Hello fellow non-budgeter! Welcome to my learning curve as well…
Do you have a Walmart? It’s consistently less expensive. Example: heavy cream is about 50% less than my regular store if I get the WM store brand.
The other thing I do is use their online version or app. This way there is no impulse buying. I order, choose free pickup, drive up and park in the pickup space, they load in my trunk and I leave. Once home I lament there isn’t anything to eat, only ingredients.
Online buying also helps me compare price between stores. While WM is consistently less, if it’s on sale at my regular grocery store, it’s usually less. Both have the online pickup, so avoid going in, and impulse buying. I always check the weekly sales flyer (online) and compare before shopping.
I don’t think you have a Costco nearby, but I really should cancel my membership. On sale grocery prices beat their prices most of the time. I think pp think they are cheaper bc they once were, or it’s just me. I wander that place and think, wow this place is expensive. (I follow a frugal yt, and she’s in Washington state. Recently said she got 10lb pork loin at Costco for $20. My Costco app says here it’s $35. She thinks it might be less in person vs listed on app. I plan to do a reconnaissance mission to Costco soon to find out.)
I know there’s seasonal sale charts that frugal shoppers know about, like buying and freezing turkeys around Thanksgiving because that’s when they’re on sale, ham around Easter, etc. Check for those online. Then stock your pantry following the sales cycles. Building your pantry by stocking up when on sale, is a huge cost savings. This is the reason I ended up buying/justifying getting a freezer.
Cutting back on meat is a huge cost savings. I pretty much recoil at seeing meat prices and I don’t even think about budgeting for them because I just can’t bring myself to buy meat at current prices bc they seem crazy. On my list is to learn more about bulk buying it.
i swear I’m going to start making all my bread any day now.
(A tip on proofing I recently slapped my head and thought why didn’t I think of that? was: you can boil some water and put that and the bread in your oven to proof. Why have I never thought of that?!)
A zero waist blogger I used to follow, said when she decided to go zero waste, she culled her recipes that called for specialty ingredients so that’s an option. At least for what you eat in regular rotation.
Eat stock up/seasonally, when prices are lowest of course. I never buy strawberries out of season for example bc I’ve decided out of season berries aren’t worth eating, let alone price. And we all know there’s only one random day a year peaches are worth eating. Farmers markets can be less depending on the market. Near me? Not so much. Near my sister? Omg so much less expensive.
Frozen fruit and vegetables can be a big cost savings and might be better than fresh. I swear by Trader Joe’s French green beans. So good!
One roasted chicken can turn into a whole week of dinners. I think CathyZ did a good post on that?
Soup, especially homemade, are your friend.
I follow “the cross legacy” on YouTube for frugal food ideas, she’s the one in WA, and sticks to a budget of $135 per person. It’s now just the two of them so $270 for the month. I learned from her that A2 milk lasts a lot longer than regular before going bad. She’s big on how not to waste or have anything go bad.
This is a really old series of posts, but it’s how to eat on the cheap and has recipes
theprudenthomemaker.com
Another frugal recipe blog is budget bytes:
Home
i have a good chunk of my recipes saved in “copy me that” website/app
I used the free version for years before paying, but it helps me by having searchable recipes, so if something is on sale I can pull up my recipes w that one item, then put them in a shopping list that I turn into what I’m buying online and go pick up. Or decide maybe I don’t want the sale item bc hey, I don’t want to make any of these. Note: I save swap recipes that are in a whole thread of recipes by clicking print, to open only one that one recipe, then instead of printing I use copy me that to save it. It also saves from almost any webpage w a recipe. Some w a payw*ll.
I almost never use it, but there is an app/site called Flipp, that compares store prices so if you want a particular item you can see prices from several stores at once. You can also see all the store flyers in one place.
I'm sure others that know how to budget will have more ideas.
