I feel like Jerry Seinfeld: “What is with the price of bread?”
Right now, the bread brand I usually buy hovers around $3.00. When money’s tight, that’s a lot for a loaf.
With my bank account whimpering like a little kid facing a tetanus shot every Grocery Day, I decided to look into how I can save a little dough on my food bill.
What things could I swap around to save a few bucks?
First went the bread.
In this instance, I spent a little money to save a little money and bought myself a bread machine. That baby’s paid for itself in the past few months. Instead of spending $3.00 on one loaf of bread I spend that money on a bag of flour and get three or four loaves. I haven’t bought a loaf of bread since October.
And making my own for the kids and husband has the added benefit of being healthier. I know exactly what’s going into that loaf and there are no additives, preservatives or words I can’t pronounce.
After the bread I ditched my “convenience veggies.”
I don’t mind cooking at home (which is a huge money-saver in and of itself) but I’m a lazy cook. The less I have to chop and prep to get dinner ready, the better. But I had an epiphany in the produce aisle not too long ago.
Why spend $2.00 on pre-washed, pre-peeled, pre-cut packages of carrots when I can spend $0.89 on plain old packages of raw carrots?
Needless to say, that rockin’ set of knives my husband got me for Christmas is getting a workout. All my veggies now come “unprepared” and I peel, scrape, and cut them myself.
And I’ll be a big girl admit that it really doesn’t take that much longer to do it myself. Plus I save a few dollars every week.
The next money-saving epiphany came while perusing the cheese selection.
Healthy or not, we’re cheese-eaters in this house. Shredded on chili, sliced in sandwiches, snacked on with rice crackers. But now, instead of buying cheese in bags or wrapped in convenient individual slices it comes in a brick and I slice and shred it myself. I save even more pennies if I get the store brand rather than a name brand.
Those are just a start. I see the fine art of couponing in my future. I’m also tossing around the idea of turning my brown thumb green and starting a small vegetable garden somewhere in the yard. Why buy it if I can grow it myself? Of course, growing it myself might be the problem… I can kill AstroTurf.
Anyway, those are a few of the changes I’ve made on grocery day. What tips and tricks have you come up with to help you save on groceries?
And do you have any tips on couponing? Feel free to share in the comments!