It's been, well, hectic around here to say the least. Between graduating with my Masters, studying for boards (next Friday eeeek) and starting a new temporary job(s) it's been, well an adjustment to say the least.
I've had a couple of friends ask me some questions about meal planning recently, and I figured since I do not have time to update y'all on what's been cooking in my kitchen (although next week...be ready for some yummy recipes that are now in my "favorites" category...major posting will happen after my brain is fried from taking my boards next Friday :) .)
I warn you ahead of time...this ended up being entirely much longer than I had originally planned.
1. How do you budget for meals?
- I enjoy cooking. I try to plan meals that are healthy, flavorful, satisfying, and filling. I could easily cut our food budget in half if I cut out some of these things, but I am not willing to. I enjoy using fresh vegetables 90% of the time as opposed to frozen or canned. I enjoy adding seafood into our food menus, which can tack on extra costs to the budget easily. I also always have tons of fresh fruit around because when we have it here, we eat it! So I'll admit, I could cut corners, but I have already managed to cut our bill a lot by planning ahead. Here is a rough breakdown on costs of our grocery store(s) budget:
Costco
1. I go to Costco at least 2 times per month. My Costco bill one trip is ALWAYS expensive (100+ dollars). This is when I buy our chicken and ground beef for the month. I'll still buy meat at the grocery stores when it is on super sale (even if our freezer is already full), but this is where the bulk of our chicken and ground beef comes from. I always buy around 8 lbs of chicken (its 2.99 per pound at Costco ALWAYS--and in individual sealed packs of 2 which is perfect for us). I also buy roughly the same amount of ground beef (also 2.99 per pound), except I buy it in the patties because it is cheaper per pound than buying it in the loaf-style... then I come home and divide it up into freezer bags of around 1.5 lbs each. The meat alone is usually around $50 (23.92 for chicken and the same for ground beef, so math whizzes who want exact numbers: $47.84).
That meat lasts us almost an entire month (well, the beef lasts us more than a month, the chicken lasts around 3 weeks because I tend to cook 2 chicken dishes per week).
I also stock up on the protein bars we like- which usually averages around $12.99 for a 24-pack (we like the nature valley protein bars...they're delicious... I swear though, if Costco starts selling Luna bars I will never shop anywhere other than Costco EVER again).
We buy fruit at Costco. 2-3 lbs of strawberries costs $4.99 when it isn't on sale (which for you grocery store shoppers, that's the same price as the 2 for $5 that they carry) however, Costco fruit tends to last much longer before going bad. Our grocery store berries last maybe 2-3 days for strawberries, and maybe 5 days for blueberries. Bananas last maybe 3 days since they're overripe by the time they hit the supermarket anyways.
We buy 2 lbs of blueberries for $3.99
We buy 3 lbs of bananas (which are green, and we pull them apart once ripe and put them in brown bags in the fridge to make them last longer) for $1.49
Fruit Total (approximate): $10.47 (and we buy this at least 2 times per month)
I also stock up on laundry detergents, cleaning products, etc during these trips...whatever is on sale (I watch the coupon flyers)-- but I don't count this in our grocery budget.
this is where I buy 99% of my spices (seriously)... just for comparison purposes note the following:
(sorry it's so blurry)
BI-LO brand cinnamon on sale 2.37 oz @ $1.99
Kirkland brand (Costco) cinnamon 10.7 oz @ $4.98
PURE vanilla extract (don't use imitation vanilla, I know it's so much cheaper but I promise you that your dishes and desserts will taste better if you spend the extra money)
Publix brand pure vanilla extract 2 oz on sale @ $3.99
Kirkland brand pure vanilla extract 16 oz @$6.58
Now, you have to keep in mind that it has taken me months to get to the point where our grocery bill is so low- probably because now I have a staple supply of basics and spices and I don't need to buy that sort of thing except on rare occasion... so don't get frustrated if you're not slicing your bill down as much as you would like. Here are some things you should get at Costco (unless your grocery store is having a fabulous sale)
1. Flour
2. Brown sugar
3. White sugar
4. Salt/Pepper (grinders that are HUGE cost around 2.99 each-- and they are 4 times the size of those in the grocery store!)
5. Laundry detergents
6. if you have an indoor trained dog (like ours) they have puppy training pads here.... 150 pads is $16.99. At walmart, 50 pads is $19.99 put that into perspective
** Confession: this price difference ALONE is what caused me to purchase my annual Costco membership (around 45-55 dollars, annually). The amount I save on puppy pads alone pays for my membership (I save 12 dollars essentially every time I buy 1 box of puppy pads-- which only lasts us about a month. So think about it- every 3 times I buy it I just saved my membership cost)
7. freezer bags
8. trash bags
9. snack-sized portions (trail mixes, snacks, protein bars)
10. MILK: it is $2.95 for a gallon of fat-free milk and the sell-by date is always at least 2 weeks away from when you buy it
back to the question now (sorry for that aside).
how do you budget for meals
So I spend roughly $125 a month at Costco, but this isn't just on food.... If I had to estimate which percentage of it would be on food, I would say around $80 (the rest is household items)
My goal for grocery shopping is never to spend more than $100 for a week.
(I know you're thinking: that's a ton of money to spend...but let me break it down for you)
I go grocery shopping once a week.
One week is my "heavy week" where the total is roughly in the 90s
the next week is my light week, where the total is roughly in the 50s-60s.
With that money I plan the following:
1. 7 days of breakfasts for 2 people (I almost always have fruit, toast, and yogurt/cottage cheese; J usually has cereal and fruit)= 14 breakfasts
-- we stock up on cereal with BOGOs. If it's not on sale, I don't buy it... if it is on sale, I buy it in bulk (I'm talking I usually don't leave with less than 6-8 boxes of cereal...so this will last us a solid 2-3 weeks)
2. 5 days of lunches for 2 people (I tend to usually eat random things, but when I plan for dinners I always cook double (so we can freeze at least 2 more dinner portions, and then have at least 2 lunch sized left-overs too)
3. snacks
4. 5 nights of dinner for 2 people
-- as I mentioned above, dinners almost always include leftovers. I plan to feed 6 even though there are only 2 of us. It feeds us dinner for 1 night, then we have 2-3 leftover portions that I put into Tupperware's and freeze, and then J has a lunch for another day that week.
10 dinners (5 lunches, 10 extra frozen portions)
So if you add up the total cost of the month: 80 (Costco) + 180 (2 heavy weeks) + 120 (2 light weeks)= 380 (i'll just round up and say 400, even though these grocery trips also include non-food items)
So $400 feeds us: (I rounded down so I would get the lower number in case one week I spend more)
14 breakfasts a week x 4 weeks = 56 breakfasts
10 lunches a week x 4 weeks = 40 lunches
10 dinners a week x 4 weeks = 40 dinners
10 frozen portions x 3 weeks (sometimes we don't have leftovers) = 30 meals
$400 gives us: 166 meals (approximately), or $2.40 per meal
that's how I budget
2. How do you plan meals for the week?
I plan to cook 5 dinners a week. My dinners tend to be a mixture between simple one-dish-wonders, slow cooker meals, and then some more time-consuming ones mixed in. I always plan for 5 dinners, 1 night of leftovers, and 1 night out (give or take, obviously).
Here is the process I use:
1. Pull out the big ole' bag of recipes
2. Sometimes I'll search pinterest for new inspiration, and write down new recipes on cards that I want to try
3. Divide it up: chicken, beef, vegetarian, (seafood)
4. Search the weekly sales flyer for what big items are on sale
-- for example, if pork tenderloin is on sale, then we may add pork that week.--
-- if bell peppers are on sale, we have stuffed bell peppers and I buy extra and chop some, slice others and freeze them for later--
5. look in the pantry/freezer.
-- for example, I had leftover frozen tilapia filets in the very back that I used this week which cut our bill for this week in regard to added meats
6. If something is a staple and it's on sale, buy it anyways--even if you already have some
-- pasta, spaghetti sauce, black beans...rice... you name it, I probably at any given time have as many as 10 of each. When broth goes on sale 10 for $10 I buy 20. Yes that week my bill is higher, but I don't have to buy any more for a very long time.
-- no, I don't need 8 boxes of cereal...but when it is BOGO for $3.99 and I have a
$2 off coupon if I buy 3 or more, that means I can get 4 boxes of cereal for 6 dollars...you better believe I buy them all.
7. Plan your weekly meals not only by meat (I mean, who really wants chicken 3 days in a row) but more importantly by produce . Don't expect to buy all of your groceries Sunday morning and then cook a delicious veggie stir fry Thursday evening-- the veggies will no longer be "delicious" and you'll likely have had to throw them out. Use your fresh produce earlier in the week, pasta/rice dishes later in the week since they don't go bad!
3. What about time commitments?
While I will admit i have much more free-time this interim year since I am not technically working in my career field, I still do work. Typically I put in 3 9-5:30 days, 1 9-4:30 day, and then a day from 9-12. I often also have weekend commitments, so while I am not technically "full time employed", I am occupied for the vast majority of my week. With this schedule, though, I still manage to create shopping lists, meal plan, and shop weekly. AND make time to cook when I get home so that we are good for the week! On weeks when I know I won't have much kitchen time, I cook 3-4 meals on the weekend and freeze them for the week so that we can still eat healthy meals when I don't have time to be near the oven! Here's a rough breakdown of time commitments:
1 hour of recipe searching/altering/inspiration
this is when I write down new recipes, plans for entrees, side dishes, and the occasional dessert
30 minutes of coupons/store flyers/ shopping list creation
I go to Publix to shop. Their flyers change on Tuesdays. So typically I will check out the sales flyer on Tuesday/Wednesday and use the fabulous shopping app they have where you can create your grocery list by literally clicking on the sales flyer. It also makes a list for me that goes straight to my Iphone and it tells me not only which aisle my items are on (ie it categorizes what aisles you need to go on and what you need to get on those aisles based on the store you list as your home store), BUT it also tells you where on that aisle it may be (ie if you put cinnamon, it will tell you to go to aisle blah de blah and look near spices). THIS app alone has saved me hours at the grocery store.
1 hour of grocery shopping including travel to/from the store
That's it.
pantry organizing/night meal organizing
It takes me about 20 minutes to put everything away. Then each night I give myself 5-10 minutes to go over the recipe for the following day and pull out the items I'm going to need for it so that when I get home, I can get straight to cooking and not go pantry digging for the cumin.
Well, that's a long enough post for now about meal planning. I just wanted to prove that you can plan delicious, healthy meals that are filling and good for you that are still reasonable.
Now yes, if I go on the Ramen noodle diet (which I wont because they are so bad for you and so much sodium) I could eat for $10 a week, but I am more than happy with the budget cuts we have made by trying this meal planning strategy!
Happy shopping,
xoxo,
Virginia
