Eating Well on a Budget

As a foodie and a student, it's hard to find the right balance between spending all my money on delicious food and saving enough so I can buy textbooks.  So, today we'll be talking about how to eat well on a budget.

• Keep a well-stocked pantry

     Having a well-stocked pantry is going to be the easiest way to make sure you always have food on hand to make a meal.  Eating out often is an easy way to lose a lot of money very quickly, so having the ingredients to make meals every day of the week is important.  Now, I don't always want to make an elaborate meal, so I stock up on easy things like pasta and sauce, ingredients for nachos, etc because they are  fast and easy meals to make.  This saves me from having to get take out because I don't want to go to the grocery store to buy ingredients.  Here's what I stock my pantry with, but the idea is to think up a few fast meals that use ingredients that tend not to go bad quickly.

Whole-wheat Pasta

Sauce

Tortilla Chips

Ingredients to make chili

Vegetables (carrots, celery, onions...these tend to stay fresh for a while)

Frozen chicken, beef, shrimp, or scallops

Brown Rice

Beans

Sauces (teriyaki or barbecue--anything to spice up the stock ingredients when you want a kick)

Having some stock ingredients always on hand will save you a lot of money.  

• Brown Bag It!

    Yeah, so you might seem like a bit of a dork bringing your lunchbox to work or school, but it's going to save you a lot of money and most likely make you healthier!  I know, it seems like extra work to prepare a lunch for the day, but once you start doing it, it will become a habit.  Take half an hour the night before to prepare a lunch, store it in the fridge, and then grab it on your way out.  I wouldn't leave it until the morning to prepare, just because it's easy to forget something in your haste or realize you don't have a key ingredient and stress yourself out. 

     Some easy lunches to bring are:

Any kind of sandwich (PBJ is one of my favorites)

Salads (pack the dressing in a separate container so your salad doesn't get soggy through the day)

Rice with meat and/or veggies (heat it up in the microwave at lunchtime)

There are lots of other options, but these are a few of my favorites!

• Plan Your Meals

     Like I said before, having a well-stocked pantry is key to eating on a budget.  But having a well-stocked pantry isn't really going to save you any money if none of it makes up a complete meal.  So, take a half-hour or so each week and plan what meals you're going to have.  This way, you have a list when you go to the grocery store.  Having a list makes you less likely to impulse-buy, which in turns saves you money.  It also helps you keep track of what food you have available to you, and you tend to know exactly what you need to buy next time you go to the grocery store.  This cuts down on buying extras of items you already have.

• Check Out the Freezer Section

      I was shocked last week when I found that Trader Joes sells a 2.5 bag of frozen chicken breasts for $6.99.  One pound of fresh chicken breast costs exactly the same amount.  We actually end up freezing our chicken anyways, so buying frozen chicken in bulk actually saves us a lot of money!  It's also usually cheaper to buy frozen fruits and vegetables, so check those out too.  We buy frozen mixed berries for 2.99 a bag, whereas fresh berries cost much, much more than that.  

These are just a few tips to help you cut down on your food budget, and feel free to comment with your own suggestions!  

Happy eating,

KS