Tips Needed: How do I cut down on my grocery bill?

Dried goods. Beans and rice especially. I have black beans soaking right now to prepare with dinner tonight.

1 side order of black beans at a restaurant is $3-$5.

1 can of black beans from the store is $1 (per serving).

1 package of dried black beans is $0.24 (per serving after cook).

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Cutting waaay back on meat helped us quite a bit

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Sounds strange, but: don't go shopping with an empty stomach. That easily leads to impulse purchases.

Make a shopping list, and stick to it. But be flexible: If you planned a cucumber salad and find tomatos are on sale, change your menu: tomato salad it will be. Leave the cucumbers in the shop.

Many herbs can be grown on your balcony or even your windowsill.

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Start shoplifting.

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Stop buying name brand, some store/home brands are better then name brand, just takes time to find them.

Specials are your friend, of there is another store 5min away selling something at a discount buy some extra to save of off your regular bill.

National chains are likely to be more expensive anyway, try going to a smaller shop or international chain to get cheaper goods.

Now for the controversial take. Eat less meat, give some of the fake meat a try. They are generally cheaper and less deadly if cooked incorrectly.
Remember I said less meat, not none. You can still get meat if you want but meat is far more expensive then substitute meats.

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In what world do you live that fake meat is cheaper then regular meat???

Beyond is ~$8/lb Impossible ~$9/lb

I can regularly find chicken and beef for $4-6/lb If I shop around can usually score meat for ~$2/lb

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- We have a frozen food chain around here (Ontario, Canada) that has a wonderful selection of faux meat, often brand name (Beyond, Gardein, etc), but also their own brand.
  
  Super cheap! I usually get massive bags or boxes of the stuff for under $20, usually much less. Not long ago they had vegan cheese for like $2.50 a bag, and the bag was at least the size of 4 or 5 dayia packages.
  
  I consider myself extremely lucky to have them around. I refuse to pay $8 for four veggie sausages 😂
  
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We’re in Hy-Vee country and the just ran a special over Labor Day, 80/20 ground beef at $2.99/#. We bought 10 to chuck in the deep freeze which will probably last us at least a year.

Most places where we are charge more for the “faux” meat products. Better to move into meat alternatives or cut it to a meal or 2 a week instead of switching.

I wish it was cheaper for meatless meat products here because we would probably switch almost completely off meat then.

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Stop buying name

I disagree with this only because prices for store brand stuff has been wacky the past year.

I'm often finding much better prices (per 100g) on brand name cereal than no name. Even brand name condiments, spreads, or drinks, have gone on sale to be cheaper than no name equivalents.

But yes, generally speaking, no name is often cheaper for just about everything.

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Stop buying name brand

to add to this, don’t turn your nose up at the discount options – dollar stores, Grocery Outlet, Walmart – and along those same lines, keep an eye out for any ethnic markets near you (fruit, vegetables, meat)

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- Be careful with those budget/dollar stores though, the actual price per weight is often higher than regular grocery goods.
  
  Around me there’s an Amish store that gets stuff that was pulled from regular groceries - damaged outer packaging, just past expiry (dry and canned goods where that doesn’t matter as much), and stuff that doesn’t sell well, that heavily discounts everything. If there’s anything like that around you, it’s a great way to save a ton.
  
  Also, befriend gardeners if you can - they love to share!
  
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- I'm going to have to disagree on the dollar stores. I once bought American cheese at one and it wouldn't melt. I don't know what it was, but it wasn't cheese.
  
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A lot of the "pre-made" stuff, we cut down on. Cheaper to make breakfast burritos rather than spend $2 per burrito.
finding when they mark down prices. My supermarket always throws 50% off stickers on hot food around 3pm on certain days. I can get a whole 10pc fried chicken for $6.
eat more staples. Most of my meals are now rice + protein + vegetables. Or bread + veggies + proteins.
Asian supermarkets sell things cheaper
mostly vegetarian diet. Meat is expensive AF. But lately, the meat alternatives are getting pricey too.

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I managed to save a lot on meat upon realizing that a lot of it is the same ingredient, just cut and treated differently.

A pork belly had so manu uses, if you have a good knife and a saw you're willing to use for food;
Ribs for the grill
Bacon (I'm sure every texan will feel a disturbance in the force upon me posting this, but a smoker doesn't have to be fancy. A homemade wood fired one will do)
Pulled pork
Roast

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what’s the saw for exactly?

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- big bones, I suppose
  
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Have you identified what the most expensive food group or food category for you is? That can help us give you some direction.

For me, making beans in a pressure cooker instead of buying canned saved us a ton.

Buying bagged potatoes instead of frozen fries helped too.

Using a bread making made a difference.

Stocking up when actual good deals come up helps over time.

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My most expensive food group is meat for sure. Beef has gone down a little bit in price but it’s still much higher than 4 years ago.

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Eat less is the simplest solution.

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Just die and your bill will be zero

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- This also helps lower your electric bill if you remember to turn the a/c off first.
  
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What I used to do is to actually keep track of how much money worth of groceries are in my cart. Eggs go in the cart, put $1.69 in my smartphone. A bag of pistacios - $9.95. And then when I had everything from my list in the cart (plus maybe some potential impulse purchases) I'd add it all up. If my budget was $150 and when I added it up it was more than $150 (which was usually the case) I'd put things back on shelves until I got down to my budget. (These figures are 1) U.S. dollars, 2) don't include tax, 3) from quite a few years ago, 4) poorly remembered, and 5) for a family of 3 (plus two dogs). So don't freak out if these figures don't match up with what you think reasonable figures for you might be.)

I was using a hackable smartphone then and had written some custom stuff that wouldn't work on a modern smartphone to make keeping track of amounts and adding them up at the end easier. I'm not sure if there are any good apps for that kind of thing now-a-days. It would be cool if you could scan UPC barcodes with your phone and it would remember how much that item was from last time you bought it (though you could correct it if the price had changed since then.) That was something I was hoping to add to my system back when I was using it, but never got it done.

But, once I had a cart full of things and how much each cost, I could more easily weigh the value to me against the cost and make decisions about what to leave out that I was happier with later than if I guessed vaguely ahead of time.

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We stopped shopping at Costco and started using sams club for bulk items we knew we would need regularly and go through before expiration. Their inventory was more consistent and prices were slightly better.

We meal plan every meal for the whole week on the weekend, then go grocery shopping afterward, ONLY getting what we need for the meals.

We stopped shopping at Sprouts, Kroger, and Albertsons, and prioritized WinCo and Neighborhood market.

If you have a winco, use their bulk section as much as possible. I did a side by side comparison of a normal shopping trip between Kroger and Winco. We bought the same items from both stores preferring store brands where possible) Kroger came to $85. Winco came to $39. (Mix of produce, eggs, lunch meats, box dinners, etc)

Our grocery bill was 500-600/mo pre 2021, jumped to 800-1000 by 2022. With the above changes, we got it back down to about 600/mo.

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Rice, beans, carrots, potatoes, slow cooker.

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Go vegan!

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Do you have some old receipts? If so you can go through them item by item to see how much stuff on there isn't something you technically "need". i.e. soda, ice cream, chips, energy drinks, etc. I'm not saying don't ever get a treat for yourself but maybe you're spending more on these things than you realize.

Then, like others have said, consider switching to off-brand foods and "shopping deals" i.e. I usually get broccoli but asparagus is on sale so I'll get that this week instead.

This is kind of related but depending your housing situation maybe consider starting a veggie garden. I've always thought it would be cool to have a salad for dinner made from veggies I 100% grew myself but sadly I have yet to do this V_V

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Same problem, but inflation is the reason.

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Lucky I guess but noticed when I leave work at 4.30pm, I can get to the local sainsburys in 5 minutes and the amount of discounted food is crazy. I buy gbp 4.00 meals all the time for 99p then just freeze and eat for the next few weeks.

Good as long as you aren't picky and will eat anything.

Freezer currently full of meat and ready made meals.

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Get staples from food pantries, go shopping for things you can't get that way. Pantries near me often have more fresh produce than they can give away, you won't be taking it from someone else.

Aldi is cheaper than most other chain stores.

A lot of bakeries sell day-old bread at a markdown.

And if you're eating meat more than three times a week, you're doing it wrong. The less, the better, for your pocketbook and the environment.

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