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Times are hard, and now more than ever we are all trying to reign in our expenses. This is difficult enough at the best of times but when incomes are shrinking and the cost of food is increasing every week, it can seem as though we are fighting a losing battle. There are some good tips to bear in mind though as you do your shopping that can save you money and still provide your family with a healthy home cooked meal every night of the week. Some of these are below.
Make your Shopping List Flexible
We all know that menu planning is a way to save money, it stops those extra runs to the supermarket when there is ‘nothing’ in the fridge for dinner, and always gives you an answer for when the kids ask ‘Mum, what’s for dinner?’ The only with thing about strict menu planning is what do you do when you get to the supermarket only to find that they don’t have what you want or that the price has risen dramatically since last week’s shop? If you have planned too rigidly you will find that you have severely limited your choice of options.
Instead of planning a specific meal each evening, start first with the type of meal you could make that night, such as a casserole or a stir fry, and then look for the ingredients that would suit those types of meal, selecting the best priced choices from what is on offer. This way you know that you will come home with enough food for the entire week, and solidify your week’s meal plans when you get home from the store.
Shop Clever
Take a good look at the brands that you buy, do you really need to buy that particular brand or could you substitute is with a slightly lower priced brand? If there are some in your family that will only eat a particular brand of cereal for example, buy a slightly lower priced option and then instead of leaving it in its packaging in the cupboard, put in to a cereal storage tub and see if they actually notice that they are eating a different brand. You will be surprised what a difference choosing the next expensive brand will make to your weekly shop.
Be clever when it comes to your ingredients too. If you are making a sauce for example, say for pasta bolognaise, you do not need to buy the very best vegetables. After all they are not going on display. Once they have been chopped up, cooked and possibly blended no one will be able to tell whether they were top class or close to their sell by date. You can save pounds buying like this.
Get Creative
Don’t automatically think that left over food needs to go in the bin. Leftover meat from the Sunday roast can be used for school or work packed lunches through the week. Left over single portion servings can be frozen for use at a later date and bread that is beginning to go stale can still be used for toast or to make a bread and butter pudding for example. Think before you throw anything away – view it as money and you might just find another use for it.
If you want to really learn how to feed your family on a tight budget, why not enrol at one of the culinary schools in your area? Not only will you learn how to cook delicious food, but you’ll learn how to budget for meals too!
