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Food Prices and how your coping...

4K views 38 replies 28 participants last post by  daylily 
#1 ·
I was just thinking as I was washing up the dinner dishes about how I have changed a few things to help keep costs down.

* Cooking a bit less pasta. Last week I made 1/2 batch of spaghetti and now I have frozen sauce for the next time plus the other 1/2 box of pasta

* Cooking more from scratch (bread, rolls, and such)

* The other day I was scraping every speck out of the peanut butter jar...

* Scraps that Sadie can eat we give to her (meat, etc.)

So, I am curious if rising prices are changing anything in your kitchen?
 
#2 ·
I've made a few changes as well. I have gotten more diligent in using up leftovers. I fix less at mealtimes so there aren't as many leftovers to begin with. We've cut out all snacky-type foods unless they are homemade (and cheap to make). We've basically just taken things that we already did around the house to save money and have gotten more intense and diligent with those things.
 
#3 ·
Luckily,we have the .39-.59 bread store available
a huge processed food stockpile and Ds is at college so demands are down.
That said-yikes.
We didn't renew Sams or Costco
Kroger has raised their mark down prices radically
And my 2 new dogs are puppies on growth spurts so costs are still up
And going to the grocery even w/ coupons is very disheartening.
 
#4 ·
I'm buying and stocking as much as I can now....I probably shocked some of you by my answer by saying this..but..it will save me money down the road as prices continue to rise..I'm buying as many canned veggies for a very cheap (I tend to serve veggies at every meal) price right now that should last me over a year or more and hoping my garden gives me better result's next year than my overwhelming let down this year..I'm also stocking all the meat I can fill my freezer with right now to be able to avoid the huge increases we all will be facing..I know I will have to pay the high prices sooner or later but since I'm in the position to stockup I'm going for it! This is how I feel I'm saving money for my family down the road..

I also bought insulation for our attic... (all Energy Star efficent)a new Entry door & new Storm door ..all will hopefully save us money on our heating bill..
 
#5 ·
* The other day I was scraping every speck out of the peanut butter jar...

So, I am curious if rising prices are changing anything in your kitchen?
Yes, I have always done this. And with the mayo jars too.
Bought some plastic long handled ice tea spoons at $ store and use those..........don't have any metal ice tea spoons and thrift shops wanted over a buck a piece.....NOT!!!

I am buying more when there is a good........and I mean GOOD....sale.

IE: bought a '2 limit butter sale' today for $1.77.........and going back tomorrow for more. It hasn't even been down to $1.99 in a long time.......probably since last Xmas.
 
#6 ·
Thankfully I live close to a Target store, where they regularly mark down their meat items on "clearance" (I go almost every day to check out the clearance isles). They also slap $1, $2, and $3 coupons on packages that I can combine with manufacturer coupons at times. When they mark them down to a ridiculously low price, I buy it all and throw it in the freezer. We eat very well, spending very little. We're empty nest now, so it's much less money to buy food now.
 
#7 ·
Luckily, I got our grocery shopping to such a science back in our 'poor' days that we're only slightly feeling the pain from rising prices.

- what fruits and vegetable we don't grow we purchase from the bountifulbaskets.org produce coop. If you haven't heard of it, it's available in several states and you get a huge fruit/veggie basket for $15, available weekly but you only buy-in when you want.

- We buy flour, sugar, and pasta in bulk at a restaurant supply store for a fraction of its cost elsewhere.

-Buy meat in bulk directly from a butcher and freeze it. We only purchase beef once a year this way. I also rarely make meat main dishes and instead use 1/4 to 1/2 lb. as an ingredient or topping in other types of meals.

-Dairy is our main budget buster. We are going to start raising laying hens in the backyard in the spring, but eggs aren't the killer. It's cheese! I buy it on sale and try to use it sparingly.

-We buy no junk food or prepackaged food (with the exception of dry pasta). I make desserts/snacks from scratch. We even brew our own beer and ginger ale. I have an awesome, easy ginger ale recipe if anyone is interested I'll post it in the recipe section.

I need to come up with some cost savers for peanut butter and milk. We're starting to feel the rising prices there and peanut butter, a family fave, is only going to get worse. :(
 
#8 ·
I'm not happy going into any grocery store anymore.
With our low income/tight budget, I feel like it's a constant juggling act. It's frustrating seeing the prices go up and up.

We had the garden this year and I was able to get some of it, into the freezer and canning jars. I still have some squash and some pumpkins to work with.

I was able to buy some produce at the market this summer while I was set up also. The vender next to me, is a baker and end of day, we been doing some swaps. She sends me home with cookies, etc, and she gets some of my produce. The most recent exchange, she got a dz eggs, and some little pumpkins from me.

Yesterday I was in a store that I am not usually in. I was able to buy some marked down meat for the freezer. I must have hit, the right day of the week for their markdowns.

When I see a GOOD sale, and if I have the money, I get extras.

EGGS. Please don't buy a few chickens to get cheap eggs. It costs a lot now for their feed. I have 60 birds currently, with about 27 that are old enough to lay. I do sell their eggs, but it's not keeping up with the grain costs. And if you have a animal that is in production, they have to be maintained correctly.
 
#9 ·
It is getting more difficult each week Ds and Dh are big eaters both are skinny so I cant tell them to eat less for their health lol. I now have bread at every meal and make alot of potatoes I spend alot of time searching out bargains and I guess and upside of not finding a job is I have the time to do so.
 
#11 ·
I shop more than one store. I go to ones that are close to me. I do on occasion go to Save-A-Lot which is in another town, but this week they have things like 39 cent chicken leg quarters and $1 bologna, so I will be shopping there this week as well. I only buy the cheapest meat in the ads for that week. I do have a pretty good stock of meat in our fridge/freezers, so I can go with buying only one thing a week. That is all that I have room for right now anyway because we do not have a stand alone freezer, but we do have more than one refrigerator.

I do not buy an item unless it is on sale or I have a coupon most of the time. Dh and I do not eat chips, sweets... and we have a soda stream machine which makes soda very affordable.

We have definitely made lots of changes.

A2M
 
#12 ·
I get most milk from neighboring farms - raw (unpasturized), and has cream (which I pour off and use in recipes.) The price is cheaper than the grocery. I've been using our garden veggies, and only buy if I really need something that I don't have either frozen, home-canned, or dehydrated. Meat is tricky - I'm only buying when there's a great sale, and loading up to break into "our" size packages for freezer (usually 1/2 - 1 pound each, vaccuum bags). Did go through freezer yesterday morning, need fish!! and hamburg. Still have lots of steak and chicken breasts.
Due to my health (lack thereof) I am cooking with more grains, less meat. Vegetarian cookbook getting a workout lately. My chicken ladies supply us with eggs, but production has slowed - not a bad thing.
As sales occur, we take inventory of our freeze-dried and dehydrated things, and stock up. (Reminds me, I need to mylar about 150 pounds of beans!)
 
#13 ·
I still shop the specials and markdowns at Market Basket. Picked up chicken quarters for 99 cents lb the other day, Barilla pasta at 89 cents per lb, butter was on sale so I bought two for the freezer. Artichokes were 50 cents each, so I stuffed them and we had them as an appetizer. Bought some marked down zucchinis for 25 cents total and made it with mint and a red wine vinegar and evoo. So far, so good.
 
#14 ·
I am on a restricted diet of sorts...no sugar, caffeine, soy, and little salt. That means we make a lot from scratch. Our prices have always been high here in Canada, but we're poised for them to go higher yet this winter. It's getting ridiculous.

I have a cold room that is mostly full, and a freezer that is mostly full. I just have to remember to use what's in them! Too many changes at once are hard to maintain. I simply forget what I've got and what for! I think I need a master list somewhere.

I'm finding it's cheaper to buy a frozen flat crust pizza for $2.50-3.00 than to make pizza at home. I buy the spinach and feta and add some tomato slices and green pepper and voila! Cheap, easy and quick.

Yes, we're eating more vegetarian...probably much to my dietitian's dismay as she's been advocating more protein in my diet. Frankly we can't afford more protein. I'll be checking out the local butcher though. He may have a deal on a Family Pack of meat or some such. Though it would have to be lean meat.

I'm not entirely sure where we'd put it. My freezer is almost full too...of vegetables and fruit for winter. Mostly fruit. Fruit gets very expensive here in winter and often is not available...unless you want oranges, bananas or apples!

I bought a new-to-us used KitchenAid yesterday in hopes it will enable me to do things like bake my own bread. My hands hurt so much these days (I'm assuming it's arthritis) that I haven't been kneading bread by hand as I normally do. I hear I can do all sorts of things with the right attachments too.

Other than that, I've been carefully shopping sales and stocking up.
 
#15 ·
our store is the only one for 30+ miles so it pretty much can charge what it wants and the people pay. I am currently stocking up on peanut butter as it's a fam fav and I only purchase it when it's on sale, they had a decent price on pasta this past wk-so I grabbed enough to last us for a few months. I keep friendly with several staff at the store so they will give me a heads up sometimes when something is going on sale. we are also 'scrappers'. I make my own jelly/jams so always have some in supply. we do not eat meat very much so I buy maybe once over a six mths period when we get a 'craving' from the 'rotten meat' counter-that's what my grandmother called the marked down section of the meat counter..... my son gets a kick out of saying that to the meat manager at the store- 'hey mr. mike where's the rotten meat' the first time he said that he was 3 now Mike will just point-they now have a dedicated portion of the cooler for sale meat- personally I think Mike got tired of having to explain to other customers that comment.... still funny though.
we have a $10 a month snack budget-(ds has learned to leave some chocolate for his sister and myself if he wants to have a peaceful life lol) and in winter I bake a lot (not so much in the summer as I have a gas range), we do lots of homemade soups, bean dishes, rice dishes- I've been slowly building a stockpile of dry goods- I wait for frozen veggies to go on sale 5/$5 and I dehydrate them and keep them in mason jars that I seal with the foodsaver attachment.
I want to get back into coupon's but we have 'coupon thief's that steal them from the sunday paper I've been burned several times over the last few mths so have stopped trying.
I also try to go to sav-a-lot to buy flats of canned foods that we enjoy, their prices have also increased but it beats the local store.
much as I hate to admit I buy most of my veggies once a month from walmart as they are just to high at the local store. my mom has several people who give her things from their gardens and she shares (I think she thinks I don't feed her grandchildren) with me. i try to cultivate friendships with gardener's so I can buy their excess veggies to offset spending too much at the store.
 
#16 ·
I used to do a lot of coupon shopping, but stopped for the most part because we eliminated processed foods from our house. When we used to do that our grocery bill was about $75 a week for a family of 5. Now there are 6 of us and 2 are teens so I would guess our bill would go up just from that, but that along with eliminated coupons and processed food has only raised our budget by about $25. We spend around $100 a week on groceries for 6 people. I have noticed prices going up, but not HUGE increases. The largest one I've noticed is milk, but we don't use a lot of it and I still get it for under $3 a gallon. I have noticed some shrinking packages- less for the same amount. But honestly have just kind of changed what I buy and buy only when on sale. No brand loyalty. I have prices I'll pay for each item and won't buy when it is above that. I don't cook less or feed my family less food. Just different food.
 
#23 ·
I used to do a lot of coupon shopping, but stopped for the most part because we eliminated processed foods from our house...I have noticed prices going up, but not HUGE increases...But honestly have just kind of changed what I buy and buy only when on sale. No brand loyalty. I have prices I'll pay for each item and won't buy when it is above that. I don't cook less or feed my family less food. Just different food.
This describes my methods very well. The changes I have made to keep the budget in check involve cooking more and more things from scratch and deciding what to buy based on what's on sale, instead of deciding what I want or [think I] need and then trying to find it at the best price.

This allows me to keep my budget for 2 adults to $100 a month. Sure, we don't eat a hugely varied diet (the same vegetables tend to go on sale week after week), but it's reasonably healthy (we do eat too much rice, bread, and potatoes as fillers), but we don't eat out and eat very little processed food, so sodium and additives are at a minimum.

This is working for us to keep our food bills relatively low, even with the near-constant increases.

Kara
 
#17 ·
Ladytoydream,
Thanks for the chicken warning but we aren't getting them to save money, but because of other goals for sustainable living and self sufficiency. I'm well aware of the cost and effort, three of our neighbors raise backyard hens. :)
 
#18 ·
I'm glad you are thinking ahead.

We have the chickens because we want to know where our food comes from. Also why we garden. I just want people to realize that grain costs are going through the roof.

So we had the cost of a new coop a few years ago. Good heavy 6 ft chainline fence. I was lucky and found a partial roll at a sale for
$ 10, was gifted with another partial roll, and found 20 pieces of kennel cage sections this spring on craiglist for the right money.

We plan on keeping the chickens for quite some time. I just have to convince the hubby , how much more of his lawn that should be made into a bigger garden.......for us and the birds.
 
#19 ·
I am finding it more important than ever to stockpile big time when I hit upon a great sale. So that is what I am trying to do. the granola bars my kids love at the lowest price I have seen in ages - I bought as many as I had coupons for. peanut butter? Before amazon hiked their prices I bought 2 cases. Pasta on sale for $1 a lb (first time in 6 months) I bought 20 boxes. You get the drift. Unfortunately all of this won't last but a few months at most with 6 people.

I am also trying to cook more from scratch, but that is always a battle - time versus money, you know? Wish I could tell the kids to eat less, but they are all super skinny and growing, so not an option.

I am also trying to find cheaper local sources for things. I found sucanat for half what Amazon or local grocers want down in amish country. They had some great deals on other things too. Might be worth a stop in when I am in that area.

It is frustrating! We can only do as much as we can and hope for the best. Lots of great ideas in this thread though. Thanks!
 
#21 ·
I went from buying store brand/generic brand items + name brand items when store/generics aren't available, to now just buying store/generic brand items. If there is only a name-brand available, I just don't use the item. An example of that is low-fat mayo, which only Hellmann's sells here. I just don't use that anymore.

I have reduced our food budget by about 1/2 since September. It was pretty much the only area I could still cut from when DH's salary got cut by several hundred/month.

I'm grateful for the stockpile I started in August. If it weren't for that, I don't know what we would do!

Another big change: I went from whole grain rice, whole wheat pasta, and whole wheat flour to white everything. I really, really didn't want to do this. I do still buy whole wheat unground for grinding. And I still have some whole grain rice and pasta in the stockpile. But from now on, we'll be purchasing the far-cheaper white varieties. :( I'm still not comfortable with this, but it is what it is.
 
#22 ·
An example of that is low-fat mayo, which only Hellmann's sells here. I just don't use that anymore.
You do know you can make low fat mayonnaise yourself? It is cooked on the stove and uses milk in it. 3/4 c. skim milk, 2 tbsp. flour, 3 tbsp. sugar, 1/2 tsp. salt, 1/2 tsp. dry mustard. Shake in a jar. Pour into saucepan and cook till thickened. Add 1/4 c. vinegar and heat through. You can add herbs or onions for more flavour if you want. :)

Hope that staves off any feelings of deprivation you might be having in the mayonnaise department. ;)
 
#24 ·
HappyMama's Ditching the Grocery store thread has my posts about fruits and vegetables. We don't eat meat or dairy so those prices are not an issue. DS's gluten-free pastas are not cheap but he has cut way back on them and only eats it occasionally. None of us eat much pasta now. We make all our own baked goods. We only drink water, never juice, etc. unless it's juice we've canned.

We don't eat processed food unless the guys are out traveling without food and buy some tortilla chips.

For the past two years, we've been experimenting with wild foods. Some of them are good, some are tolerable :) By that I mean I could eat them if I needed too and be OK with them. But at least if we have to eat wild foods, we know how to find and identify them and how to prepare them. We've made maple syrup, prepared acorns, and tried various wild greens. We've also been playing around with the parts of vegetables people usually throw away such as radish leaves, radish seed pods, etc.

There is a discount/salvage food store about an hour from us. If Mom has a doctors appointment that direction, we stop by and see what they have. Sometimes we find great deals, sometimes not.
 
#25 ·
Right now I am on a no flour or dairy (milk) diet. So with my other food restrictions I basically make everything from scratch. After getting rid of flour and dairy I can't believe how little I need to eat to feel full.

Right now I am back to embrassing more beans, frozen fish, and eggs. The grocery store had eggs for $.99. I purchased 4 containers. Used one to make a frattata for company. The rest should last me into the beginning of December. I have never purchased this amount of eggs before but I figured they are a good source of protein so why not.

I still purchase produce that is on sale and always scan the manager's specials for produce and meat.

Fortunately I have so much in HBA that I really do not need to purchase any more except bodywash for the year!! So right now most of my grocery money can go directly towards food!
 
#27 ·
Peanut - I admit to using an inventory list at the location (ie one in garage), as well as a matching one in the kitchen for food items) this way, I can glance in the kitchen to see if I have, let's say ham in the chest freezer without having to put boots on and go trudging through snow or mud then paw through lots of frozen stuff, hoping there's some in the freezer. If I'm good at remembering to mark off what I take out, it's up to date. (the remembering part is challenging sometimes)

I have cold storage (potatoes and squash, some apples left), two freezers, full basement, and HBA stuff in the mudroom.
 
#28 ·
I just hate the limit sales...........but got four more pounds of butter today..........for $1.77. Might go back for more before the sale is over next Tuesday.

I think it will be back down there more often close to the holidays.............the expiration dates are just too close.........the stores HAVE to get rid of it.

So, once again.............when a good sale hits........STOCK UP!!

Now I need one for TP!!
 
#29 ·
This is were I am still having trouble. If I cook, no leftovers grandma leaves tons of leftovers and I hate it but what am I to do. I do not take her shopping with me she raises my grocery bill at least 25 dollars. I buy all meat on sale in bulk and freeze. I buy produce only when I need it. I buy lots of generics and stockpile. It is hard and we do not like leftovers very much.
Started buy less snacky stuff and eating full meals. We snack on apples and bananas. Generic fruit pop hubby enjoys this won't take it away from him. Grandma will not drink water from my brita filter it has to be bottled with peach flavoring. She drinks lots of ice tea. We make a 1/2 pot of coffee rather than throwing the rest away. Grandma is stuck on frozen breakfast sandwiches so that is lots of money . I buy them because at least she eats that. Rather than wasting box after box of cereal that no one will eat. ( she picks it out and still won't eat it)
 
#30 ·
I'm trying much harder not to let anything in the fridge go to waste. On Monday, DH pulled out six 1-lb packages of ground beef to defrost and told me that it's 'unsafe' to eat now. I convinced him that if you fry it up TONIGHT, it'll be fine. Thankfully, that's $12 I saved! Gah!
 
#31 ·
~Eating out of the freezer this month and just picking up perishables. I went way over budget last month. Some was stocking up on sales but most was just increases for staples. Hoping to spend less than $200 this month. That means I haven't restocked the usual hot dogs and ice cream when we ran out 2 weeks ago. They're the kids' favorites. There's been a lot of peanut butter sandwiches around here lately. But now my peanut butter is almost gone. *sigh*
Luckily a few weeks ago my BIL(who is a grocery vendor)made friends with a baking vendor and is getting pallets of just expired baked goods. He's passed along 12 loaves of whole grain and specialty breads, 2 packs of bagels, and 8 bags of crackers and cookies to us over the last month. It's been wonderful!~
 
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