I'm sure you all have noticed the drastic increase in the prices of groceries here lately. It's crazy how much a dozen of eggs and many other of staple food items go for nowadays. In fact, I told my husband the other day...If it wasn't for having to buy groceries, we might actually have a little bit of money. Lol 😂
Food is one of our biggest budget items on a weekly basis. (I've never been into monthly grocery hauls!) While I know we HAVE to eat, the Grocery budget IS one area in our budget that we do have more flexibility, however. The rest of our bills usually stay the same (or close to it!) but the grocery budget solely depends on me! If I choose to plan and get creative, it is one area where I CAN make small changes to achieve a noticeable difference in savings (and possibly even in our health! )
My family and I began this new year by seeking to pursue a healthier lifestyle. We decided we should start increasing our activity and begin focusing more on our nutrition. As I began to revamp our menu and rethink our usual grocery shopping list, I found that a lot of healthy/diet food seemed to be even more expensive than basic, processed, junk food. As a result, I have had to get even more creative and intentional with my menu planning and grocery budget.
One small hack that I have found to be super helpful is to utilize substitutes!!
For example, I have started using ground chicken in replacement of ground beef in some recipes. I hadn't ever really used ground chicken before, but I found a couple diet recipes that called for it so I bought some and decided to try it.
To my surprise, it was very delicious!! My family loved it as well!! It is extremely versatile and can easily be used as substitute in many of my family's favorite recipes!
Ground chicken works wonderful in tacos, burritos, spaghetti, lasagna, chili, stir fry, etc.
Another awesome thing is that (in my area) ground chicken is nearly $2 less per pound than the ground beef is. When you cook a lot, that can add up to a lot of savings!
Don't worry 😉 , I still DO buy ground beef but instead of using it multiple times a week like I used to, I have reduced to maybe one meal a week with ground beef. By subbing the ground chicken in a few of the other recipes during the week, I can save $10 or more usually on our grocery budget ( and we even save calories by using it! Ground chicken is very lean!)
Also: Another meat I have recently discovered is ground pork. I had no clue that ground pork was even a thing. Someone my husband works with recommended it.... to our amazement, it too was super scrumptious!!
Ground pork is just like the ground chicken but it is pork. If you go to try it, make sure the package only says ground pork. It should not be seasoned or flavored. It is not ground sausage!
While it is not as cheap as the ground chicken option, (ground pork is about $3.45 per lb in our area) it is a great addition to add to your ground beef to lighten it up the calories a little and to mix the flavor up a bit. I like to mix a 1/2 lb of ground pork and a 1/2 lb of ground beef together - this meat mix works for various recipes.... like meatloaf, meatloaf burgers, meatloaf cupcakes, meatballs etc...
Because we are trying to eat more healthy, for a special occasion, I also tried a weird cake concoction, that, to my surprise, turned out really really good. All I did was take a chocolate devil's food cake mix and add a can (12oz) of diet Dr Pepper (you can use any diet soda) to it and mix it up and bake it. After cooking and cooling, I cut it into squares, and I topped each individual cake square with a dollop of light cool whip. It was delicious! I was shocked that it actually worked and I didn't taste any of the diet soda in it. It just tasted like chocolate cake to me!
Anyway, I hope these ideas might be of some use to you. May I encourage you to look around and see how you can get creative in your grocery budget!
(And...If you haven't given ground chicken or ground pork a try, I challenge you to do so! These meats are so yummy! I think you will probably enjoy adding them to your repertoire!!)
-Tiphanie 💕
Will be trying soon ❤️
Great advice Sister Tiphanie <3 Thanks - Kiji