Last year in NJ I averaged $250 a month on food and this year in CO I'm averaging $280 a month. We're a family of 5. I had a garden in NJ but less store options/competition. I really miss Aldi! :( See if you have one of those. A garden is Strategy 1.
Out here I have at least 2 super stores, half a dozen chain grocery stores, and dozens of specialty markets all within a 5 mile radius. I shop mostly at the cheapest grocery chain and Save-A-Lot. I get a lot of my produce from Bountiful Baskets, a food co-op. Also see if you have one of those. Discovering cheaper sources for what you buy the most is strategy 2. I stop at a second, more expensive chain for their loss leaders. When I need to go to Walmart or Target I stock up on things like coffee, peanut butter(always seems to be cheaper than grocery sales)and HHB(Home-Health-Beauty). Stocking up when there are great prices is strategy 3. I rarely even look in the grocery HHB aisles. This week I will be getting shampoo at the grocery though. A mailed coupon plus a sale will net me my favorite brand for 65% off WM prices.
That leads me to strategy 4, coupons. I do not go out of my way to get or process these since most of what I buy is staples. Some are mailed to me from manufacturers, some come with the local shopping guides free in the mail, some I can load onto my grocery savers cards and some I can print from online sites. When I get one of those RedPlum type coupon things I look quickly through it and make a mental note of any really good opportunities, write the date on the front and slip it into a plastic page protector. If you follow coupon savings sites, they will match up your local ads with the coupons in those sheets. If you know the date each booklet was distributed you can easily find the coupon they talk about without having to cut and file hundreds of tiny pieces of paper. I don't even bother to really skim my coupons until my list is complete. For example, I needed to get shampoo this or next week. The store ad has my favorite brand 15% off the WM price. Since it's a brand item I flipped through my coupon pages and found a coupon for it. It took only 20 seconds to save $3 on what I wanted to buy anyway. Same thing with online coupons. If you see something in the ad that is a pretty good deal, and you needed to buy it anyway, flip through your paper coupons or do a quick online search. Most places take printed coupons now that more security features are built into them. With very little couponing effort, I still manage to save almost $30 a month on items I was going to buy anyway. I've never understood the point of getting elaborate deals which fill your pantry with foods you wouldn't normally buy and eat just because they were nearly free. I'd rather pay $1 can for sale tuna in water than score $.25 cans of tuna in flavored oil.
And that brings me to strategy 5, eating less meat and junk. The more you can make at home from scratch, the more filled up you will feel with less. We noticed this effect years ago when I stopped buying anything with hydrogenated oils and then even more so when I stopped buying items with corn syrup in them. Stick to serving sizes with meat. Never ever "fill up" with meat(well, I guess there's a pass on that at special occasions and holidays). When you eat less, you can eat better quality and you will learn to love fruits and veggies. I've watched an almost complete transformation in my hubby over the last 15 years. Anyone can change with time and effort and should actually come to love the changes.
When you start eliminating junk you will almost certainly be forced to recreate your favorite items at home with ingredients you approve of. Strategy 6, prepping, cooking and baking your own. Basic cookbooks and online sites like Allrecipes are really all you need to do it yourself. Practice makes perfect. I'm in my early 30's now and I grew up helping my mom in the kitchen from my toddler years. I was blessed with a mom who was not only a great teacher but a great cook. I then went on to work in a restaurant and then a bakery. I know I have more experience and interest in the area of food preparation than most people do and that one reason why people often doubt the numbers in my budget. They've never spent 20 happy hours in their kitchen in a week's time.
Strategy 7 is to shop less often. The more often you're in stores the more you will put in your cart because it looks or sounds good. It's really easy to forget what you have at home already and when you buy more you decrease the likelihood that you will be able to consume everything you've purchased before it spoils. I try to do the big stock-up shopping day only once a month. This takes about 4 hours and I usually make 6 or more stops. Then I spend less than 30 minutes on the other weeks just stopping in for loss leaders and perishables. I have a large upright freezer that costs less about $3 a month to run. I have a pantry, a dehydrator and canning jars. I'm not super gung-ho about any method or having a year of food or anything. I just want to have enough of what I use the most obtained cheaply that will last until the next sale where I can obtain them cheaply again. Some things, not many, I will stock up a year's supply. This week I will be stocking up on a a year's supply of blueberries(about 10 lbs). Blueberries freeze exceptionally well and take up little space in the freezer. Prices for this fruit are a their yearly rock bottom near July 4th. Being very aware of what's in season and the rock bottom price will really help the budget. You should never buy oranges in summer or melons in winter. Drives me crazy when I read comments on other sites that lament the cost of produce. Yes, $3 a head for iceberg is very expensive. Maybe they shouldn't eat so much salad in winter. Try to eat mostly what's fresh and in season and use some of your own frozen items to fill the nutritional gaps. Steamed green beans from your freezer that you bought at $1lb are way better for you than that head of iceberg anyway.
An lastly, strategy 8, don't waste food! Don't overbuy. Process things quickly to avoid spoilage. Eat leftovers for lunch the next day, freeze any remainder for a weekend meal or as an ingredient in "planned-overs". Don't let your picky palette hold you hostage. If all that's left from the chicken taco meal is the beans and a tortilla, don't be a baby, eat the beans and tortilla. One meal that isn't exactly what you wanted isn't a big deal in the grand scheme of things. There will be other meals coming up that you will love. Sometimes food can be just about sustenance.
