Cutting Your Food Bill in Half--Link to Article

[Tracy in Ky]

Follow the link to a good article from Mother Earth News

 

 

http://www.motherearthnews.com/Real-Food/How-To-Cut-Food-Bills-And-Save-On-Groceries.aspx

[Ria]

It is a good article. I already do almost everything on that list, including brewing beer. LOL.

 

Ria

[JFSinIL]

I have to add, with Ria, that beer is brewed here as well! Plus already do most of the the article states.

[Ria]

I have to add, with Ria, that beer is brewed here as well! Plus already do most of the the article states.

 

JFS, we have a lefse blonde in the secondary fermenter right now!

 

Ria

[G5052]

We buy so much more locally than we did even five years ago, and I'm convinced that in the long run we do save money. The food is so much better in quality and my children are much more willing to eat vegetable when they're really fresh. We're looking forward to the CSA share this summer and bought an egg share from them too.

[Faith]

Thank you for this article. I buy most of my stuff local from our co-op. I also go to our farmers market. We eat lots of beans, and vegetables.

[Nicole M]

I have to add, with Ria, that beer is brewed here as well! Plus already do most of the the article states.

 

Beer here too. I used to grow our own hops, too, but the vine died in a hard freeze a couple years back and I didn't replant. Maybe it's time to rethink that....

 

ETA: I would love to try making "country wines" too. I planted a pollenizer (sp?) elderberry last year, and expect a good crop of berries. I have a very old cookbook with a recipe for elderberry wine. We do many of the things on this list, but I still have a hard time imagining cutting back. Though this year, I did start collecting shopping receipts and have tallied the last two month's food bills. It isn't pretty.

Edited March 1, 2009 by Nicole M

[Tammyla]

Good article.

 

We do many of those, but I'm always looking for ideas. To save money, we're opting out of the weekly CSA and giving squarefoot gardening a try. I'll be up against an army of rabbits and more squirrels than imaginable. :glare:

 

Homemade wine and beer sounds very interesting.

[Ria]

For those of you who are interested in brewing beer, a great resource is http://www.northernbrewer.com

 

You'd need the better basic starter kit; dh says the glass carboy is easier to clean. You will need sanitizer, bottles, bottle caps, and a large stainless steel pot. There are lots of beer kits to chose from, too. If you love beer, you really need to brew your own. We tend to make the European style beers. If anyone has any questions, feel free to pm me. Dh will gladly answer any questions!

 

Ria

Edited March 1, 2009 by Ria

[CalicoKat]

I scored big with the Crockpot Chalupa Meat recipe once posted here.

[CalicoKat]

For those of you who are interested in brewing beer, a great resource is www.northernbrewer.com

 

You'd need the better basic starter kit; dh says the glass carboy is easier to clean. You will need sanitizer, bottles, bottle caps, and a large stainless steel pot. There are lots of beer kits to chose from, too. If you love beer, you really need to brew your own. We tend to make the European style beers. If anyone has any questions, feel free to pm me. Dh will gladly answer any questions!

 

Ria

I LOVE New Galarus Belgium Red Ale -- more of a wine, beer, fruity thingy. Is it possible to make something similiar like this? I'd gladly start my own brewing if it was even a remote possiblity.

[Nestof3]

Thanks! I am very much enjoying reading this. I bought my first dry beans this week, and I thought of cooking up some of each of the three beans to add to meals this week. The thought of soaking and cooking for each meal didn't thrill me.

 

We are going to have a mexican dish, but I can add the leftover beans to soup and even spaghetti sauce.

[mamagina7]

I am interested in making "country wine", but have never thought of it until reading this information. For those of you who do make your own wine, is it a long process to get a yummy wine...I am not that picky!!haha. Just love a glass of wine at the end of the day or on a cold winter night.

[cathmom]

I have such hard water that I have to buy water to cook the beans in or else they are too hard to eat. By then I figured I'm not saving that much so I would rather just buy canned at this point in my life. Anyone else have this problem with the water?

[AuntPol]

Sigh. These are great suggestions but then there is reality.

 

My kids hate beans.

 

Gardening has never worked between our clay soil, abundance of rabbits and squirrels and my thumb that is any color but green (I kill aloe plants and cacti lol).

 

For locally produced foods, I have to drive 30 minutes to the farmer's market to pay twice as much for the same items I can get at store 5 minutes from my house and then drive 30 minutes there. PLus spend several hours just trying to navigate and find what I want there.

 

Organics are more costly and our local stores have only a little selection that hardly ever goes on sale. Trader Joes is 30-45 minute drive, Whole foods and the other one that is escaping me are on other side of town. Organics go bad extreme quickly -they seem to go bad within 2 days. So I would have to be able to drop in store often. I have also yet been able to find an organic apple that was worth eating. They look good and crisp but cut it open and every time, it is half bruised and all mushy. The extra gas and time doesn't make it a viable alternative.

 

We don't drink beer or wine often enough to make our own.

 

The Co-ops that I have found have not seemed to be worth the effort for the drive involved and being stuck with food my family won't eat.

 

We don't have a basement and we don't have any closets other than the ones in the bedroom so storage is hard and a freezer is out of the question (I dream of it though).

 

I am not one that "loves" to cook and homeschooling one kid and spending an hour a day driving/picking up other kid from school and working from home doesn't leave me inclined to spending all day making everything from scratch.

 

Gleaning????? Love the concept but where does one do that in a city? I get free pecans from my mom's tree but that's about it .

 

However many of the other tips are great. My budget for groceries, paper and household goods, health and beauty supplies, and pets is $400 a month and the pets use 25% of that and we donate a lot to the food bank. I like to go under that so I can funnel the money into some other fun areas. We are a family of two adults, two kids, a big dog, four cats, and two chinchillas. My husband's career involves some entertaining and sending in things to the office for meetings.

 

My family calls me the coupon and leftover queen. Not much gets thrown out here.

[Rosie_0801]

Thanks! I am very much enjoying reading this. I bought my first dry beans this week, and I thought of cooking up some of each of the three beans to add to meals this week. The thought of soaking and cooking for each meal didn't thrill me.

 

 

You don't do it that way. You cook up one packet of beans at a time and store them in a tub in the fridge. That way you can pull them out when it's time to fix dinner (or breakfast, or lunch...) If you try to cook them up in time for each meal, you'll stop even bothering to try. Put them to soak over night, then put them on the stove to cook the next morning and leave them to it while you do whatever you usually do. That way they don't really take any time out of your day. Cooking one type of beans at a time takes less effort than cooking a few different types. You don't need the variety in type of beans if you are using the same ones in different recipes. Besides, with a house full of hungry boys, one packet won't last long anyway!

 

:)

Rosie

[Nestof3]

Thanks Rosie. See, I love chili with red beans, kidney beans and black beans. I had always used the cans before. So, I will have to break myself of that. We then use leftover chili on baked potatoes or rice.

 

I am cooking black beans today (with extras) because we are having a Mexican casserole tonight. The leftovers for that will be made into a tortilla soup with added chicken broth.

 

I love making something that can be turned into something else for the next dinner.

[C_l_e_0..Q_c]

my kids are allergic to most legumes, so beans are out of the question for us.

 

But we do have our own wine! And without much trouble too. There's a store nearby where you buy your supplies, and they will make the wine for you! So there's no chance of the wine being bad. And that's a good thing! Our cost is about 4$Cnd per bottle. If we were to "brew" it at home (what does one do to get wine? Isn't brew just for beer?) it would cost us about 2,75$. The extra cost though is worth it to us.

[Sharon H in IL]

Anyone else do a double-take on the sentence: "and seven percent spend a third of their budget on alcohol?"

 

You know it happens, it's just . . . unpleasant to see in black and white, in Mother.

[Jane in NC]

 

But we do have our own wine! And without much trouble too. There's a store nearby where you buy your supplies, and they will make the wine for you! So there's no chance of the wine being bad. And that's a good thing! Our cost is about 4$Cnd per bottle. If we were to "brew" it at home (what does one do to get wine? Isn't brew just for beer?) it would cost us about 2,75$. The extra cost though is worth it to us.

 

Both beer and wine require fermentation using yeast, yet for reasons I don't understand we say that we "brew" beer and "ferment" wine.

 

I'll see if I can figure out why these words are used and report back.

 

Jane

[cjzimmer1]

Thanks Rosie. See, I love chili with red beans, kidney beans and black beans. I had always used the cans before. So, I will have to break myself of that. .

 

No you won't. Beans freeze wonderfully. About once a week, I throw some beans in the crock pot, usually around 2 pounds as that's all my crockpot will hold. Once they are cooked, keep out whatever I plan to use in the next few days and freeze the rest in 2 cup bags (approximately the amount in a can). Just label the bags and then the next time you make beans make a different kind. Pretty soon you will have a collection of as many types of beans that you want.

[Rosie_0801]

No you won't. Beans freeze wonderfully.

Ah! I didn't know that! Thanks for the tip.

:)

Rosie

[Nicole M]

Anyone else do a double-take on the sentence: "and seven percent spend a third of their budget on alcohol?"

 

You know it happens, it's just . . . unpleasant to see in black and white, in Mother.

 

Yes. Me, too. My mouth just dropped open.

[OH Kim]

Another solution for the bean cooking is a pressure cooker. I can presoak beans (either speed soak - 2 minutes in boiling water, then let sit for 1 hour) and then cook them in the pressure cooker usually under 15 minutes, or I can skip the presoak and cook the beans under pressure for 20-45 minutes (depending on the bean.)

 

Lentils unsoaked are often done in 10 minutes in a pressure cooker.

 

The pressure cooker has saved my tookus more times than I can count.

[Blueridge]

Thanks! That was a good article. I especially likes this idea: <<Declare periodic “food rest days,†during which the head cook gets the day off, thus encouraging active refrigerator foraging by other household members.>>

We do this at our house on Sunday evenings...the girls call it 'robbing the larder'. :D

Ginger

[Janet in Toronto]

Thanks! That was a good article. I especially likes this idea: <<Declare periodic “food rest days,†during which the head cook gets the day off, thus encouraging active refrigerator foraging by other household members.>>

We do this at our house on Sunday evenings...the girls call it 'robbing the larder'. :D

Ginger

 

We call it "snack supper" and our teen boys love it. (It also involves eating dinner in front of the TV or a video...double bonus!)

[cathmom]

OK, I've decided - next time I go shopping, I am going to buy water and beans, cook them up and compare what I get with what one can costs and see what the difference really is. Cooking beans is not hard to do, for me it's just the water issue.

[Nestof3]

OK, I've decided - next time I go shopping, I am going to buy water and beans, cook them up and compare what I get with what one can costs and see what the difference really is. Cooking beans is not hard to do, for me it's just the water issue.

 

I cooked my own beans for the first time this week. I used information from these two websites. I read what you said about your water, so I cannot help you there, but I wanted to say that I was very pleased with the results!

 

I used the speed soak method because I started too late in the day.

http://www.ehow.com/how_4724925_cook-dry-beans-hurry.html

 

This has great pictures too. I love pictures (can't you ladies tell?)

http://www.vegancoach.com/how-to-cook-beans.html

[NutriMom]

OK, I've decided - next time I go shopping, I am going to buy water and beans, cook them up and compare what I get with what one can costs and see what the difference really is. Cooking beans is not hard to do, for me it's just the water issue.

 

I usually pay around 65 to 85 cents a pound for dry beans and around the same for one 14-15oz can (around 2 cups). Organic = 1lb = 1.15 and one can equals the same. I get 6 cups of cooked beans from 1lb. For 1/3 the cost of a can I am getting a savings and a knowledge that I do not have any of the preservatives and leeching from the can.

 

I soak the dry beans overnight. In the morning I drain the beans and put into the crockpot. When done I freeze into 2 cup portions. I write these on a freezer list and I can always see what I have. They thaw quickly but I am usually just adding them to soup, so I just dump in frozen.

[cathmom]

I usually pay around 65 to 85 cents a pound for dry beans and around the same for one 14-15oz can (around 2 cups). Organic = 1lb = 1.15 and one can equals the same. I get 6 cups of cooked beans from 1lb. For 1/3 the cost of a can I am getting a savings and a knowledge that I do not have any of the preservatives and leeching from the can.

 

I soak the dry beans overnight. In the morning I drain the beans and put into the crockpot. When done I freeze into 2 cup portions. I write these on a freezer list and I can always see what I have. They thaw quickly but I am usually just adding them to soup, so I just dump in frozen.

 

Thanks! I have to add in the price of buying water to cook the beans with too!

[Mekanamom]

You guys convinced me! DH and I used to brew beer once upon a time... It was fun. So I looked online, found a kit, did a little price comparison between homebrew and the cost of beer at the store, and ordered the kit!

 

DH is Australian, and so I bought the Cooper's Microbrewery kit. Even buying the Coopers (beer mix) refills is cheaper than buying beer at the store... and, of course, now all the Aussies will get the Coopers they've been missing... ;)

 

http://www.makebeer.net/

 

The kit is big enough and expandable enough to branch out with our own recipes if we eventually want to. (We did everything from scratch last time. :))

[the floating cottage]

Thanks, great article!