How much do you spend on groceries?

[Anonymous]

I can't understand how some families are spending so little on food- the prices keep rising at the store. The ground beef I used to pay $3.99/lb is now $5.99/lb and no longer affordable for us. I only buy chicken when it's part of the buy one, get two free sale. DH loves steak but it's not in our budget so we go without. We are out of crackers but nothing was on sale today, so we are going without them until they are on sale again. We eat LOTS of PB&J, cereal, eggs, but feeding a family for $300/month seems very difficult if you are buying fresh produce, anything remotely healthy. I never pay full price but don't see how you can feed a family 3 meals a day for $10.

I've tried Aldi but when you look at the ingredients, I refuse to feed my family all that crap. Reading the label made the savings not worth it at all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:To the PP whose husband spends too much on drinks, let me tell you what I found works for my husband (who pretty much only likes to drink Gatorade or beer--luckily he homebrews the beer). Wegman's sells the powdered Gatorade in a large tub that costs about 8 dollars. My husband makes pitchers of it and 1 usually lasts him 1-2 months at least. You might have already tried something like that, but if not I recommend!

Thanks! I am definitely going to see if he will do this. He loves his Gatorade so it just might work!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I can't understand how some families are spending so little on food- the prices keep rising at the store. The ground beef I used to pay $3.99/lb is now $5.99/lb and no longer affordable for us. I only buy chicken when it's part of the buy one, get two free sale. DH loves steak but it's not in our budget so we go without. We are out of crackers but nothing was on sale today, so we are going without them until they are on sale again. We eat LOTS of PB&J, cereal, eggs, but feeding a family for $300/month seems very difficult if you are buying fresh produce, anything remotely healthy. I never pay full price but don't see how you can feed a family 3 meals a day for $10.

I've tried Aldi but when you look at the ingredients, I refuse to feed my family all that crap. Reading the label made the savings not worth it at all.

One thing we're doing is minimizing the amount of meat used in each meal. For example, tomorrow instead of pork chops we're having homemade pork fried rice.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:no more than $35 per week for family of 3... we coupon. Eat out just once a month to save $$$$

Seriously, what are you eating? Is it all pasta?

[Anonymous]

What kind of ground beef are you buying, PP? Regular is $2.19lb at Wegmans, organic at Costco is $4.49lb. If you're buying lean, you can get much the same effect by putting 80/20 in a colander after cooking and pouring boiling water over it.

[Anonymous]

Not the PP spending $6/lb on beef, but I get my ground beef through a farm share - so grass fed, organic, local - basically all the stuff you'd pay extra for and it's $5.49/pound. Sometimes it's packed in 1.25 pound containers in which case I'm getting it at $4.39/lb.

[Anonymous]

I'm looking into buying a side of beef, myself. How has your experience with the farm share been?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm looking into buying a side of beef, myself. How has your experience with the farm share been?

Excellent. I'm signed up with GroundWorks Farm - they do weekly pickups in Alexandria, Arlington, Annapolis and on their farm out in the boonies in MD. I get their weekly produce & eggs and their monthly meat & cheese. Meats are frozen - I find the ground beef defrosts well, doesn't get rubbery like when I try to freeze the fresh stuff from the grocery isle. Produce is good too - more than we can use most weeks. They do a points system for meat so you get 17 points each month - a pound of ground beef, bacon, or sausage is 1 point, a steak is 3-7 points depending on size, a big roast is 6+ points. We walk away with 12-15 lbs of meat each month because we mostly eat ground beef and bacon. If you want mostly steaks, you'll get fewer pounds of meat each month, understandably. They also do stew & soup pieces for a point each.

We still do $50/week at the grocery store for milk, yogurt, coconut milk, beans, nuts, etc but we have a toddler who drinks a freakish amount of milk so if you're just taking a splash in your morning coffee, you'd probably make due with an every other week grocery run for whatever you want that's not in the share.

[Anonymous]

Maybe $125 - $150 every two weeks for two.

[Anonymous]

I spend an insane amount of money on food, and we eat it all. I fix breakfast, lunch and dinner, 7 days a week. I SAH with two kids who need lunches packed. DH takes his lunch most days. So that is 21 meals for 4 people each week.

I spend around $350-400 a week. I almost exclusively shop at WF because it is close to my house and after going all over the place to shop around for good produce (including local farmers markets and coops), they consistently have the quality I like andi am willing to pay for it. Healthy, good tasting and good quality food is important for our family. We make certain sacrifices in other areas of the budget (I don't have a shiny new iPhone, we don't eat out much, we don't often buy new clothes, etc). We treat our grocery budget as a luxury expense and therefore need to make up for that overage somewhere else.

99% of the meals are made from scratch. We eat a ton of fresh fish and other seafood and that in and of itself is a budget buster. I do not buy prepared foods, frozen meals, or processed snacks. We don't have fancy water or pastry habits. We aren't gluten free , 100% organic hemp milk drinkers. I enjoy cooking, I have the time to do it, and I want to eat good tasting food. For where I live, WF seems to offer the quality I want. I have tried TJ, HT, Giant, Safeway, Aldi, Shoppers and Wegmans but the quality was poor in my local stores. I don't care if the apples are 50% cheaper, if they are brown, grainy and gross I won't eat it and it's a waste of money. I have tried coupons and shopping at different stores but I put a value on my free time and I don't want to spend it going to 3 different stores to save $20.

Where I still do use coupons like mad is at CVS., for my toiletries, paper products, health and beauty, cleaning supplies, etc. I save bank there.

[Anonymous]

We save a ton of $$ by shopping at Aldi. But we don't buy everything there. I buy coffee and bread elsewhere, for example. And I know what the PP means about processed crap--well, that's everywhere, though, isn't it? Where Aldi is very competitive is in produce, dairy, frozen fish, maple syrup, crackers, tuna, etc. It's not organic (although they do offer organics) but it's not processed, either.

[Anonymous]

I buy all my sandwich bread at Aldi. No HFCS at less than a buck a loaf? Yes please!

Sucks for toast, though, but with what I save during the week I don't feel bad about splurging at the bakery on the weekend.

Their flavored instant oatmeal is good too. One packet plus a quarter cup scoop of minute oats from the canister and my kids have a relatively healthy breakfast for less than twenty cents a bowl.

[Anonymous]

Plenty of non processed and processed food at Aldi. Take a look a the grape tomatoes, sweet potatoes, blueberries, bananas, wild pink salmon etc.

Don't like their beef (solution added) or applesauce with HFCS though.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I spent $584.45 on groceries for a family of three -2 adults and one teen. What do you spend? Trying to gauge what is normal.

Is this per day, week, month?

Sorry. From Sept. 1 through today.

WOWWWW!!!! Where do you shop and what did you buy?

Is it low? I split my shopping among Asian supermarkets - Great Wall in Merrifield or HMart - for vegetables; Trader Joes or SuperA (local Latino market) for milk - and Giant and/or Safeway for the balance depending on what's on special. I usually get meats on sale at either Giant or Safeway. Sometimes also hit Harris Teeter.

I break mine up too - we spend about the same for a family of 3.

I buy chicken thighs/tenderloin at Giant twice a month - the big packs and freeze portions for later.

I buy almost everything else possible at Trader Joes, except no fresh meat (too $$$).

I buy my steaks and everything Trader's didn't have at the Plaza Latina market (like Goldfish, dry beans, etc.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:$100 a week for 2 adults, 1 grade school aged child who eats more than the adults.

Does not include: coffee or dining out. We spend $10-$15 on dining out a week. Also does not include DH's random trips to TJs for larabars.

All meat and eggs are from the farmers market, most veg and fruit are too. Pantry staples are TJs and MOMs.

do you mind sharing what you buy/what you cook? $100 includes farmers market? i must be doing something wrong I am the OP from another thread - my food bill is $1500 a months for 4 adults/1 toddler. Cooking from scratch. Making home made kefir/yogurt, baking our own bread. We are a lot of fruits/veggies - i mean a lot we never cook steaks, really. use 1 or 2 pounds of ground beef a week, perhaps one chicken a week - making broth and such. I don't get it - please share

I miss steak. A lot.

Eggs, whole chickens every two weeks ($15 for a 5 to 6 pound bird), tongue, liver, heart, ground beef, canned tuna or salmon once a week. I buy whatever veg is on sale or cheapest at the market.

I write up a menu plan and stick it on the fridge. Saturday night is finish up the odds and ends or freeze them night.

I do a cash system so when there is no more cash, there is no more food shopping and we have to get creative with the pantry staples. I actually take $200 out for 2 weeks because that is how I get paid. We are down to $13 until Friday but I can't see anything we really need. If it lasts, I'll probably go to Penzey's and buy paprika, which we are out of, and then save the rest for stockpiling the pantry as needed.

Wait- do you really eat tongue, heart liver?

Also, I love the cash system idea. I am so bad at reeling it in with grocery shopping. I get impulsive at the store. Oh, that got me thinking- I like the idea of meal planning/having the menu plan on the fridge.
Can you answer this- how long can leftovers last? If Saturday night is 'freeze or use up' night?