<p>I’d go in on the ‘try to get the weekly food budget down to the lowest possible’ game. :-)</p>
<p>One thing I’ve found w/fresh veggies–they are way more filling & last much longer if eaten fresh (not cooked). So I’ll make a dip of dijon mustard & sweetener & a plate of sliced zucchini, cucumber, etc. This is very filling. If I cook the veggies, I use them up much more quickly. I actually need to do this more often (esp in the afternoon) to lose a few lbs!</p>
<p>Two suggestions on fresh veggies–</p>
<p>1) GRow them yourself (I say that so smug-sounding, but it is my H who does most of the work, including starting them from seeds in the basement, not me). We ate fresh all summer and into fall (just harvested the last edible tomatoes last weekend.) We have lots frozen, plus enough frozen basil for pesto once a week till next spring, I think. We ate green beans, squash, eggplant peppers, and herbs from the garden most nights.</p>
<p>We’re hoping to expand to much more next year, and get better at preserving. </p>
<p>2) Another alternative, if available–join a CSA (Community supported Agriculture.) Up until this year, we paid an upfront price of about 400 dollars, and got six months worth of fresh veggies from a local farmer. Tons of great stuff I’d never have thought to try to cook and eat before. We did that for about ten years.</p>
<p>We eat vegetarian more often than not, so also, the price of veggies, even if you do pay in the store, is much more palatable if it’s the main course rather than a side dish.</p>
<p>Other food savings include, as I said earlier, H’s newfound clamming habit, fishing, and making stuff like ale and mead (he hasn’t mastered chardonnay yet, though.)</p>
<p>As you can see, I’m not the instigator here, though I love cooking and eating the stuff! H gets the credit–he’s a one-man food production machine.</p>
<p>“We eat vegetarian more often than not, so also, the price of veggies, even if you do pay in the store, is much more palatable if it’s the main course rather than a side dish.”</p>
<p>You are 100% correct. We are 100% vegetarian and small eaters so food prices are least concern to us - even if we buy organics. Wife unit does not like to ‘store’ food. Our freezer is almost empty. Some of our friends buy stuff or make more and freeze. Then they forget what they have in freezer. After months and months they end up throwing most of the stuff.</p>
<p>Has anyone tried the indoor tomato grower advertised in Sky Mall? It has a grow light and supposedly grows an indoor plant. It’s not cheap but if it works it would be incredible to have fresh tomatoes year round and would eventually pay for itself.</p>
<p>Eat with the season. This is the time to grow kale, aragula, spinach, beet roots, lettuce, carrot, etc… not tomato.
My family just had pork chops with apple sauce and unlimited kale+carrots from the garden. The total cost for 3 persons is less than 5 dollars. The pork chop was $3.49 and it was not from Costco. I rarely buy meat/veg from Costco.</p>
<p>We basically live on rock, so there would be much work to get a garden patch together. Had one years ago in the midwest but not to the degree that it made that much of a dent in the budget. Zuchinni, tomatoes, cucumbers and peppers were all I planted. We are big eaters here, though greatly diminished this year. Last year I had two grandmoms, 5 kids, and H and myself to feed at times. The grandmoms particularly were into vegetables and were very picky about them. My boys are very much NOT into vegetables and also picky about them.</p>
<p>I usually center my week on a dish, say chicken, and have it 3-4 times that week using it in a pot pie, curry, sandwiches, lomein, fried rice, casserole, and freezing the dish for a future week. To break up the monotony, I will take out a frozen dish from the prior week, this time a meat loaf in the middle of the week. I do cook a steak or something special one day of the week and have something casual like pizza or soup, one day or eat out every other week, though not as much this year. </p>
<p>We had 2 roast chickens with stuffing and veggies, salad on Sunday. Monday we had lo mein with chicken bits. Yesterday we had meatloaf that was from two weeks ago when I made a spare and stuck it in the freezer. Had it with mashed potatoes, enough for two meals. Tonight we had a chicken pot pie. Tomorrow we will have what’s left of the meatloaf, only with rice and tonkatsu sauce and broccoli. Friday will either be pizza–I have coupons, or chicken sandwiches with soup. Saturday I have special sausages planned that I bought on sale with scalloped potatoes and red cabbage that I got on a special that was very inexpensive. Sunday will probably finish off the chicken either in a curry or it will be lentil curry if there no chicken left. Monday I will roast one third of a pork loin with the other third already used as pork medallions and a roast last month. The pork will be used like the chicken for the week in an asian pork with ginger dish, a moo shu pork dish, pork with potatoes and sauerkraut dish. We’ll have grilled cheese sandwiches one night I know. I’ll reserve a bit of the cooked pork for a curry in a future week. We then have Thanksgiving coming up, so I’ll scrounge that week until we get to MIL’s who is providing the fixings at her house for me to make for dinner. We’ll eat on her dime that weekend, and take back the leftovers frozen as I skip turkey for the week after Thanksgiving. I’m planning on ham that week as I can get a free one, and will center my meals around that. Turkey will be the theme the week after with the pork making an appearance in there. I have a london broil stashed in the freezer to break the monotony and some of those special sausages as well for variety. We have two pot luck dinners I am hosting at our house where I will not provide any of the food, just the house, and I know there will tons of leftovers I can freeze and use as well, so I think November and December will be cheap in terms of food. My free turkey is being kept for Christmas, and I have a beautiful roast I picked up on sale in the freezer for that week too, when all of my boys will be home and I’ll be cooking gangbusters. I also have a great lasagna and mac and cheese in the freezer for when they come along with a huge pan of chicken breast casserole–I had made two pans at a time last month. I probably will not have to buy much other than fresh vegetables, milk, eggs that sort of stuff until February. I just watch the sales and pick up whatever is a good deal to stash away, but lately it has had to be an incredible deal for me to buy other than the one splurge that CC had me make with all the Trader Joe talk. I still have some of those goodies in the freezer to pop out and be a special if things get boring. </p>
<p>We have really been enjoying oatmeal in the mornings. I don’t cook it on the stove but just mix boiling water,more than recommended in it, and then microwave at defrost for a few minutes. We then have it with a little butter, brown sugar, milk, nuts, dried, fresh fruit, granola–just a bit sprinkled onto it. Sort of what Starbucks offers. I buy my bread at a discount wholesale bakery, and get seconds very cheaply. French toast, heavily coated with egg and baked is delicious and I serve that with fruit and syrup. </p>
<p>I bought a case of mixed nuts last year on clearance and my kids and I picked through them all, froze them, and use them as sprinkles on things. I have enough for another year as sparingly as I use it. The same with some dried fruit trays that again, I got on clearance and as gifts. They make a great garnish on things and flavoring when ground up and sprinkled. </p>
<p>Yeah, my biggest problem is the fresh fruits and veggies. I don’t have anywhere I could keep them even if I could get them cheaply in bulk. My basement and garage are too well insulated and warm, unlike where I used to live where I could keep a bushel of apples, potatoes, carrots and onions. i can’t believe what I am spending on potatoes at Costco.</p>
<p>Interesting discussion. Frugality is all the rage now, even among the most affluent. </p>
<p><a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/16/fashion/16consumption.html[/url]”>http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/16/fashion/16consumption.html</a></p>
<p>Well, I just made a significant decision based on fear of the economic situation. I hope I don’t regret it.</p>
<p>In previous years, I’ve always gone with the “gold” health plan from my employer. It had lower copays, lower out-of-pocket maximums, higher coverage for out-of-network providers, etc. But for next year the premiums are going up so much that I went with the budget plan instead, promising myself that I would bank the $200/mo. difference in the premiums as a buffer against those higher out-of-pocket costs.</p>
<p>If everybody in the family stays reasonably healthy and doesn’t need healthcare more often than last year, we should end up ahead. Here’s hoping.</p>
<p>I’ve always picked the absolute cheapest plan available from my employer. We’ve used very little in the way of health care services. The main expenses were the pregnancies and one hospitalization for a week. The cheapest plan approach generally worked quite well. $200 a month over 20 years is some serious cash. Just remember to workout - it helps at this age.</p>
<p>Lunitari, we did the same with our health insurance last year. I have many problems with my health, and even was hospitalized. It used to cost nothing for a hospital visit and now there is a copay of $500. Specialist visits went to $25, and when you go fairly often, it adds up. But with all that, we still saved a lot of money going to the cheaper plan.</p>
<p>We have been picking up the “cheapest” health plan for years. This year H persuaded most of his collegues to go this way as well.
With the least expensive option we get free yearly physicals, no co-pay and no referrals for specialists needed… We are responsible for 50% of the cost till it hits $2,400 and after that we pay 10%. We do however collect money in the health spendings account, so when the emergency strucks, we are not left paying large sums out of our current budget. This was one of those years - S had an emergency surgery, ER, specialist, you name it. We ended up paying lesst than $2000 out of pocket. Being on this plan saves us $350/month. You do the math :)</p>
<p>I think the health plan suggestions above are good ones. I work as a health care administrator, and it makes sense, unless of course you don’t have to contribute to health insurance costs and can choose any plan (I think that there are few of those left out there).</p>
<p>The health savings accounts are a good idea, and you can use them for non insured items like glasses or dentists if you don’t have that type of coverage. Also I believe that copays can be reimbursed from the health savings account.</p>
<p>We did the “cutting back” when we had kids enrolled in private colleges. Things we are doing without: family vacations (other than driving to relatives), dinners out, new unneeded things…when the TV got fuzzy we didn’t replace it, we watch a fuzzy tv, no new cars and won’t be getting anything like that for at least three more years, no new furniture, no house renovations (would love to redo part of the kitchen…it’s NOT happening until kids are out of school). In addition, we have added some cost savings by using mail order for prescriptions, buying gas at a wholesale club where we are members, carpooling whenever possible, looking for “new” clothes at consignment shops, cutting coupons and getting them online, turning the thermostat down two degrees in the winter, using the AC very infrequently in the summer, getting all cf lightbulbs, reducing cable service to basic cable (no need for 98 different channels, although I do miss the weather channel), use of automatic thermostats to reduce temp in the house when we’re not here. </p>
<p>Our “economic situation” changed when our kids went to college. We have always been somewhat frugal but we are very careful how we spend our money even moreso now. </p>
<p>I’ve said frequently that when both of our kids graduate from college (keeping fingers crossed that this happens in June 2010) that we will feel like we’ve won the lottery.</p>
<p>If you have broadband, one could argue for dumping Cable. We’ve never had cable outside of a free trial period of a few months after which we dropped it when the real price kicked in. There are a ton of videos and television shows available on the web now and those can keep me quite busy when I need some entertainment.</p>
<p>I have been thinking about the things I have given up and cut down on to save money. Some of it we looked at as being only temporary, but I don’t miss them all that much and think I could really learn to to without a lot more than I imagined.</p>
<p>We’ve always lived below our means so there’s not been much changes lately. My S who works in the finance industry was told by his employer that he’s not targeted to be laid off and we’re happy that we don’t have to assist him financially.</p>
<p>IF you get the cable special- three services wrapped together for some ‘great deal’ (phone/tv/internet for $100) you can get nasty at renewal time and they will usually meet the price again.</p>
<p>For us it is the only internet option available for our home office.</p>
<p>Same here as thumper, we made our cut backs years ago and there is not much left to cut unless we sell our house and move somewhere cheaper</p>
<p>We’re fortunate enough to live close to the branch exchange of the phone company so we have DSL available to us and it’s quite a bit less than cable broadband. Dealing with monopolies can stink.</p>
<p>BC…we live in the middle of nowhere and we have DSL. It used to be that you had to live near a branch exchange, but now pronto sites are sprouting up all over the place and so is the availability of DSL. We’ve actually switched back and forth…depends on who has the best deal and for how long.</p>
<p>DSL is about half cable in our area though cable is faster. We have to have a contract to get the good price though.</p>