself to be that much smarter than people, whose literal job it is to tempt you into buying stuff you didn't plan for. It is the same story as with credit cards.
Buy whatever beef is on sale and grind it yourself. I can often buy chuck roast and have ground beef for 3.50 per pound and way healthier than the cheap ground beef.
What my wife and me do is we making healthy dinner and what is left over we eat the next day as lunch.. that way we get two healthy meals and we have almost no food wast. Also we use most the tips mentioned already like buying online, we do have delivery as we don’t have a car. We pay the delivery for 3 months as this is giving us discounts. Also make sure to use discounts on foods, don’t buy to many foods that expires fastly and use cashback apps
For meats instead of calculating the price per ounce, I focus on the price per gram of protein. That cheap meat isn't necessarily cheaper if you're eating meat for protein, as most people are.
microwaved potatoes and sour cream + some cheese on toast fills you up and has enough protein to be eaten once a day every day of the week if you have to
THAT IS A LOT OF CARBBS FOR ONE MEAL,
I'm sorry, but that sounds pretty bad.
Buy a 40 pound of rice on sale. If you eat out check the lunch specials. Drink tap water. Alcohol has the highest markup.
If things get bad I’ll go to Jennifer’s house? Nope! A lot if people have this attitude. I teach others how to grow and preserve their own food. Growing indoors and outdoors all year long saves so much money! I have a seedling sale that pays for all the seeds, fertilizers and garden tools so my produce is just the labor. It’s a great anti- depressant, a physical and mental work out every day. You get better quality food. This is a skill you want to learn before you need to depend on it. When we go to war there are ALWAYS food shortages. Growing and preserving food, cooking your own food I are skills that are just plain smart to develop now. The more people in a community who have theses skills, the better off the entire community will be.
I collect my own seeds too and that saves! It also helps to make your own compost and fertilizer.
Bingo, been growing a bunch of our own veggies for years now and I still have a lot to learn.
I'm comfortable enough now that I can grow enough food for my family with potatoes. I have several 8ftx16ft raised beds and many 4ftx8ft raised beds.
Time to learn is now, not when things go south.
I'm with you! I'm still trying to get comfortable with pressure canning, though. We filled an acre with fruit trees and veggie beds. We'll finally get to harvest our 2 20-foot Asparagus beds this next season.
I bought a home in the suburbs last year...never had a yard before. I have a garden and greenhouse, this is my second year and I'm still pretty darn lost...feel like I'm following all direction but not really having yield.
@@jacobawojtowicz check with your local county extension office. They usually have information how to grow in your area.
The reduced meats is awesome. I’ll make a quick 10-15 min trip to the store, find what is reduced and cook it that night and plan a dinner around it. Kind of like a game and saves money!
Know the prices at your favorite stores. As well, make grocery shopping list and only buy what is on the list...I use an app on my phone, this helps me stay on track
I always do this. Lol. Go to see what's on the posters at the restaurants and go back home and make those recipes.
I recently started doing the meal prep companies. I personally like better quality food so doing this cut my expense from 450-500 to 380. That may not seem like a lot but we don’t have to spend hours shopping and cooking, unless we do the meal kit ones which spoils save us an extra $100 (we will do this once we get a little more time). Anything we need to buy one off we go to discount grocery stores like grocery outlet. You can also buy coupons online from companies. You pay like .10 per coupon but save $2 + per item
With the meal preps/kits they have crazy new offer bonuses. And when you try to cancel or do cancel the rejoin bonus is even better. Just rotate these
When calculating cost per serving, don’t forget to be realistic about what you (or your family) will actually eat. If you will only drink a half gallon of milk before the expiration, then it isn’t a good deal to buy a full gallon because it’s a slightly lower cost per ounce. This also goes for those items that you (or family) might eat all of, but would be fine with a smaller portion- yeah, family sized bag of tortilla chips, I’m talking about you!
I manage to save when shopping for groceries by going to Costco business Centers and purchasing whole chickens, whole ribeyes, whole strip loins, and whole pork loins and pork butts etc. takes a little more time but my family eats well and saves a lot. I even got to where I make our own homemade smoked bacon and sausage. Last time I made bacon I got it to where the price per pound was around $4.66 instead of $12-15. And I had a little over 9lbs of bacon for roughly $42. Last time we stocked up on chicken we ended up with around 114lbs of chicken for $1.49per pound. And all the scraps and bones we used to make homemade chicken stock which we canned and froze for later. Sometimes just putting in the extra effort goes a long way with saving you a few dollars.
Last sentence so true!
George, that guy eating out may have been joking. However, I was prescreening a home buyer (who had credit challenges) and I was offering up hacks on saving on groceries and she said something along the line of, we don't spend that much on groceries so we're good there. We eat out a lot. 😱 needless to say, they have not become homebuyers last I checked.
Never eat out is my rule #1! Could I? Yes, because I'm debt free but that doesn't change the fact that it is still a waste of money!
For sure. I'd rather buy fancy things and never eat out
I drive a $5K car but I LOVE trying new foods and the environment at a restaurant. To each their own!
Same. To help my adult kids kick the habit, I got an air fryer and the items they would order for the freezer. It is cheaper, and better, to make from scratch, but when they don't want what is made, they can pop it in the air fryer.
@@jacobawojtowiczi agree
@@Twinkie989but what does an air fryer have to do with any of that? An air fryer is just a tiny convection oven. Like a microwave oven is just a tiny oven
Skip the bakery items, make them yourselves
This is the first one of your videos I’ve watched and I can’t stop laughing 😂 you’re hilarious . I’m definitely going to subscribe ❤
Lot of curbside grocery stores add 3-4% to every item. So not totally *FREE*. check that fine print.
I get 2% cash back for my groceries, but I know you hate that. Cheers
This maybe George’s funniest episode. Amazing jokes!
I will say this… ive gotten into the habit of buying holiday/seasonal items when they go on clearance after the season ends. It cant be done for everything… like if you want that fall scent from bath and body you just might as well get it now… they never do clearance. But it works great for a TON of holidays… every once in a while ill allow myself to get a full price item mostly because i figure it wont be one of those things that sticks around until clearance… but with a lot of this stuff, you’re better off waiting.
My wife and I spend around $500/month with no eating out except for 6 times/year when her family gets together for lunch at a local restaurant. This last time was $30 including tax and tip but as always compared to our home cooking from scratch eating out is an expensive disappointment. My goal isn't necessarily to spend the least amount on groceries but to make the best meals at a reasonable cost so we shop and stock up on weekly sale items at our small town grocery store, our local butcher and the one supermarket in the city that we drive right past. Everything goes on sale on a roughly 6 week rotation. We prefer buying in-season fruits in quantities we can use before they go bad as it's significantly less expensive than frozen and tastes much better. Take those Chic-filet sandwiches for instance. We buy boneless chicken breasts for $1.99/lb, pound them to a uniform thickness (not super flat), season them with kosher salt, freshly ground black pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, paprika and toss them on the grill. Fresh bakery rolls from our small town grocery store that are baked in-store, lettuce, tomato slices and I'll whip up a batch of dijonnaise. Now, I've never eaten at Chic-filet but I guarantee it's not better than these sandwiches and the chicken is great in wraps as well. Why copy cat when you can do much better.
Sunday nights we rotate between a whole chicken (99 cents/lb), beef roast ($3.99-$4.99/lb), another whole chicken and a pork loin roast ($2.49/lb) with baked potatoes that cook along with the meat and frozen veggies. It's meant to be an easy but delicious Sunday dinner with Monday night leftovers and sandwich meat for several days. We'll mix in a bone-in half ham for 99 cents/lb and whole turkeys for the same low price when they go on sale too.
During the pandemic after watching a PBS special on supper clubs I decided to come up with "Supper Club Dining at Home". I was already making NY strip steaks and bone-in pork chops from our local butcher once per month each so these were a natural to expand on. Starting at 4pm I go into the kitchen to make the relish tray (no restaurant can beat it), salads and salad dressing from scratch which we then leisurely enjoy until around 5:30pm. I found a fantastic UA-cam video of classical music with a slide show of European art, architecture and nature which is fantastic to have on low in the background. I head back into the kitchen to make the main course with a sauteed mushroom and onion pan sauce and a nicer side like popovers, twice baked potatoes or hash browns, etc. By the time we're all done we're well fed and super-duper relaxed...far surpassing even the best supper club or finest restaurant and no drive home!
I also expanded my made from scratch pizza that's better than any pizzeria around into a "Friday Pizza and Movie Night". I put on the 80's music videos while I make the dough and while it's rising I cut up the veggies, saute the Italian sausage and onions, mushrooms then make the sauce and grate the mozzarella and finally make the pizza/s. While they're baking it's a cartoon short from the 1930's and while we eat the pizza I start the main feature. About halfway through I stop the movie for an intermission when it's back to the 80's music videos while I make popcorn or kettle corn from scratch on the stove top to munch on while we finish the movie. It's WAAAYYYY better than going out for pizza and a movie which was a staple for us way back when it was a lot cheaper, lol.
Then there's "Soda Shop Desserts", with shakes, sundaes with made from scratch sauces and sodas with home made syrups. I found another UA-cam video with 50's music and a slideshow of 50's cars, soda shops and other 50's pics. We even have vintage glassware that we bought at various garage sales a decade ago when the generation that had them were downsizing. We like Breyer's ice cream which is frequently on sale for $2.49-$3.49...a few months ago we even score some for $1.99!
So many ways to save...why buy 1.55oz Hershey bars at $1-$4 each when semi-sweet chocolate chips go on sale for $1.99/12oz bag, taste better, have almost 4 times the cacao and are roughly the equivalent to 8 Hershey bars that would be $8-$32 depending on where you buy them. These days I prefer having an ounce rather than 1.5oz so they go even further. Skip the convenience foods, things that are bad for you like soda, juices, store bought treats with bad sweeteners/fats and baked dessert goods, etc and you'll save big while getting to skip most of the store and shopping quicker.
Obviously I can go on and on but you get the idea....
Cheers!
Loved reading this! Well done!
My husband and I also spend closer to 650 a month on food and we are not extravagant shoppers. We try to buy organic vegetables when we can and limit the amount of meat. I don’t know how people can do it for less than 500 a month. We always buy organic chicken and try to go for grass fed beef when we want beef. My husband is 70 and I’m 63 so we’re trying to do what we can just stay healthy!
@@barbaramulligan8161 It's important to check which vegetables are most important to eat "organic" rather than non-organic. Some are not - so do the research online. In addition, most people are unaware that a product has to be labeled 100% organic to actually be organic. If not, anyone can use that label. Truly organic vegetables are generally much smaller than ones not organically grown. If you have an Aldi, they have great sales every few weeks on grassfed beef at $3.49 a pound - you can't beat that price anywhere, so when they do, we stock up. Aldi has a limited selection, but also focuses on organic and gluten free for a lot less money. The best way to cut down on groceries is to search the weekly stores for the "loss leaders" and BOGO sales and stockpile (NOT prepping) on what is a really good buy. That's really the only way to save significant money. The best help in terms of staying healthy is to watch your WATER source.
Wow! Where do you live? I haven't seen prices like that in 25 years.
I cook from scratch, no manufactured prepackaged foodstuffs.
Tried for years to have a decent garden. Far too hot and 100+ for months on end, so I stopped and found a mom and pop produce and dirt cheap. I can grow herbs and a great way to add flavor without calories .
@@naomiemoore5725 how much do you budget per month? My husband is quite the granola fanatic and that adds up as well.
This was such a great a video. Great tips and comedy 👌 😅
I write a grocery list and take a calculator (phone or tablet). I also shop many stores for sales, the cheapest place for specific items and look for marked down items.
4:22 I’m sorry but if someone is making lasagna for $15 and it’s feeding 4 people “several times”… they’re not making lasagna. They’re making something without meat and cheese. Last time I made lasagna, buying all the ingredients, it cost a touch under $60. This was long before the pandemic/inflation had its hand in the game of price. It was a standard pan, where you can cut it into 8 healthy portions… or 16 tiny portions. Lasagna is not cheap to make… at all.
I make lasagna for less than $15 for a full 13*9 pan. We use ground turkey instead of beef or lentils and make it stretch with shredded or minced veggies like carrots, zucchini, mushrooms, onions, etc. And instead of ricotta I use cottage cheese. Things can be as expensive as you make them.
@@lillynevers7305 sounds like you’re making a ground turkey casserole, layered in the style of lasagna.
Cottage cheese, imho is not a substitute for ricotta. It doesn’t break down and remains curdled doesn’t have the same mouth feel or even close to the same flavor of ricotta. Also, you’re forgetting the fresh parmesan and fresh mozzarella. Both are also in lasagna with the ricotta.
@@Ashkeyjaye2001 Lasagna can absolutely be made for around $15-$20
Ground beef 4.50/lb
Ricotta $2.48 15oz
Lasagna noodles $4.00
Jar of sauce $2.00 cheaper if you make your own and tastes better!
Mozzarella $3.75 16oz
Plus Misc seasonings, eggs, any veggies you’re right around $18 ish
There’s absolutely much higher quality ingredients you can use other than great value brand, however that’s not the point.
Stop being a drama queen and over exaggerating…
Making simple meals it home is always cheaper than restaurants and takes out food. And you know what you are eating. One tip with leftovers. Never have leftover chicken unless you are going to eat it cold. The texture and taste are ruined with reheating. Unless you overcooked it the first time, and then it was all ready ruined. Some people are so worried about food poisoning that they regularly ruin every meal that they cook.
I think there is probably enough water in the chicken for the initial cooking. The first time cooking most likely you cook out most of the water. It will be juicy meat that first time but you won’t have enough water in chicken for any reheating. The ruined texture and taste is because the chicken is dried out from reheating. If there is a way to keep chicken moist during reheating it will probably taste the same as the first time cooking.
Today..2 tbs ..tbs..with cooked carrots and 1/2 chopped 1 large onion..cooked together+ tortilla shell..= cheap "taco wrap". Surprisingly tasty.
There is a WEALTH of fabulous food hacks below! Thanks to everyone for posting!
1:04 I am totally here for this!
Here was my hack when the kids were home before making my grocery list I would write out a week's worth of menu. Then I would make my grocery list accordingly. I never got good enough to include coupons or sale items but I always shopped at the cheaper stores. Unfortunately one of those stores was the Big W and oh my gosh I love Aldi!
I do the opposite from you. I look at the sales flyers on Wednesday and then plan meals around what is on sale. I don't worry about coupons except digital ones for that week - they save a lot, esp when you can get five items at the sale price.
Well, if you tip at grocery curbside (which I think you definitely SHOULD if someone wheels the groceries to your car), there goes the savings...
Why? They are being paid per hour just like everyone else? I'm confused why there is so much tipping for simply doing their job. I don't tip my ups driver and they deliver to my door😂
Nice to see Food 4 Less make the cut. Just last week I picked up a 2.5lb bag of York Peppermint Patties off their clearance rack for $5.94 because they were set to expire...next month!
Deal of a lifetime.
Been cooking at home for 15 years and been cooking almost every meal at home since the pandemic. It requires experience, time and effort to learn how to shop and how to cook. You should around how much all your ingredients should cost. Trader Joe's is great for pantry items, frozen food, ready prep meal, SOME veggies and SOME fruits, nuts, eggs, dairy. It's expensive for red meat (no onsite butcher). Aldi's is cheap for most produce and snacks but their meat is garbage tier and they have tons of stuff that is average price (meats etc). Big box grocers like Ralphs have the best tradeoff between quality and price for meats. READ your weekly ads and build your meals around WHATS ON SALE. It may make sense to take a trip to your Latino market or a Middle Eastern market like Super King but you have to know what's on sale and what's a good price. Takes time and experience. Also batch cook your food. No one got time to cook every meal. Also eating the same thing every meal will burn most people out, so people who scream "rice and beans" is not realistic and a bunch of BS nonsense.
No one HAS time
@@pamsmith1665 Yet you are filling up your time watching UA-cam videos and commenting... Keep that mindset of "I have no time to learn life skills" mentality. You can take the easy way out in life and continue be a bystander in life and make excuses, or your can make time to learn and grow.
@@inigomontoya4135 you are so obnoxious to assume you know anything about me. Please remind me of what you are being so judgmental about. Because may I remind you, that you gleamed this knowledge from watching UA-cam?
Pretty judgemental about someone you dont know. I retired from a very busy career in the medical field. I dont need to find something to do. I am quite busy caring for my horses. Involved in veterans therapy for veterans and special needs kids on horseback. Also fundraising for animal shelters. I hope you feel foolish because you are...@inigomontoya4135
I find meat is sometimes cheaper when you buy it behind the counter. I have bought chicken breast $4 a pound when packaged in the store
My grocery hack 1. Grow a garden. Pays for itself if you’re bad at it.
Grocery hack 2. If you’re a bread eater bake your own bread, costs less and has less to no preservatives.
Yeah, but it tastes so good you'll eat 3 times as much 😂
Very fun, entertaining - and helpful! - watch! 😂👏👏
I use rebate apps like fetch, receipt pal and Ibotta. I save all of my points/cash back all year and that's our Christmas present fund. I take advantage of sales and clearance items as well.
We also at least have a use it up meal per week. Even if everyone one eats something different.
I garden and put up what I can.
For me, I try to never grocery shop while hungry. I always eat before shopping to avoid impulse spending and it helps!
That is a tip as old as time
Not the fun option, but Vegetarian meals made from scratch are extremely cheap. Pasta Primavera can make several meals while costing only around $5 of ingredients.
I hate left overs. I buy exactly what we need. I go to the meat counter and buy 1 chicken breast, 1 salmon. I can make 4 meals for two people with that. It cost me like 15 bucks for use to have protien everyday
My local kroger has ground beef store brand for 8.99 wow i pretty much quit eating beef its brutal out there aldi and sams club bout only place i shop at now
GROUND BEEF ISNNT HEALTHY ANYWAY.
My wife and I budget $600/month on food groceries (does not include household and toiletries). We live in Florida in a very expensive part of Florida. We don't shop at the most expensive grocery stores, and we stay on budget. We buy bulk when possible and keep our meals very simple. It is just wildly expensive here. $6 for 1 pound of ground beef is insane. We used to spend more though and did bring it down from over $800/month when we were shopping at more expensive stores etc. I keep a running tab in my calculator as we are shopping and I add everything up so I know where we are at. That has been the most helpful. We also make bulk meals that will last us for the week to help keep costs down. It's all about what is really valuable to you
When we were broke newlyweds we shopped with a calculator. It wasn't to stay on budget. If $50 was all we had we stopped when the total got close to $50. The shopping list often was left uncompleted.
More of a health tip than a money tip, but stick to the outside of the store. That's where the fresh foods are. The aisles contain all the super processed foods. Obviously there are exceptions, like coffee and condiments, but it's a good general rule to follow. Also, a lot of the best sales tend to be on the end caps.
Make your own bisquick mix you can use much better ingredients (organic flour and real butter) and it’s much cheaper! I got a sourdough starter and make a no knead sandwich bread, just stir the ingredients and let sit overnight
Pack a lunch for work or school. Every. Day. Buying prepared food is delicious and easy, but that’s where all your money goes…convenience.
I love sprouts because they markdown 30% on meat near expiration
I'm still trying to figure out the difference between Aldi's or Grocery Outlet. Which one better? Do they serve different purposes? Do you guys shop at both? I would greatly appreciate some of y'all's input
Actually switched my list from curbside to delivery and saved 20-30
Buying in bulk at Sam’s Club and making several different dishes using that item. Having a well stocked pantry before inflation helped us..we did this by using coupons, apps, rewards, gift cards. We also have several raised beds. We can and freeze everything..butter, cheese, cream cheese, sour cream etc. This is how we live easily on one income. Tripling recipes saves you time, money and energy. You clean up once, turn the over on once and use the dishes once..less dish washing!
A lot of people don't realize dairy can be frozen. I've never tried freezing sour cream, but I freeze butter, cream cheese, and regular cheese.
@@Trustbutverify2651 YES MANY DO NIT KNOW THIS.
YES MAKE THE MEAL IN BULK, SAVE THE LEFTOVERS IN FRIDGE OR FREEZER.
Look local, our farmers market is sometimes cheaper on produce in bulk seasonally, so we stock up and spend a day with a friend processing. Also local butchers, if you have them are often cheaper to buy from if you're purchasing cuts that are not "fancy" stew meat, ground, roasts, and fat cuts are less than half the cost that they are at the Walmart down the road! And cheaper if you buy a half cow, and discounts for buying 10lb or more
We have money and can shop where we want. But shop Aldi for 90% of food. Lets us take vacation for 6 weeks a year.
Our local Aldi is no longer much cheaper (if at all) than our local Walmart unfortunately. If we drive 30 minutes away Aldi prices are cheaper.
@@PinkieJoJo I have heard and seen that. Our town has 2 Aldi 15 min apart one store is a lot more expensive than the other. Sorry you have to drive 30 min to save money.
I like your videos, keep them coming
Eat less meat, buy the reduced items, comparison shop. Eat at home, don't throw away food. No pop, alcohol, or cigarettes. Drink water or homemade iced or hot tea. Dried beans, rice, pasta. Tina, Al's wife
A LOT OF PASTA IS BAD FOR DIABETICS.
Bear meat does indeed freeze well. The flavor of your bear meat is actually highly dependent on the season when they are hunted and their diet. Generally, bear meat is described as having a rich, gamey taste, often compared to a combination of beef and pork with a slightly sweet undertone. This sweetness comes from the bear's diet, especially if it feeds on fruits, berries, or grains. Bears that primarily consume fish can have a more pungent, fishy flavor, which may not be as appealing to some.
The texture of bear meat is typically dense and somewhat coarse. It is a fatty meat, which can contribute to its moistness when cooked properly, but the fat also has a strong flavor that some people find overpowering. When overcooked, bear meat can become tough and dry, so it requires careful preparation. The best cuts tend to be slow-cooked in stews or braised, which helps break down the meat's natural toughness and enhances its flavor. Bear meat must also be fully cooked to avoid the risk of trichinosis, a parasitic disease.
I will pass
Publix is generally a more expensive grocery store, but I like the BOGOs on bread, coffee or Duke's mayo. I get the 16 oz jars because they get used up faster than the 30 oz (yup, no longer 32 oz) jars.
Bazamati rice, chicken breast, frozen veggies and if you get tired of it get some sugar free bbq sauce.
I try to make it a challenge to go to the grocery story as little as possible so I use whatever i already have. Also my grocery store has a discount section
“14 sandwiches from 6 large breasts” likely means two were larger and yielded 3 sandwiches each. 😂 not all breasts are exactly the same size.
Your last statement goes for humans, too - 🤣
@@Trustbutverify2651 I didn’t specify chickens 😜. Though human breast sandwiches is a very different video and probably NSFW.
@@sharaguzzetta9504 🤣
I stopped going grocery shopping at Walmart. I've found that ingredients (flour, frozen vegetables, eggs, etc...) are more expensive at my local Walmart than my local grocery store. I had a friend who was so sure that I was wasting money not shopping at Walmart that I made a deal with her to shut her up. She went grocery shopping with me and then we immediately took my receipt to Walmart so she could show me how I was wasting money...every single item I bought was cheaper at my local grocery store. While in my local grocery store she kept pointing out the cost of convenience items being higher than Walmart, but I don't buy those things I buy ingredients. We did the same with her shopping and since she buys things like frozen pizza, frozen burritos, premade salad mixes, etc...her shop was cheaper at Walmart. The items that we were simply ingredients (like eggs and cheese) were more expensive at Walmart. She now gets her convenience foods at Walmart and her ingredients at the local grocery store but keeps track of the prices at each store to ensure she's buying each item at the place giving her the best deal.
WHAT GROCERY STORE DO U USE?
7:44 to skip the ad 😊
Keeping track of sales and sale prices makes a difference. For example, I know that canned black beans are $1.99 each, $1.25 on sale (same price as $tore) so I when I was at Costco and did the math, the case came to $1.09 per can. I know dried beans are cheaper but there is a lot to be said for convenience.
This sounds counterintuitive but I buy salad in a bag, salad kits often go on sale for $3 a bag. Yes, it's cheaper to buy all the ingredients and make your own, but for just two people that is a lot of produce waiting to go bad, plus all those bottles of dressing take up space in our little fridge. I often add left over meat to the salad or canned beans and have a very inexpensive meal that's healthy and quick.
We spend a lot more on groceries . $450 dollars was what we spent maybe 5 to 10 years ago. Our groceries bill is over $1,000 a month especially because of inflation. Kids can eat through $450 dollars in one to 2 weeks depending on their age. Baby formula is an arm and a leg these days. A lot of meats are over $4 dollars a pound. In the old days maybe $2.50 to $3.50 a pound for chicken and ground beef.