<p>There are a couple good threads about this, we gave S1 $50 a week for food so $200 a month. He and his room mate shopped together and they ate very well and fed others on $100 a week for several years. Disclosure both S1 and his roommate have worked many years in restaurants so they knew how to shop and how to prepare food and they were roommates for 3 years. Another disclosure, they didn’t buy a ton of booze with it even after they both turned 21 and they both had cars so could could get to the farmers market or wherever they wanted to purchase food and sundries. They threw fabulous Thanksgiving meals for the stay-on-campus friends. We’re planning the same $50 a week for S2 who also has spent 3 years working in restaurants. S2 hopes to continue to Thanksgiving tradition having visited and spent one Thanksgiving with his brother. S1’s roommate starts culinary school in August after completing his BA and S1 is in the food and beverage biz in operations since his May graduation. Sorry couldn’t curtail the brag 
I don’t get to do that very often. In 2007 S1 was one of those 3.0 - 3.3 kids but he found “his way” and is on his way. S2 asked me to make a recipe book for him this summer of our family favorites as he moves off campus for his sophomore year.</p>
<p>Just to add some levity…I lived in a house with 12 women in college in the mid seventies and we all kicked in $6 a week for groceries and ate like champions…often filling our house with “other kids” who wanted to eat “our food.” $70 bucks would fill 2 carts every week back then. I baked bread at a food co-op on Saturdays and my “job” in the house was to make the bread for the month (by hand). Cooking is fun! Teach your kids.</p>
<p>I also recommend roommates pool their money and cook together. I know that’s really tough, but pooling the money and making “real meals” goes much, much further than having individual fridges with labeled food. If the kids can make it work, it can be alot of fun and will generate great memories (and photos). S1’s Facebook is filled with dinner parties and great grill outs and great meals shared with friends. It’s amazing what grilled chicken and roasted potatoes and corn from the farm market (less than $20 and usually leftovers) make for good memories. Learning to bone a chicken is a great thing to know. I know, because I learned how to bone a chicken living in that house with 12 women. Food is love and I’m not Jewish :-)</p>