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[quote=Anonymous]- Eat less meat. Eating vegetarian a couple times a week can really reduce your costs if meat is a major line item for you. But make sure you are replacing meat with unprocessed whole foods, like grains and beans and lentils, and not the processed vegetarian items in the frozen foods section or shelf-stable, highly processed foods. That stuff will cost even more than meat (and also likely is no better for you because of all the stuff they add to it).

- Learn to make (or find inexpensive versions) of good sauces and dressings that really dress up your food. It's a very easy way to make simple meals more appetizing and exciting. And usually cheap -- sour cream or yogurt is pretty inexpensive, we use herbs from our garden or relatively inexpensive ones from the store, and basic veggies like onions and garlic that are really cheap.

- Relatedly, splurge on spices. When you are well stocked on spices and season your food well, you can spend less on your other ingredients because you can always dress up really simple items.

- DON'T BUY PREPARED FOODS UNLESS YOU REALLY HAVE TO. I think this is a big one. Prepared foods are so much more expensive than ingredients. Even semi-prepared foods (like buying pre-made ravioli, jarred sauces, pre-chopped veggies, etc.) cost so much more than the raw/unprepared alternative. I think this is where a lot of people's food budget goes.

- Learn what is cheap at different stores. There are inexpensive items at TJs, Whole Foods, Aldi, HT, everywhere. There are rip offs everywhere too. Learn where the deals are and rotating stores according to that knowledge, as opposed to choosing at random or going by what's closest.[/quote]

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