
Brown rice, veggies, and chicken breast. One way to stretch a tight budget.
My family is on Day 18 of the 30-Day Whole Foods Thrifty Challenge. We’ve settled in, although shopping days (like later today) are still stressful because I know I won’t be able to buy everything I want. I have a pretty good handle on things, though, and how I can feed my family, fairly healthfully, via our budget ($1.82 per person per meal). Here’s what I’ve learned so far:
Sales are Good, Coupons are Irrelevant
Coupons are dispensed by manufacturers to help pump sales of their items. The problem is coupons are almost always for processed foods. If you’re on a tight budget, you’re better off buying the components of the dish and making from scratch. It’ll be healthier and fresher anyway. Coupons just don’t matter at the bottom of the budget ladder.
Sales, on the other hand, can really stretch your budget. We jumped on a great deal for chicken breast that should free up our budget for extra fruits and veggies. Reading the weekly flyer, but also keeping a keen eye out for unadvertised specials, can really add up.
Buy Real Food
Real food is cheaper than processed. The more stuff “done” to it (preparing a sauce, baking a cookie) by someone other than you, the more it will cost. This makes sense, of course; you’re paying for labor and equipment. But if you do the work yourself, you’ll prepare healthier food (I always cut back on butter and oil, for instance, and no one notices), it will be fresh (what’s better than a homemade cookie or slice of bread, still warm from the oven?), and, heck, you’ll burn a few calories preparing it.
We’ve discovered that buying canned, diced tomatoes is cheaper and doesn’t have the sugar normally added to pasta sauce. We can doctor it ourselves with frozen veggies, a fresh onion, and spices, and it tastes better and is healthier. I’m not planning on going back to pasta sauce after our challenge is over.
Grazing is Bad
My husband, son, and I were all unaware grazers. We’d wander through the kitchen and grab a little tidbit of something, barely registering that we were chewing. Now that we’re on a hard budget and food is “rationed,” we are paying attention to every morsel we eat. Guess what? While we felt deprived the first few days, after adjusting, we realized that we weren’t eating because we were hungry, but mostly because we were bored. Bad idea. It’s been a relief to break that trap and none of us are planning on backsliding.
Store Brands Are Quite Good
I was raised on a tight food budget; my Mom didn’t just squeeze every nickel, she squeezed every penny! We bought store brands a lot (back in the ’70s) and they were usually horrible. This isn’t true anymore! We have found all kinds of “365 Brand” items at Whole Foods that we like better than higher-priced name brands. Because Whole Foods does have a mission to provide more healthfully prepared foods, we find the 365 Brand often have more wholesome ingredients and less junk, too. It’s been a revelation and, again, we won’t be going back.
By the way, Whole Foods is gradually changing their entire 365 brand over to 100% organic. That’s not true now, but as they get vendors on board, you’ll see more and more organic items, so keep your eyes open.
Stretch Your Food with Stir-Fry
I’m stuck with starches; it’s a simple fact of life at this end of the budget. If I served the level of fruits and vegetables I truly wanted, we would be hungry. Quite hungry. So I have been serving whole grain and brown rice as much as possible and then I add fruit, vegetables, and lean protein as a “mix-in.” It fills us up, is relatively healthy, and keeps us from starving. It is a sad reality to me that I have to rely on starches to feed my family, but it’s necessary.
Fund SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program)
Despite my struggles with the USDA thrifty budget levels, this is still about 30% more than people receive from SNAP (the new name of the Food Stamps program). I think probably one of the cheapest ways to fix the welfare system is to simply let people feed themselves well. If we increase SNAP allowances to higher levels (much higher levels!), we’ll be able to have kids in school who can focus, parents who can find some extra energy to cook a home meal, or to learn a new skill. We are hamstringing our poor with lousy nutrition. It’s not okay … we need to do better!
So what do you think? What thrifty ideas do you employ at home? I’d love to hear them and share them with everyone, so please add them below!
Cheers,
Lisa
Read ALL the 30-Day Whole Foods Thrifty Challenge posts.
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