grocery shopping on a budget

[Tanaqui]

That does not sound cheap. Egads. You can probably also buy sesame seeds off of Amazon, of course, though I don't know what the pricing is there. You might be able to grow it. I mean, people must grow sesame, right?

 

[applethyme]

One of our cheep and filling meals is bacon and broccoli omelets.  I divide a package of bacon into thirds.  I fry my bacon, drain and crumble and sprinkle over chopped cooked broccoli.  I will often bake a potato or two to grate and mix in.  If we have it I will sprinkle a little of very sharp cheddar cheese. 

 

Potato soup is the least expensive meal I make.  I learned how from my grandma who learned to make it during the depression.  Basically peel and cut potatoes into cubes.  Chop onions and some carrots.  Place in pot with enough water to cover.  Cook it until the potatoes and carrots are mushy and thick.  Stir often as it can burn easily.  Once the potatoes have cooked down add a stick of butter and milk to thin.  This makes a really rich tasting soup that is filling.  This is how I survived as a broke college student :lol:

 

Dh likes to make enchiladas with a little shredded chicken and a bunch more black beans and rice.  We use left over chicken to make these. 

[Slartibartfast]

I make this gravy from America's Test Kitchen. It's healthy--and don't try to convince me otherwise.  :leaving:   :lol:

Seriously, I love gravy. Sausage gravy is probably a less healthy option. But with the new thinking about fats not being so bad nutritionally, maybe it's not as bad as once thought. 

 

I cannot have milk, it has been some time since I have enjoyed sausage gravy. I am determined though and now my brown gravy is delicious. My gravy fu is mighty.

 

:lol:

[Ausmumof3]

Leftover ham can work as a sub for bacon in carbonara pasta. I find bacon a great budget stretcher too as the flavour is intense so you feel like you are getting more meat. The other thing is trying to get good vegetable protein helps you not miss the meat so much.

 

The other thing is you have to have time. If we're doing frugal ill set aside a whole hour for food prep. If the ovens running for roast I will put in extra pumpkin and potato to purée for soup the next day, I'll get the bread maker running and try and get some baking in the oven to save on electricity. If I'm cooking on the stove top I might put on some stewed apple for sweets or a snack, some custard or a brothy type soup. Basically you cook like crazy for an hour so something's around for when the munchies come to call! And if the oven is running its full.

 

And don't presume a particular type of food is cheap. Look at the amount of food you can produce with it. $3 of rice goes much further than 90c rice cakes. $3 of apples cheaply becomes Apple crumble, apple muffins, apple tea cake etc. $3 of oatmeal makes more breakfast than $3 of boxed cereal. Buy ingredients, not food.

[Slartibartfast]

This is the lentil spread my 11 year old likes.

 

 

http://www.bigoven.com/recipe/leftover-lentil-spread/138245

 

Ooh...that looks yummy. I am crazy for cardamom.

[ProudGrandma]

thanks again for all of your responses.  I really appreciate it.  Today I am going to go through my pantry and my freezers and take inventory of what I have.  Does anybody know of a website that allows you to type in a list of ingredients and then it comes up with a list of recipes that use those ingredients?  If not, I might be back...listing what I have, knowing I will get some great ideas here.

 

[TammyinTN]

http://www.recipe.com/recipecom/file.jsp?contest=true&item=/quiz/quickfind/whatisfor&ordersrc=googlesearch75560Recipes-From-Ingredients

 

This site might help. 

[kewb]

I have no problem with beans (about the only thing in the world that agrees with my stomach), but we've realized that DH gets very sick if he eats them more than twice a week. Like, cancel outings not near a bathroom and the yard doesn't get mowed sick. So one dinner plus leftovers, then no more beans for at least a week. How do you make them easier on the digestive system? I do all my pintos, black and white northern beans from dry, and do the whole soaking/rinsing/cooking thing. Red beans are canned.

 

I'm working on tightening our budget too, and this is the newest wall I've hit.

I soak my beans with an acid to help with the digestive issues. For example..1 cup chickpeas. I cover with water and add 2 tablespoons of apple cider vinegar. I also soak them for 24 hours. Different beans need different soak times. Easy to find with a quick Google search. Eating beans with more frequency also helps your body adjust and some of the digestive challenges go away.

[Allearia]

I find tahini in the regular grocery store with the Jewish foods like matzoh etc. One can will be enough for quite a few batches of hummus. The most common one in the grocery store looks like this: http://www.amazon.com/Joyva-Sesame-Tahini-15-Oz/dp/B000VK484I/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1407598373&sr=1-3&keywords=Tahini. Of course there are a bunch of varieties, organic etc. on amazon but this one I have found pretty much everywhere.

[DawnM]

This woman provides so many great ideas.  She published this back in 2001 and only had toddlers and young kids at the time, but I think the ideas are still excellent:

 

http://www.budget101.com/budget101-free-ebook/free-ebook-groceries-200-month-2547.html

[J-rap]

We were on a very, very strict budget for years.  I refused to eat Ramen noodles all the time!  haha  (Although I would in a pinch -- I'd always add frozen veggies to it when we did.)

 

We ate beans and rice for years.  And whatever veggie was on sale.  I guess that's the main reason we became vegetarians way back when.  (We're not anymore.)  My husband kept going back to school for more degrees, so we lived on a student's income until right before our 4th child was born.

 

We all LOVE beans and rice now!  haha  It's a great, healthy alternative.  If you make your own, from dried beans, there are so many options.  If you like Mexican food, then you can learn to like beans.  It all has to do with the spices and whatever else you add, honestly.  (And a slice of cheese on top always helps!)    You can mix lentils in with hamburger meat to stretch it.   We also have a bread machine and have made our own bread for years.  In fact, it used to be a homeschool assignment.  One child each day would be in charge of adding the ingredients to the bread machine.  It only took a few minutes.

 

My children do not remember sacrificing anything food-wise, but for years we lived on $50/week (not including milk or toiletries). 

[TeacherZee]

Tahini is a sesame sauce of a sort, you could google substitutions. Otherwise it might be least expensive at a ethnic foods store. I usually buy dry beans, but splurge on canned if I get a good deal.

I think cashew butter would work.

 

I like adding lentils to chili and having it on baked potatoes

[Ohdanigirl]

I have no problem with beans (about the only thing in the world that agrees with my stomach), but we've realized that DH gets very sick if he eats them more than twice a week. Like, cancel outings not near a bathroom and the yard doesn't get mowed sick. So one dinner plus leftovers, then no more beans for at least a week. How do you make them easier on the digestive system? I do all my pintos, black and white northern beans from dry, and do the whole soaking/rinsing/cooking thing. Red beans are canned.

 

I'm working on tightening our budget too, and this is the newest wall I've hit.

It takes time. If you want to add more beans to your diet, you may need to do it slowly. Stick to twice a week for a few weeks, then add a third day for about a month or more. Also, soaking beans is supposed to help.

[Audrey]

This is not ideal and some would call it hummus heresy, but you can substitute the amount of tahini in the recipe with half that amount of peanut butter cut with half that amount of hot water.  Whisk the peanut butter with the water before adding to the hummus.  It won't taste exactly the same because peanut butter is a much stronger flavour than sesame butter (which is what tahini is), but it's still very tasty and, IME, little kids like the taste better with peanut butter.

[Momof3littles]

I think of it in two levels. I  have things I would cut if we needed to dial back but not go into crisis mode.  We don't do a lot of grains, and we do lower levels of beans and legumes, although I do like the taste, especially since I was a vegetarian for a pretty long period of time in my younger years.  If I needed to cut but not go into crisis mode, I'd trade organic for conventional whole foods.  I would do a lot of eggs.  Ramen, healthy or not, still really just doesn't provide any real nutrients.  So I'd pay a little more for things like eggs that are still fairly inexpensive but have good nutrient value.  Cabbage is great in places where people would normally "bulk" their food with grains.  Serving various dishes over sauteed cabbage "noodles" and the like.  Again, not as cheap as ramen, but pretty inexpensive most of the time, and it has nutrients.  Sweet potatoes are sometimes pretty cheap considering there's little waste (no "core" to throw out, for example). 

 

If i was in crisis mode, I would buy grains in bulk from an ethnic grocer.  Dried beans, smaller amounts of meat.

 

Either way, I would make sure we were utilizing leftovers to the max, and not wasting or throwing out food.  Lots of soup, lots of leftovers served for another meal and stretched. I'd make sure every time I roasted a chicken I was turning the bones into stock for soup.  I'd stretch meals with shredded/chopped cabbage, legumes, etc. for the first scenario, but would add in grains and a higher % of legumes for a "survival" scenario. 

 

 

[Momof3littles]

thanks again for all of your responses.  I really appreciate it.  Today I am going to go through my pantry and my freezers and take inventory of what I have.  Does anybody know of a website that allows you to type in a list of ingredients and then it comes up with a list of recipes that use those ingredients?  If not, I might be back...listing what I have, knowing I will get some great ideas here.

 

I like those challenges.  I love when they do this on NPR's The Splendid Table :)  We'll be here to hook you up if you need help coming up with ideas.

[Momof3littles]

I imagine things like tortillas (could stretch beans, meat, cheese via quesadillas, burritos, etc) are cheap at ethnic markets as well.

 

Crustless (or crust if you want to go that route) quiche and frittatas are a good way to use up leftovers, works for any meal, nutrient dense overall.

[BarbecueMom]

It takes time. If you want to add more beans to your diet, you may need to do it slowly. Stick to twice a week for a few weeks, then add a third day for about a month or more. Also, soaking beans is supposed to help.

I already do the soaking/rinsing/ACV, so I might work on adding another bean dinner, but cutting down on the amount of leftovers. Spreading the meals out might help instead of having back-to-back bean dishes. I, OTOH, could eat refried beans with eggs every day for breakfast!

[srs]

We're in "cut back but not crisis" levels of grocery budgeting here, and the big favorite for breakfast has been egg drop soup and a raw carrot. I make the soup in under five minutes with already made homemade stock, and it can really stretch the eggs so that my two younger kids and I can eat only two eggs total for breakfast, which would never work if we had scrambled eggs instead.

[happypamama]

I think of it in two levels. I  have things I would cut if we needed to dial back but not go into crisis mode.  We don't do a lot of grains, and we do lower levels of beans and legumes, although I do like the taste, especially since I was a vegetarian for a pretty long period of time in my younger years.  If I needed to cut but not go into crisis mode, I'd trade organic for conventional whole foods.  I would do a lot of eggs.  Ramen, healthy or not, still really just doesn't provide any real nutrients.  So I'd pay a little more for things like eggs that are still fairly inexpensive but have good nutrient value.  Cabbage is great in places where people would normally "bulk" their food with grains.  Serving various dishes over sauteed cabbage "noodles" and the like.  Again, not as cheap as ramen, but pretty inexpensive most of the time, and it has nutrients.  Sweet potatoes are sometimes pretty cheap considering there's little waste (no "core" to throw out, for example). 

 

If i was in crisis mode, I would buy grains in bulk from an ethnic grocer.  Dried beans, smaller amounts of meat.

 

Either way, I would make sure we were utilizing leftovers to the max, and not wasting or throwing out food.  Lots of soup, lots of leftovers served for another meal and stretched. I'd make sure every time I roasted a chicken I was turning the bones into stock for soup.  I'd stretch meals with shredded/chopped cabbage, legumes, etc. for the first scenario, but would add in grains and a higher % of legumes for a "survival" scenario. 

 

Could you give me a few more details about how you do the cabbage as "noodles?"  We use spaghetti squash for noodles sometimes, but it's one, a big pain to cook and shred, and two, it's kind of expensive.

[Audrey]

Could you give me a few more details about how you do the cabbage as "noodles?"  We use spaghetti squash for noodles sometimes, but it's one, a big pain to cook and shred, and two, it's kind of expensive.

 

 

If you cut the cabbage into long thin pieces, they will sauté up kind of like noodles (in shape, not taste).  Cut the cabbage in half through the core, take out the core, lay the cut side down and slice across the cabbage the longest width about 1/4 inch wide strips.  Some bits will be much smaller, some longer.  Then, I put them in the fry pan first with a bit of water to help soften and steam them, and then when the water has evaporated and the cabbage has softened down a bit, I add some butter or oil (not a lot) and continue to sauté until done.

 

You can also make zucchini "noodles" by using a peeler to make long ribbons out of the zucchini then slicing the ribbons into narrower long strips.  These are best as "noodles" when only barely cooked.  If you cook them too long they go mushy.

[*lifeoftheparty*]

I always seem to recommend this, but using "The Fresh 20" meal plans have helped me save money- big time.

 

The meals are very tasty and filling, and all sauces and stuff are made from simple ingredients and spices- very few convenience foods. All the fresh ingredients are seasonal and you use them in several meals, versus having to buy several ingredients that only get used once.

 

The prep list, and the fact that many recipes have you cooking enough meat for two meals at once, make cooking dinner fast and easy- which means we are more likely to not eat out or get take out.

 

Each week there are 5 recipes, and the 5th is vegetarian.

 

I'm telling you, my grocery bill has gone down tremendously by sticking with fresh 20 recipes. And we eat healthier. And dinner time is much less stressful.

 

Might not help you, but thought I would recommend just in case :)

 

ETA- one of the recent recipes involved tossing black beans with tomatoes and a few other things in a pot, then making wells in the beans mixture and putting eggs in them, and serving with corn tortillas. I thought that sounded so gross, but I made it and it was so freaking good!! So now I'll make a crock pot of black beans one night, and we'll have that with rice and make Chipotle style bowls, and the next morning, use those beans to make the egg thing. Soooo good- and very cheap :)

[LucyStoner]

Tortillas are super cheap and easy to make at home. No need to buy them and no one feels deprived when their beans are wrapped in a perfectly delicious homemade tortilla. No one.

[Truscifi]

This is not ideal and some would call it hummus heresy, but you can substitute the amount of tahini in the recipe with half that amount of peanut butter cut with half that amount of hot water.  Whisk the peanut butter with the water before adding to the hummus.  It won't taste exactly the same because peanut butter is a much stronger flavour than sesame butter (which is what tahini is), but it's still very tasty and, IME, little kids like the taste better with peanut butter.

 

I make a peanut satay dip using chickpeas and peanut butter as the base. It has ginger and garlic and lime juice. I came up with it after I tried making hummus with peanut butter.

 

Could you give me a few more details about how you do the cabbage as "noodles?"  We use spaghetti squash for noodles sometimes, but it's one, a big pain to cook and shred, and two, it's kind of expensive.

 

We just shred and saute the cabbage and put sauce over it. We also sometimes make zucchini noodles, but they take a little more prep.