Wow- bananas are expensive there. I regularly see them at $0.39/lb (~$0.86/kg) in the US.
Jebus... $0.86/kg?? Yeah I have a feeling the repeated cyclones that keep destroying all our banana crops are keeping our prices up a bit lol You know at one point a year or two ago they were $12/kg! Was mental...
Well, about six of the 17 food items you posted are processed foods. Maybe this isn't representative of your eating, but yes, you're eating quite a bit of processed foods! IMO, nothing wrong with that, but I did laugh when I read "avoid processed foods like the plague" and then "shaved ham." :)
Which 6 do you consider processed? I consider Rice Crackers and Soft Drink (this is consumed very minimally maybe 1.25Lt per fortnight) to be highly processed. Gluten Free bread (we have considered making this ourselves) and the Lactose Free Milk is processed but not really that bad I don't think. And the only other two possibilities I can see are maybe the can of corn and the ham you mentioned. The can of corn is exactly that... 100% corn in a can (that's it's ingredients list). It's put into a can but ultimately it's just corn so I consider it the same as just buying corn on a cob. By shaved ham I mean get a whole ham... and shave bits off it. It's not meat in a sealed cryo container or anything processed like that it's just straight from the deli shaved off a giant leg of ham. I assume that leg of ham is just as "non-processed" as a giant slab of mince but you never know, either way I don't consider it processed food.
I'm curious as to where all your calories are coming from. You limit meat, and you seem to opt for low-fat products, so I assume that your diet is skewed towards carbs over protein or fat. Was this a conscious decision? Personally, I tend to overeat when my food options are carb-heavy, but not with fat or protein. Fat is calorie-dense, but incredibly satiating. I'm one of those freaks that thinks fears over dietary fat are way overblown, so if you're up for it, I'd say go regular-fat ground beef and full fat milk and see if that makes any difference in your satiety levels and thus grocery spending.
You are correct that our diet is quite heavily skewed towards the carbs end just purely because we try and replace meats with fruit/veg for the most part. Obviously not ALL meats (hence the ~1kg/week) but aside from the higher costs of meat we've mainly cut it down as a lot of things I've read up on say that anything more than about 300/400g per week isn't really that good for you.
As to expanding your repertoire, if your wife tolerates soy, look into Asian cooking. But even without soy, I happily ate a ton of coconut curries and stir fries, which were cheap, easy, and fructose-free.
That's actually not a bad idea. She can take soy fine and I've been wanting to learn how to make butter chicken for a while now, might see what we can bust out :-D
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Thanks for all of those figures, makes it a lot easier to see how prices compare here vs there. To start off with HOLY CRAP corn over there is cheap lol $0.17/150g!??? That's just ridiculous! All your meats seem to be a good 30%+ less than ours from the looks of it as does the fruits. Your whole chickens are especially good too, a 1.5kg whole chicken here would be around the $10 mark as opposed to your $1.74/kg... BIG difference!
But keep a food journal. I have a spreadsheet in my Dropbox account that I can open on my iPhone. I record the prices of all of the foods I buy, location, date, unit cost, etc. So I now know how much food costs, and which stores have the best prices. Because of that, I know that I need to buy most of my groceries at Aldi.
I think I might have a month of doing this to see how it goes, sounds like a good system (except with Google Spreadsheets and my Galaxy Nexus :P) Also, thanks for the site, tis indeed good!
Lots of good posts here, but having been in Oz just last year for a few months, and being a champion bargain grocery shopper here in the US, I'd say, quite simply, food costs are very nearly double there.
Yeah? Double?? I'd say they're not double if you're a local and know where to go for what but if you have no idea and just walk into where ever (especially in the city area's) holy crap it could be triple or quadruple even.
After reading through everything I think the common threads seem to be:
- Keep a log book of cost/location/size so I can focus in on what's the best price from where (and stock up when I know it's a true special)
- Start shopping at Aldi for as much stuff as we can
- Buy more veg/meat/carbs in bulk and start utilizing our freezer more
- Realise that USA has way cheaper food than stupidly expensive Australia (you seen
our house prices BTW?) and maybe aim for $115/week instead of $80/week seeing as most things seem to be around the 30%+ more expensive here
Thanks everyone! :D