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Hawaii Babies
How much do you spend monthly...
on groceries (food and household items) and eating out (meals and incidentals like coffee or snacks)?
Last month we were at $550 for groceries and $190 for eating out for our family of 3. Not sure where this falls, since we live in a high cost-of-living state (e.g., $5.50 for a half gallon of organic whole milk), but I'm curious what other estimates would be.
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Re: How much do you spend monthly...
Our grocery budget makes me
.
We spend about $700-$800 on groceries (eating out is a whole other story), and that's budget shopping - no organics, no pricey cuts of meat, no prepackaged food, buying generic brands for staple items like flour, etc. We meal plan and that helps keep costs down, but that's about all we can do - unfortunately they don't use coupons here so there aren't ways like that of reducing the bill.
Australia is craaaaaazy expensive for food, and we could easily spend upwards of $1k a month if we weren't careful or bought more premium items.
We spent about $700-$800 last month for the 2 of us...and that was with us trying hard to be "good" -- taking sandwiches or left overs for lunch, no fancy dinners, "going out" meant fast food or plate lunch.
Before we bought the house, I think we probably spent around $1000...
Thanks, ladies! I guess we're normal then.
Here's a great budget recipe blog that I found recently. It's got great photos, directions and a ton of decently healthy recipes -- I'm so inspired to try some new stuff!
https://budgetbytes.blogspot.com
Thanks for the link. I always try to calculate how much our meal actually cost us. Let me know how you like some of the recipes...I'm interested if trying a few out too!
I definitely need to learn to make the most out of my grocery budget. I'm not a big cooker in general, but I remember when I first got laid off and tried to cook dinner to save some money. I spent about $40 making curry for the two of us
Part of the reason was I needed to buy "basics" like flour, sugar, etc. But still...I felt like it would have been cheaper to just go to Bangkok Chef!
I know what you mean. I rarely follow recipes perfectly; I just use them as inspiration and try to work with what I have or what is on sale. I try to keep dinners around $10-12 a pop and big enough to last two nights. Obviously, we eat pretty simply around here.
Recently, I discovered that NOT shopping so much at Costco actually saves us lots of money. I get more variety and can still get good values if I shop at Don Quijote or Safeway (they price match competitors and have so many great coupons online via the club card), especially for produce. Who would've thought?
Tonight I made chicken adobo in the crock pot, which is so basic and probably cost all of $8 for 2 nights' worth. I'm gonna try the apple spice pork chops and the marinated white beans from the blog this week. Both seem pretty straightforward and don't require too many purchases at the grocery store. Let me know if you try any good ones too!
Chiming in late here...we are a family of 3 adults and one toddler. We spend $100-150/week at the grocery store (that includes food and sundries, household supplies, etc.). We probably spend another $80-100/mo. eating out (mostly DH when he's at school/work).
I think we could do better...but my mom and DH won't really do leftovers, so that means cooking fresh everynight. They are not big fans of
"reheat and eat" meals. Sometimes I can get away with it on things like rice, pasta (kept in the fridge unsauced), chili and grilled chicken. But even then, it's like one-day MAX and then they avoid it like the plague so either I'm eating it for days on end or it goes to waste.
Once we're settled into our new home I plan to utilize our crock pots more and do meal planning for the week so we can get a tighter rein on our spending AND ensure that we're eating well-balanced meals each day.
TTC/PG Blog | Mommy Blog
MH is like this too. Plus he doesn't have a fridge or microwave at work, so it's hard for him to take leftovers for lunch. I feel kind of sick when I see how much food we throw out when we clean the fridge. Since we moved closer to my parents, we have been switching off cooking days with them and trying to make just enough for the four of us so we don't have leftovers.
we don't spend very much on groceries every month, maybe $200-300/month.....I take the ads with me and get price matches at Target and Walmart. that said, I don't cook every night... I usually cook about 2x/wk and we eat leftovers or simple stuff like sandwiches, cereal w/milk, etc. plus we don't buy very much organic stuff ....but we plan to start doing that soon.... cannot wait until we have a TJs here so we can do that more affordably.
for eating out, we spend even less. about $30-60/month. I usually treat myself to lunch out once/week on a day that I am working and then every once in a while we'll eat out. we just don't eat out much b/c it is obviously more expensive than eating in and we're so frugal!
if you want to check out another good blog on frugal cooking then google Prudence Pennywise
Jaime & Brent
Oahu, Hawaii | Sept. 9, 2005
My Food Blog - Good Eats 'n Sweet Treats