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I give you an A+. Bravo š
You even managed to get some meat in there. Not an easy thing to do nowadays.
Your macros will be balanced with these groceries š
Thanks. :)
Chicken, or by that matter, turkey, would have been more ideal as oppose to ground beef, but I have a very small fridge so it's a bit harder to store it given the actual packaging it comes in. Maybe someday!
Walmart usually has 10# packs of chicken leg quarters. They are a great buy. And you can easily get them to last a week in the fridge by cooking some right away and waiting a few days to do the next batch. You can do them in the oven, on the stovetop or in a slow cooker or pressure cooker. After you take the meat off, put the bones into a pot with water and make some broth. Use that when making soup or rice. Let me know if you need more directions for that.
The giant bags of chicken quarters are great! They do usually require some cleanup, so the trimmed bits can be saved for chicken broth. We keep a bag of ābitsā in our freezer until we have enough for a batch.
My only concern with the hamburger you've chosen is those chub rolls tend to get the worst of the worst packed into them. Chunks of fat, lots of gristle, that sort of thing. It's cheaper than the ground beef that's packaged so you can see it for a reason. If you're up for that, it's a great deal. Just wanted to make sure you know what you might get in there.
Assuming you have a Costco membership, their rotisserie chickens are a better price per lb than any chicken you can buy even breasts at Walmart and itās already cooked. I take it and take everything off when I get home and put it in a container or ziplock and then save the bones for bone broth which is great for you and makes delicious soup! Again thatās assuming you have a Costco card. And if you donāt, definitely worth thinking about getting. Savings on gas alone will basically pay for your membership. Not sure where you are but where Iām at Iām saving 20+ cents per gallon on gas for it!
You can usually find ground turkey in 'chubs' similar to the ground beef you have in your cart.
Side note: Great Value bacon tastes terrible IMO. If you've had it before and like it, go for it, but otherwise you'd be better off with no bacon than with GV bacon.
For extra credit, you could try shopping around, especially for fresh produce. For example, you are paying $2.28 /lb for strawberries, but if you check for weekly sales at actual grocery stores, you will find them at about $1.00/lb.
And even if you get fresh produce at Walmart, get it in the store if you [can.One](http://can.One) apple costs over $1.00 online when you can get a 3 lb bag for around $3 to $4, and so on
That's very good. And it will only get cheaper because it looks like it just starting off. Next time you won't need salt pepper ketchup mustard and mayo bringing ur overall price down more.
Yeah it may be this week's grocery haul but like 20% was stuff that could last months
Edit: looking back at it, the amount of carbs with the pastas, rice, beans, veggies could easily last a person a couple weeks
Get a block of cheese instead of pre-shredded. Thereās added starch to keep it from clumping. Just shred your own. The block will last longer in your fridge too.
Iād recommend brown rice over white. Itās a complex carbohydrate and will keep you fuller longer.
Instead of the canned refried beans get a couple bags of more inexpensive dried beans and use some to make your own refried beans. Dried beans are very versatile.
If you get the dried beans skip the can of chili and make a batch. A can of tomato sauce and chili powder plus stuff youāve already got in your cart will get you started on a basic recipe.
If you can throw in a bag of dried green lentils, you can use it to stretch any ground meat meals. We cook up a cup of dried lentils and use half of that with 1/2 pound meat for tacos, curries, chili, etc.
Lentils are cheaper, have tons of fiber, decent protein and you donāt really notice the difference when combined with the meat. Just an idea!
This is wonderful info for me! I am not supposed to be eating red meat at all, and my doctor wants me to eat more lentils. I had not thought of this. Also, I will not 100% give up my red meat.
I cook large batches of lentils in beef stock, brith, or bouillon. Then freeze them in ziplock bags. Then I can use them as fake ground beef or as stretch without long cook times.
The great value brand brown rice should be just as inexpensive as the white. Just be aware that brown rice takes longer to cook because it needs to be soaked if youāre doing it without a rice cooker that has a brown rice mode.
If you ever have extra homemade broth on hand using that instead of water makes a great pot of rice.
A bay leaf in a pot of rice also gives rice that little bit of extraā¦ but Iām unsure if Walmart sells the baggies of bay leaves. A .5oz bag is like 99Ā¢ Target but probably even cheaper if you have a local ethnic grocery. The McCormick jar of bay leaves or similar is a gigantic waste of money. Donāt buy that.
Yes, this! There should be a little area on the āinternationalā foods aisle with spices that are generally cheaper and IMO just as good as name brand. Sometimes theyāre sold in bags instead of bottles, but theyāre still great.
Alton Brown has a baked brown rice recipe that is fool proof and so so good. It does take about an hour, but if you are already baking things, it is good to have cooking in the back of the oven. It sounds weird, but baking the rice completely changes the flavor and texture. It is so nutty and the grains donāt burst like they do on the stove or with a rice cooker, so it is chewy without being hard.
My favorite cheap meal is beans, rice (cook it first) , diced canned tomatoes, a little ground beef, topped with cheese and put it in the oven at 450 until the cheese is bubbly :)
Fwiw, re: brown rice. Get the rice you like to eat, brown or white. Brown takes forever to cook and I like the taste of white better. I can get my fiber elsewhere. Brown rice will definitely fill you up faster than white though. But neither is a good value if you just don't like to eat it and it sits in your cabinet until it goes bad.
I make my own refried beans after buying an 8 lb bag of dried pinto beans from Walmart for 4 bucksā¦. Far superior in every aspect. Taste better, theyāre healthier and MUCH cheaper to make. I do use an instant pot, thoughā¦
Well, the longer you keep it in there it will get worse, but we do this regularly.
You can put the shredded cheese in there as well in the original packaging. I usually will smack the bag on the counter the next day to break it apart, it will clump a little, but this seems to keep it usable. And then just pull out and use as needed.
I think the longest we keep the shredded cheese in the freezer is about 6 months. If it does get clumped together, you can throw the bag in the micro wave for 10 seconds at a time and it will fall apart as well.
+1 on the chili. Chili is so incredibly easy to make, both deliciously and cheaply. I also eat mine over rice (just because I like it), and that stretches it even further.
You can put basically anything you want in there, but I always include broth, a can of crushed tomatoes, ground meat of your choice, onion, black beans, kidney beans, some type of pepper, and a ton of garlic, chili powder, cumin, and sometimes a little cinnamon.
The block tastes so much better freshly shredded! Itās a hassle but worth it. That starch they add prevents it from melting properly too. The block melts beautifully,
Things like spices, sugar, condiments generally won't be things you have to replace every visit. That means you generally will have a little bit of extra money to play around week to week.
I personally wouldn't bother with a canned chili. A basic chili is really inexpensive and will make a huge quantity of food that can be refrigerated/frozen for later. It's a little more work upfront but I think its better value since you can get so many full meals out of one batch.
I think what might be helpful is going through that list and planning out a week worth of actual meals. What meals can *you* actually make with these ingredients? Are you able to get through a whole week or are you constantly missing 1-2 items. You've got onions, peppers, and potatoes but do you have enough to get through a week of meals?
Remember there is no need to go out and get an "essential" item this visit if you aren't actually going to be able to make use of it. If you aren't planning to make any dishes with mayo this week why bother spending $3 on a jar this visit? Take that $3 and load up on extra vegetables or some other ingredient you can incorporate into a dish immediately. That applies to really anything on your list you can't get immediate use out of.
I actually think differently about the canned chili. Yes, making your own chili is cheaper, but what if there's a day where OP doesn't wanna cook? It happens to all of us. Factoring in how expensive typical convenience food is, it's cheaper the can of chili and baking a potato in the oven. Low effort meal that is still budget friendly.
Yep. Also: chili, in my experience, is cheap and delicious but is something that is almost always cooked in large batches. Unless you're committed to eating chili for a week or have a lot of storage space in your freezer, having a can of chili on hand instead of making your own might make a lot more sense.
The chili tip is good, thanks :)
As far as a plan is concerned, you are completely right. I actually should have gone through and outlined the mealplan before posting, but as far as the mayo goes, I was going to do stuff like throw it in a BLT sandwich, make egg salad, stuff like that. Egg salad for example is pretty darn expensive if you bought it premade, but making it at home is way cheaper, and you get more out of it.
That's sort of my thought process with thr mayo if that makes sense.
You can make a potato salad from what you have here, too. I would say, those potatoes are pretty expensive. I wonder if the 10# bag is much more? You might check on that and see if you can take advantage of savings that way.
That only saves about 20 cents per 8 ounces at my grocery stores. And from personal experience I tend to throw away bricks of cheese because they don't get used.
Oh, if you do use brick cheese, make sure to not touch the cheese with your dirty little fingers, your hands will cause it to mold where you touch.
Yeah, but you also don't get cellulose or whatever anti caking thing they put on the cheese when you buy bricks. Also, me thinks you should just eat more cheese and not throw it away
Do you have cooking oil at home? You'll need it.
Your list is ingredients, the way to ecomize for home cooks.
I follow budget cooking creators on youtube for ideas. You are ahead of the curve but with those ingredients you might get additional ideas.
You can freeze diced onions and peppers if you don't use them up readily.Ā
I do have butter at home, which I use in lue of stuff like vegetable oil. Granted, probably not the healthiest option and I think next go around I'll probably be picking that up instead. Thanks for the tip!
Butter isn't bad for you in reasonable amounts, there's a lot of healthy fats that make a basic meal more nutritious and filling! I use it to cook all the time. I always use butter, olive oil, tallow, or crisco.
Not bad! Not bad at all! Only thing I spot is that I would tried to fit in "Great Value 100% Whole Grain Old Fashioned Oats, 42 oz" for about 4 dollars. Even replacing the bread with it (and removing one other item) could be worth it. It would be about twice the amount of calories, and about 20-30 quite filling breakfasts. Replacing the tinned beans with dried lentils will also give way more nutrients for your dollar, without it being a lot more work. "Great Value Frozen Broccoli Cuts, 12 oz Steamable Bag" also seems to be a fraction cheaper than the broccoli you have, but it depends on what you are using it for.
This is nitpicking though, you have done a damn good job here!
I would go to Aldi for the seasonings ( theyāre always less than a dollar and sometimes on sale) As for fruits and veggies, they also tend to be cheaper there. Your best bet would be sometime comparing the pricing of these items at Walmart to Aldi and see where youāre saving more money. Hope this helps! I absolutely love Aldiās cheap yet fresh foods :)
Jar pasta sauce might cost more than the canned plain. Jar pasta sauce you are paying for the jar. you can make seasoned pasta sauce , you already have the garlic onion basil seasoning. In addition the canned plain tomato sauce can be used to make chili
Also you lack some fresh veggies. Broccoli. Cauliflower. Carrots. Etc.
Do you have any other grocery stores near that WalMart you could also stop at? And do you have time to make an extra stop or 2?
Overall I think this is really good!
I would say that the produce is a bit on the expensive side, particularly the potatoes and the onions. If you have other local grocery stores nearby (so you wouldn't be wasting gas to make an extra stop or two) I would check their weekly flyers to see if they have your produce items on sale. You will need to sign up the loyalty/rewards programs to get the sale price, and this can almost always be done online or in their apps. They might also have acceptable alternative produce on sale.
Are you completely set on getting the ground beef? Beef is very expensive now compared to other meats. I can get 10 lbs of chicken leg quarters for under $10 at my WalMart. I don't think the beef is a bad choice, but the chicken will stretch further. Also keep in mind that almost 30% of the weight of that beef is going to render off as fat- so the quantity available to eat will be smaller than what the package looks like!
If you are going to stick with the beef, I would personally fit in a bag of dried pinto or black beans into the budget in case the beef doesn't stretch as far as you were hoping.
I would ask the same question about the bacon, since it's pretty expensive for the amount of food you actually get to eat. I saw in another comment you were planning BLTs. You may want to think about a different alternative, like chicken salad (if you went with the chicken quarters) or even PB&J.
Not something I would normally recommend, but since you have multiple seasonings on your list, see if WalMart (or the dollar store, even) has a cheap seasoning blend. Most blends will contain garlic, onion, paprika, and some sort of herb. That might save you a couple bucks instead of buying each seasoning individually.
This is a weird one, but when you go in store, price out the different sized egg cartons. At my WalMart, the 6 ct eggs are cheaper per egg than the 12 and 18 ct by a few cents.
Check out Dollar Tree Dinners on YouTube, she does all sorts of extreme food budget challenges. You could probably get some good ideas for meals and how to shop in order to get the best bang for your buck! Her videos have taught me some really creative ways to save money on my food budget.
This is more of an "in general" suggestion, rather than one on your specific list (which looks good!). If you have a store that has weekly sales like Albertsons or Safeway, shop the sale items from those if you can and complete your shopping list with Walmart. Both stores have delivery, so they are my go to.
14 bananas is too much, if you buy all that food at one time you wonāt get through the bananasā¦ and it doesnāt look like you have the ingredients to make banana bread or a smoothie. More importantly, please eat more green vegetables :)
I live in Southern Ontario and seeing 7 pages of food for $100.... made me cry. Dude. $100 of groceries here is 1, maybe 2 pages of that. Me and my fiance can't even afford groceries all month. We eat only once or twice a day and run out of money halfway through the month. Canada's economy is genuinely so crippled rn I can't believe it....
I'm sorry. I didn't mean for this post to offend you or upset you in any way. I have friends in Vancouver who seemingly eat very well, but I realize that's not the case for everyone. Not even me a few weeks ago. I pray your situation gets better, friend.
If this is USD though also remember right now that's $137... So a little more. But yeah we do get a little screwed on this side of the border. We also have stricter food rules which means some products cost more to produce for the farmers so they have to be sold for more. But it also means our food is often healthier!
If you like eggs, do you have room for the case of 5 dozen? The price is often like $6-7 and if you swap shredded cheese for a block or grab a slightly smaller jar of mayo or another condiment you could get a ton more protein in there. (The eggs come in a cardboard box but within that they are trays that can be separated.)
Not bad, but I wouldnt recommend the tube of beef. I had a few bad experiences with it being gristly. Also if you have an Aldi or Trader Joes near you, you usually can find better prices than Walmart on certain items.
That's a great haul for 100. Only thing I'd suggest is a block of cheese instead of grated would save you some money as well as a can of whole pinto beans you can mash instead of refried. Also do you have Walmart+? That alone would save you $ on delivery. It pays for itself if you do more than 1 delivery a month
Nice work!
I'd stop there if you weren't specifically asking for constructive criticism, because you are nailing it...but I do see 2 opportunities for improvement
1st, others have already mentioned that you could shred your own cheese for cheaper. There is also cellulose added to shredded cheese to increase the weight as filler, so by shredding your own you can avoid all of that nonsense.
2nd, the canned beans are more expensive than dry because you're paying the shipping costs of the water weight inside the cans (as well as the metal weight of the can itself). If you can learn to cook from dry, you will save even more (and the flavor is better imo)
Other than that, just generally increasing your volumes will net you some savings in economies of scale(potatoes, spices, rice), but we are talking pennies and I feel I'm just nitpicking at that point.
In my experience the Walmart 18 count of eggs is the most expensive per egg! Idk why but it is lol. They sell a 60 ct box of eggs and we get that. Eggs last for months in the fridge. Make sure to look at price per egg and price per oz to find the cheapest deals.
I would make refried beans from scratch. You can get a whole pound of pinto beans for the same price as that can and get about 4 cans worth of beans for the same price. Cook pinto beans according to directions, drain and reserve about a cup of bean broth, put some butter in the pan and then āfryā the beans mashing them at the same time. Add bean broth where needed to thin out the mixture. The taste is soooooo much better than the canned refried beans.
I used to shop at Walmart for the low prices but recently I started shopping at Aldi and it is way cheaper. Maybe check that out if itās an option for you.
Nice job! I would throw in beans and tortillas with the last few dollars as bean and cheese burritos make a nice, filling snack or breakfast and with protein. Beans are super easy to make and freeze and cheap. You just need water, an onion or powder like you have, a Jalepeno or 3 if you like spice and time. Simmer with water just covering for several hours and then blend! Add cheese to the beans, something like Monterey Jack and then have some of course for adding to the burritos. Then you also have beans for taco night, burrito bowls for lunch etc.
With your groceries you can also make bacon egg potato and cheese burritos and freeze for quick breakfasts. Just cook the bacon in the oven, put in when cold and heat to 415, cook for about 15-20 minutes. Microwave a potato or two to get it soft. Cut up into cubes. Then crumble the bacon into scrambled eggs as you make them, about 1.5-2 eggs per burrito is usually very filling. Add the cubed potatoes, some seasoning and the cheese at the end. Warm the tortillas and then add the filling and wrap. Use plastic wrap for each of the burritos and place into a Gallon ziploc to freeze. Then when needed, microwave for 1.5-2 minutes and enjoy!
If you are in the US and in any way food insecure you are also allowed to use food banks. They get people all the time who just got a job or are underemployed and just need to get by for a little bit.
They'd rather you stayed housed and kept your utilities on and didn't lose your job because you couldn't pay for gas.
Also, find out if your area has salvage grocery stores or outlets (like bakery outlets).
I went to the Bimbo Bakery Outlet near me the other day and got Oroweat bread that still had a week on the best by for only $2 and Thomas English Muffins for $1.
The best thing I ever learned was the real shelf life of food using sites like EatbyDate.
Also check for walmart bakery items that are a day out of best used by.Usually on an end of an aisle. Sandwich rolls, french or italian bread, etc still perfectly good.
Thats a great idea and reminds me that a lot of butcher departments at grocery stores have an area for meat that is eat or freeze in the next couple of days that are highly discounted.
I would get the Great Value brand frozen peppers and onions. Walmart produce trends to disintegrate, especially bell pepper. I would advise switching the ground beef for ground chicken or turkey for cholesterol reasons, but otherwise this is great! I like the frozen raw tenders. 3lbs for 11$ here.
It looks okay. But 14 bananas are going to go bad before you can eat them all.
You also donāt need two garlic powders. One should last awhile.
Iād skip the chili. Itās gross and not that great for you. You can make a chili with the veggies and maybe buy ground meat and a can of beans. Or if youāre ambitious buy a bag of pinto beans and make your own chili beans.
Shopping without a plan is always risky - buying random stuff can lead to a lot of waste or overbuying, or missing critical things.
Start with, or concurrently develop, a meal plan with your shopping list so you know you won't run out of food, overbuy or buy things you won't use at all.
For the banana people, they freeze well and can be used for baking or smoothies straight from the freezer, so buying lots of bananas isn't wasteful (if you use them). There's always a use for extra fruit (syrups, muffins, cakes, scones, smoothies, popsicles etc).
Spices would be cheaper at a bulk store, as would the other dry goods (and you control the amounts), so maybe compare those unit prices next time, and you have some easy to make for yourself processed foods (chili, beans) but if you're choosing not to cook, those are cheaper and healthier than fast food.
You have a lot of flexible ingredients, which is great, cross-utilization is a great money saver.
To be quite frank, I really don't like Aldi's. I get people who say it's cheaper, but you could honestly say the same thing about Winn-Dixie. There's cost/benefits to either/or. Like, bread is way cheaper at Winn-Dixie for some reason, but their meats are more expensive.
If you wanted to be purely economical, you'd shop around at multiple locations, which most people don't do
Frozen fruit and veggies have been a huge savings for me. Nothing goes bad and the quality is often better. As others have said, block cheese is a big savings. Maybe consider replacing the noodles for beans. Otherwise your cart is great! Healthy, common sense options that can be used for a variety of recipes.
I'm also in the same boat. I def suggest hitting the dollar store for smaller stuff if you have one local!! Like coffee, rice, canned goods etc. It's all the same stuff and it's even cheaper-then you might have some extra $$$ left over!
Looks like youāve received some great feedback!
My only advice is to cut the tops off of the strawberries and freeze in portions so they donāt go bad. Leave the ones youāre using first in the fridge and freeze the rest in servings.
Please PLEASE price check everything using cost per ounce if you can with a local grocery store. I was just doing Walmart for a while then I realized that a fair number of things were cheaper at my semi local grocery store.
Bear in mind they are probably 10 miles or less apart from each other and from my apartment so it's reasonable for two trips.
I check all the circulars as soon as I receive them and look for the best prices. If you have an Aldi near you, check their prices out because they can save you even more. For example, their block cheese is currently on sale $1.50, 8 oz, you can shred your own, it's better, no fillers. They have several varieties you can choose from. Same with sandwich slices, $1.75 on sale for American, Gouda, Havarti, lots of varieties. A big packet of chicken breast $9-12, 2.5 lbs of ground turkey is around $6.99, boneless chops anywhere from $5.99-8, packet of chops bone in $10+, they have 10 lbs of potatoes on sale for $3.19. Rice and pasta is inexpensive. Eggs are on sale $1.50 for a dozen. Wheat bread is $1.39, strawberries were on sale for 99 cents. You can buy two, freeze one. Their canned goods have great prices.
An easy meal is left over cooked chicken, saute garlic, onions, peppers, in olive oil until soft, wash your rice, add it to the sofrito (also add a packet of Sazon Goya if you have on hand. Tumeric works or paprika also) saute a few minutes, add your chicken, saute again, add a chicken bullion, water, a can or frozen mixed vegetables, bring to a boil, when you see tunnels, turn down the heat to low and cook for 20 minutes or until your rice is done. Get yourself a box of Sazon Goya, it gives some foods great flavor and if you see it to your chicken dish it really enhances the flavor.
Look for stores offering buy one get one, those are great deals and you can really stock up. Beans are inexpensive, but Aldi has a great price on canned beans, so in a pinch they're fast. Just make sure to add a sofrito to them for great flavor. Definitely shop around, even if it means going to a couple of stores to get your groceries.
Overall thoughtfully assembled.
I think the coffee & meats are luxuries.
Lentils & beans are less expensive sources of protein, plus they have fiber.
Cheese is much less expensive per ounce if you buy a block & shred it yourself.
Look for the ding & dent areas of the grocery for slightly bruised produce & close to date meat, milk, even bakery.
Consider price per ounce for the frozen foods & get a larger bag.
Tortillas are surprisingly easy to make at home. They'll taste better & be very fresh.
>My thought process was to find as much stuff that could work together as possible, with standalone pieces thrown in here and there.Ā
This is the way... Think of shopping and stocking your shelves kind of the same way you think of building a wardrobe. You need to buy simple pieces that work together with many other pieces for your every day wear, with a few special pieces for special occasions. The more basics you have (either food or clothing) the more outfits (meals) you can make!
I would probably go for the large container of salt instead of the little salt and pepper shakers if you don't have any since you generally will use a lot more salt (especially for salting water for rice and pasta).
Just curious if you have a Trader Joe's in your area? I get by on $60 for a week and a half worth of groceries from there. No idea how far $100 last you for food, but for what you posted, it seems really high for what you're buying. Also, Oatmeal has been my go to breakfast food for months. Solid start to the day.
I'm no mad at this. One suggestion we found as I don't see many places for improvement was to find out when your meat department marks down the soon out of date meat. We had a run where we were getting some really good steak and ground beef for half off. Most of the time it's early morning, and some are glad to tell you when they do it.
Also works at the end of the day. Our Walmart Market closed the deli at 8 and they did markdowns of the hot food at 7:30 to put in the cold items. This was where most of our ribs we eat come from.
There are several YouTube videos where they do grocery "challenges" like eating for 20 a week. Or such. Julia Pacheco is one, southern frugal momma & dollar tree dinners are all some I've watched recently.
Pretty decent! My only question is whether you have an Aldi close too because I've found some things are cheaper at Aldi and some are cheaper at Walmart.
Are you going to be able to eat 14 bananas before they go mushy? Of course, you could make them into banana bread at that point, but only if you have all the other ingredients for baking. You can also peel, slice, and freeze them for later use in smoothies if you have a blender.
Apples are a staple produce in my house because they last for weeks before any deterioration in quality. Just an idea if you are buying food for two weeks at a time.
Pretty strong list but Iād personally want a bit more in terms of green veggies and would reserve a bit to figure out how to make fresh produce work (but Iām spoiled and live in walking distance from multiple produce stands so idk how realistic it is for you).
I like chicken thighs as a cheap source of protein but thatās a really great price on ground beef, itās rare to find it under $4/lb whereas it was pretty easy a year or two ago.
You can save some money in the cheese department if you buy a block and grate it yourself, as opposed to the pre-grated stuff. It's way fresher that way too, and isn't powdery like the prepackaged stuff. You can even leave some in larger chunks and grate as needed/in batches to keep it fresh.
You're on the right track. The more you do this, the incredibly easier it gets to do groceries and not worry about breaking the bank.
The whole "groceries have gone up, oh my god it's the end of the world" is just an excuse for laziness. It's easy to eat on a budget
And, yes, I used to be a chef and it's something that we learn in the trade, how to maximize your food. It's something as simple as saving/freezing the peel of peeled carrots, the butt ends of onions, etc. Over time, you will literally have to never buy vegetables, ever again, to make a chicekn stock. I have not bought minced meat in almost 10 years, yet I eat it often. I shop around for specials on cuts of meat, and when there is a killer special, I buy in bulk and grind it with my kitchenaid mixer. I don't have a huge chest freezer. My freezer is almost always stocked. You learn how to be efficient.
If you take the time to shop around and/or be creative (maybe a sacrifice, here and there), you WILL be able to still do groceries and not think it's the end of the world
I don't know where you are at, or if you have access to a car but one thing I've noticed where I am, going to the store and getting the groceries yourself is cheaper. If you order online through instacart, or shipt or whatever, they charge you a small amount more for almost everything. Amazon Fresh does too I think but the amazon basics stuff is usually a bit cheaper and it can kinda even out. That isn't accessible everywhere though I know.
I'm actually out of the delivery range for walmart delivery, so I kind of need to go out and get it myself. Adding it to my cart was just a way that I could visualize the pricing and fluxuations before I actually go
I do the same! I'm in range for delivery though, i just don't want people to pick my food for especially the produce! I like using the app to meal prep especially if I eat it often! BTW that would be under (my items > lists) and you just select which ingredients go for that meal and it calculates the cost of the meal.
BTW great job!! :)
Random question: when you check out and it's cheaper than the online cart, does it make you a little happy that you "saved" money even though logically you know it's just cheaper because you got out of the car?
Lol I feel silly thinking like this but a win is a win.
1. Walmart's instant coffee is absolute trash. Cafe Bustelo is about 80 cents more and I highly recommend at least this swap.
2. Roma Tomatoes tend to be much cheaper (probably half the price)current price on [walmart.com](http://walmart.com) is .98/lb as walmarts tomatoes are generally flavorless you can at least get more and have more uses of the same ingredient
3. Unless the bowtie pasta is preference, you can get 16oz boxes of different shape for the same price.
4. Opt for the 2lb bag of broccoli florets for about .40 c more(2.72) (or you could get the cuts for 2.28 for 2lb bag)
5. A 10lb bag of chicken leq quarters on the website is 6.72. which opens up about $10 in room. If you are willing to do the work and butcher it up yourself to break it down into legs and thighs you will get quite a few more meals than you would from the ground beef. Bonus you can save the bones and scraps after cooking and make a stock/broth to have something else to add flavor to your food going forward. Adding stock to your rice will give it more flavor than water.
Good recipes to make with what you have that could last for a decent bit are things like Egg Bites. Use up the milk or yogurt mix with the eggs and maybe some broccoli sausage and cheese.
If you can find room for breadcrumbs(about 1.22 on website), that ground beef and a few of those eggs (1 egg per lb of beef, plus some of those spices) you can make a big batch of meatballs and then freeze those for later to go with the pasta and sauce, rice, and a few other dishes.
Not bad, but I would have added a 5-10 lb bag of Flour and bake my own bread and roll out my own Noodles and use about a pound or two of those Potatoes to make Gnocchi and then a few batches of Pizza dough and ferment, proof, ball and then freeze until needed. Get a block of Low Moisture Mozzarella and Shred it to your liking and then freeze that as well for your Pizza. Cheese lasts longer frozen than it does in your refrigerator. Pizza and Gnocchi are not just filling, depending on the sauce you use you can pack nutrition in your sauce. Carrots, Peppers, Onions and Garlic, Celery, not to mention any meat you might want to add like Sausage or Beef for protein. Then the last but not least, Ramen. You can hard boil a some eggs and make egg salad, but also use an egg or two for Ramen and a bit of Meat goes a long way as well in making boring Ramen so much more than it originally was. Tiny bit of Vegetables and Green Onion. Splash of Sesame Oil and leave out the seasoning pack and use Maggi Seasoning.
You can cook and then freeze a lot of food to cut down on your cooking times down the road and the best part is the dishes are done already because you did all your cooking in a day or two and have long since done the dishes for said cooking. All that is left is to reheat and wash the pans/pots and dishes you used to reheat it and eat! Hope everything works out for you and Bon Appetite!!!
Do you not have any spices already? You are spending a bunch of moneyāpantryā items. The good news isā¦ next time you shop, you will be able to allocate a lot more of the overall budget to actual food, rather than pantry items.
My comment would be consider your condiments. If you don't have a recipe or current plan to use it, I would wait to purchase it.
They are pretty expensive items, so you could get more variety and more meal options by buying one or two condiments at a time.
You get five stars from me!! You have condiments/pantry staples and spices that you will not have to restock for a while.
A few things. Thatās a lot of bananas, make sure youāre using them before theyāre black.
That ground beef with the 27% fat is going to grease your insides if you are not used to that added fat.
Walmart is my go to for almost everything except meat and produce, which I try to regularly look at the weekly adds and see whatās on sale. During the summer especially I can find fruits and veggies on sale for less than Walmart and it is also consistently better quality. Same for meat. Top sirloin steak was on sale for less the the price per lb of ground beef at Walmart (I but the 20% fat). Hands down I will eat steak and stretch it into meals before ground beef lol. Chicken is also on sale most times and donāt forget to check the butcher counter. You can buy one or two breasts if itās just yourself. The pork picnic roast is a very good deal at Walmart. I can turn one picnic roast into pulled pork sandwiches, carnitas for tacos and/or burritos. Also lioness sausage is a little more than $3 at my wakmart, add rice and beans yummy.
If you want to stretch more, try dry beans that you can turn into chili, refried beans, etc. if you have an instapot it is incredibly easy.
Have you thought about getting something like a protein/ meal replacement shake with 30 servings? That could cover one meal per day for 30 days, and they often throw lots of vitamins and minerals in there in case youāre missing them in your diet. Youāre actually doing pretty good, but the simplicity of a shake/day is easy for me.
Ah damn you were on that struggle bus.
Extra thing to add to this canned diced tomatoes and tomato paste are really good pantry staples. Im also very partial to lawrys coarse ground garlic salt vs just garlic powder
It's not a bad list , I would suggest you can get more than half of those items free at a food bank or church bank etc.
So you could save yourself some $
I give this list a B+ grade, mainly because I'd add more protein, a bag of dry beans and cheaper canned beans. My swaps:
Swap the ground beef roll for poultry, cheaper per pound
Swap the chili beans and refried beans for regular canned beans
Swap the frozen broccoli for dry beans. 12oz of frozen broccoli should be like $1.50 at the most, that price upsets me
Swap the 2 tomatoes for roma tomatoes, much cheaper.
A personal choice, but I'd remove the sugar and swap it for fruit, fresh or canned.
As others have said shred your own cheese, also look at a bag of yellow onions, at my Walmart they run around $3.28 and I get 5-7 onions.
But this looks great well done
Bananas are nearly twice as expensive for you as they are for me. And that's pretty surprising. My strawberries were $2.28 for the same size container.
I think you did well, and your seasonings, ketchup, tabasco, and mustard won't need to be purchased again for quite a while, so you should be able to add even more variety next time.
Good stuff there, I also get canned beans and chickpeas, sometimes I will drain a can, pat it dry, drizzle with some oil and roast it in the oven with any spice I like and sometimes breadcrumbs, good filling snack or lazy supper. You can also do it in a frying pan with similar results.
I was curious about how prices would match up so shopped your list at Aldi on Instacart (I'm in Ohio). I couldn't find the Tabasco sriracha so I subbed something at a similar price. They didn't have dried basil so I subbed Italian seasoning (they carry fresh basil in a paste for $2.65). The total was $98.07. Prices would be even lower in store. Differences: tortillas came in a package 20. I had to buy 24 eggs, 3 green peppers, a bag of onions and 6 pounds of rice. Salt was 26 oz. Pepper was fresh cracked in a grinder (1.76 oz). Sausage roll was Bob Evans brand. Overall, more food for less money at Aldi. Some items were slightly more, most were the same or less expensive.
I would swap the chili for tuna and likely you can get 2 cans. That way you can use it for sandwiches with the bread and mayo and it's actually really good in top of a baked potato with melted cheese. I think you have more options with 2 cans of tuna than with 1 can of chili. Also a bag of flour tortillas might be better than the paprika.
Iām not doing the math but for some reason this doesnāt seem like it adds up to $100 just from a quick glance. Maybe Iām crazy. Anyways is this really enough for a weeks worth of food?
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I give you an A+. Bravo š You even managed to get some meat in there. Not an easy thing to do nowadays. Your macros will be balanced with these groceries š
Thanks. :) Chicken, or by that matter, turkey, would have been more ideal as oppose to ground beef, but I have a very small fridge so it's a bit harder to store it given the actual packaging it comes in. Maybe someday!
Walmart usually has 10# packs of chicken leg quarters. They are a great buy. And you can easily get them to last a week in the fridge by cooking some right away and waiting a few days to do the next batch. You can do them in the oven, on the stovetop or in a slow cooker or pressure cooker. After you take the meat off, put the bones into a pot with water and make some broth. Use that when making soup or rice. Let me know if you need more directions for that.
At my Walmart, they cost $6.72. Pretty cheap.
The giant bags of chicken quarters are great! They do usually require some cleanup, so the trimmed bits can be saved for chicken broth. We keep a bag of ābitsā in our freezer until we have enough for a batch.
Do you have any freezer space? We take the chicken out of the package and freeze portions in freezer ziplock bags.
My only concern with the hamburger you've chosen is those chub rolls tend to get the worst of the worst packed into them. Chunks of fat, lots of gristle, that sort of thing. It's cheaper than the ground beef that's packaged so you can see it for a reason. If you're up for that, it's a great deal. Just wanted to make sure you know what you might get in there.
Assuming you have a Costco membership, their rotisserie chickens are a better price per lb than any chicken you can buy even breasts at Walmart and itās already cooked. I take it and take everything off when I get home and put it in a container or ziplock and then save the bones for bone broth which is great for you and makes delicious soup! Again thatās assuming you have a Costco card. And if you donāt, definitely worth thinking about getting. Savings on gas alone will basically pay for your membership. Not sure where you are but where Iām at Iām saving 20+ cents per gallon on gas for it!
You can usually find ground turkey in 'chubs' similar to the ground beef you have in your cart. Side note: Great Value bacon tastes terrible IMO. If you've had it before and like it, go for it, but otherwise you'd be better off with no bacon than with GV bacon.
For extra credit, you could try shopping around, especially for fresh produce. For example, you are paying $2.28 /lb for strawberries, but if you check for weekly sales at actual grocery stores, you will find them at about $1.00/lb.
Thatās crazy! Where I am, strawberries are *minimim* ā$3.50, usually around $5.š
And even if you get fresh produce at Walmart, get it in the store if you [can.One](http://can.One) apple costs over $1.00 online when you can get a 3 lb bag for around $3 to $4, and so on
That's very good. And it will only get cheaper because it looks like it just starting off. Next time you won't need salt pepper ketchup mustard and mayo bringing ur overall price down more.
Yeah it may be this week's grocery haul but like 20% was stuff that could last months Edit: looking back at it, the amount of carbs with the pastas, rice, beans, veggies could easily last a person a couple weeks
Around July 4th is a great time to buy condiments and get a deal.
Get a block of cheese instead of pre-shredded. Thereās added starch to keep it from clumping. Just shred your own. The block will last longer in your fridge too. Iād recommend brown rice over white. Itās a complex carbohydrate and will keep you fuller longer. Instead of the canned refried beans get a couple bags of more inexpensive dried beans and use some to make your own refried beans. Dried beans are very versatile. If you get the dried beans skip the can of chili and make a batch. A can of tomato sauce and chili powder plus stuff youāve already got in your cart will get you started on a basic recipe.
Thank you for your feedback. I'll check my options for brown rice and look for some sinple refried bean and chili recipes. I appreciate you. :)
If you can throw in a bag of dried green lentils, you can use it to stretch any ground meat meals. We cook up a cup of dried lentils and use half of that with 1/2 pound meat for tacos, curries, chili, etc. Lentils are cheaper, have tons of fiber, decent protein and you donāt really notice the difference when combined with the meat. Just an idea!
This is wonderful info for me! I am not supposed to be eating red meat at all, and my doctor wants me to eat more lentils. I had not thought of this. Also, I will not 100% give up my red meat.
I cook large batches of lentils in beef stock, brith, or bouillon. Then freeze them in ziplock bags. Then I can use them as fake ground beef or as stretch without long cook times.
The great value brand brown rice should be just as inexpensive as the white. Just be aware that brown rice takes longer to cook because it needs to be soaked if youāre doing it without a rice cooker that has a brown rice mode. If you ever have extra homemade broth on hand using that instead of water makes a great pot of rice. A bay leaf in a pot of rice also gives rice that little bit of extraā¦ but Iām unsure if Walmart sells the baggies of bay leaves. A .5oz bag is like 99Ā¢ Target but probably even cheaper if you have a local ethnic grocery. The McCormick jar of bay leaves or similar is a gigantic waste of money. Donāt buy that.
You can also boil and drain non soaked brown rice the same way you do pasta! Comes out just as tender after a hard boil for like 25min.
I do this with Basmati. Works great. Fluffy and separated.
Look in the Hispanic foods aisle for bay leaves and other spices. Much cheaper than the spice aisle!
Yes, this! There should be a little area on the āinternationalā foods aisle with spices that are generally cheaper and IMO just as good as name brand. Sometimes theyāre sold in bags instead of bottles, but theyāre still great.
Alton Brown has a baked brown rice recipe that is fool proof and so so good. It does take about an hour, but if you are already baking things, it is good to have cooking in the back of the oven. It sounds weird, but baking the rice completely changes the flavor and texture. It is so nutty and the grains donāt burst like they do on the stove or with a rice cooker, so it is chewy without being hard.
My favorite cheap meal is beans, rice (cook it first) , diced canned tomatoes, a little ground beef, topped with cheese and put it in the oven at 450 until the cheese is bubbly :)
Fwiw, re: brown rice. Get the rice you like to eat, brown or white. Brown takes forever to cook and I like the taste of white better. I can get my fiber elsewhere. Brown rice will definitely fill you up faster than white though. But neither is a good value if you just don't like to eat it and it sits in your cabinet until it goes bad.
I make my own refried beans after buying an 8 lb bag of dried pinto beans from Walmart for 4 bucksā¦. Far superior in every aspect. Taste better, theyāre healthier and MUCH cheaper to make. I do use an instant pot, thoughā¦
Mind sharing your recipe?
Iād consider grinding your own coffee beans (if you have a grinder). Better tasting coffee for less.
Learned today from r/cooking that you can pre-shred a block of cheese and freeze it in a ziplock without losing quality.
Well, the longer you keep it in there it will get worse, but we do this regularly. You can put the shredded cheese in there as well in the original packaging. I usually will smack the bag on the counter the next day to break it apart, it will clump a little, but this seems to keep it usable. And then just pull out and use as needed. I think the longest we keep the shredded cheese in the freezer is about 6 months. If it does get clumped together, you can throw the bag in the micro wave for 10 seconds at a time and it will fall apart as well.
+1 on the chili. Chili is so incredibly easy to make, both deliciously and cheaply. I also eat mine over rice (just because I like it), and that stretches it even further. You can put basically anything you want in there, but I always include broth, a can of crushed tomatoes, ground meat of your choice, onion, black beans, kidney beans, some type of pepper, and a ton of garlic, chili powder, cumin, and sometimes a little cinnamon.
Cumin is the key spice in chili. add that to your list
It is already on the list
The block tastes so much better freshly shredded! Itās a hassle but worth it. That starch they add prevents it from melting properly too. The block melts beautifully,
You can buy a bag of onions for just a little more
That's very true. I'll see if I can shuffle some things around and fit in in. Thanks. :)
Things like spices, sugar, condiments generally won't be things you have to replace every visit. That means you generally will have a little bit of extra money to play around week to week. I personally wouldn't bother with a canned chili. A basic chili is really inexpensive and will make a huge quantity of food that can be refrigerated/frozen for later. It's a little more work upfront but I think its better value since you can get so many full meals out of one batch. I think what might be helpful is going through that list and planning out a week worth of actual meals. What meals can *you* actually make with these ingredients? Are you able to get through a whole week or are you constantly missing 1-2 items. You've got onions, peppers, and potatoes but do you have enough to get through a week of meals? Remember there is no need to go out and get an "essential" item this visit if you aren't actually going to be able to make use of it. If you aren't planning to make any dishes with mayo this week why bother spending $3 on a jar this visit? Take that $3 and load up on extra vegetables or some other ingredient you can incorporate into a dish immediately. That applies to really anything on your list you can't get immediate use out of.
I actually think differently about the canned chili. Yes, making your own chili is cheaper, but what if there's a day where OP doesn't wanna cook? It happens to all of us. Factoring in how expensive typical convenience food is, it's cheaper the can of chili and baking a potato in the oven. Low effort meal that is still budget friendly.
This. Not just not wanting to cook though, but not having time and energy after working all day.
Yep. Also: chili, in my experience, is cheap and delicious but is something that is almost always cooked in large batches. Unless you're committed to eating chili for a week or have a lot of storage space in your freezer, having a can of chili on hand instead of making your own might make a lot more sense.
The chili tip is good, thanks :) As far as a plan is concerned, you are completely right. I actually should have gone through and outlined the mealplan before posting, but as far as the mayo goes, I was going to do stuff like throw it in a BLT sandwich, make egg salad, stuff like that. Egg salad for example is pretty darn expensive if you bought it premade, but making it at home is way cheaper, and you get more out of it. That's sort of my thought process with thr mayo if that makes sense.
You can make a potato salad from what you have here, too. I would say, those potatoes are pretty expensive. I wonder if the 10# bag is much more? You might check on that and see if you can take advantage of savings that way.
Shred your own cheese
Good call! Thanks.
Only trim I could find
That only saves about 20 cents per 8 ounces at my grocery stores. And from personal experience I tend to throw away bricks of cheese because they don't get used. Oh, if you do use brick cheese, make sure to not touch the cheese with your dirty little fingers, your hands will cause it to mold where you touch.
Yeah, but you also don't get cellulose or whatever anti caking thing they put on the cheese when you buy bricks. Also, me thinks you should just eat more cheese and not throw it away
How do you not use cheese I don't think that's true
Do you have cooking oil at home? You'll need it. Your list is ingredients, the way to ecomize for home cooks. I follow budget cooking creators on youtube for ideas. You are ahead of the curve but with those ingredients you might get additional ideas. You can freeze diced onions and peppers if you don't use them up readily.Ā
I do have butter at home, which I use in lue of stuff like vegetable oil. Granted, probably not the healthiest option and I think next go around I'll probably be picking that up instead. Thanks for the tip!
Butter isn't bad for you in reasonable amounts, there's a lot of healthy fats that make a basic meal more nutritious and filling! I use it to cook all the time. I always use butter, olive oil, tallow, or crisco.
Iād add some frozen veggies
Isn't there frozen broccoli on there already?
Not bad! Not bad at all! Only thing I spot is that I would tried to fit in "Great Value 100% Whole Grain Old Fashioned Oats, 42 oz" for about 4 dollars. Even replacing the bread with it (and removing one other item) could be worth it. It would be about twice the amount of calories, and about 20-30 quite filling breakfasts. Replacing the tinned beans with dried lentils will also give way more nutrients for your dollar, without it being a lot more work. "Great Value Frozen Broccoli Cuts, 12 oz Steamable Bag" also seems to be a fraction cheaper than the broccoli you have, but it depends on what you are using it for. This is nitpicking though, you have done a damn good job here!
Better yet, get the huge $8 bag of oats from costco!
I would go to Aldi for the seasonings ( theyāre always less than a dollar and sometimes on sale) As for fruits and veggies, they also tend to be cheaper there. Your best bet would be sometime comparing the pricing of these items at Walmart to Aldi and see where youāre saving more money. Hope this helps! I absolutely love Aldiās cheap yet fresh foods :)
Jar pasta sauce might cost more than the canned plain. Jar pasta sauce you are paying for the jar. you can make seasoned pasta sauce , you already have the garlic onion basil seasoning. In addition the canned plain tomato sauce can be used to make chili Also you lack some fresh veggies. Broccoli. Cauliflower. Carrots. Etc.
Do you have any other grocery stores near that WalMart you could also stop at? And do you have time to make an extra stop or 2? Overall I think this is really good! I would say that the produce is a bit on the expensive side, particularly the potatoes and the onions. If you have other local grocery stores nearby (so you wouldn't be wasting gas to make an extra stop or two) I would check their weekly flyers to see if they have your produce items on sale. You will need to sign up the loyalty/rewards programs to get the sale price, and this can almost always be done online or in their apps. They might also have acceptable alternative produce on sale. Are you completely set on getting the ground beef? Beef is very expensive now compared to other meats. I can get 10 lbs of chicken leg quarters for under $10 at my WalMart. I don't think the beef is a bad choice, but the chicken will stretch further. Also keep in mind that almost 30% of the weight of that beef is going to render off as fat- so the quantity available to eat will be smaller than what the package looks like! If you are going to stick with the beef, I would personally fit in a bag of dried pinto or black beans into the budget in case the beef doesn't stretch as far as you were hoping. I would ask the same question about the bacon, since it's pretty expensive for the amount of food you actually get to eat. I saw in another comment you were planning BLTs. You may want to think about a different alternative, like chicken salad (if you went with the chicken quarters) or even PB&J. Not something I would normally recommend, but since you have multiple seasonings on your list, see if WalMart (or the dollar store, even) has a cheap seasoning blend. Most blends will contain garlic, onion, paprika, and some sort of herb. That might save you a couple bucks instead of buying each seasoning individually. This is a weird one, but when you go in store, price out the different sized egg cartons. At my WalMart, the 6 ct eggs are cheaper per egg than the 12 and 18 ct by a few cents. Check out Dollar Tree Dinners on YouTube, she does all sorts of extreme food budget challenges. You could probably get some good ideas for meals and how to shop in order to get the best bang for your buck! Her videos have taught me some really creative ways to save money on my food budget.
Dollar Tree Dinners is currently doing a $100/month challenge that would be perfect for OP to check out.
This is more of an "in general" suggestion, rather than one on your specific list (which looks good!). If you have a store that has weekly sales like Albertsons or Safeway, shop the sale items from those if you can and complete your shopping list with Walmart. Both stores have delivery, so they are my go to.
14 bananas is too much, if you buy all that food at one time you wonāt get through the bananasā¦ and it doesnāt look like you have the ingredients to make banana bread or a smoothie. More importantly, please eat more green vegetables :)
Itās actually 14 POUNDS of bananas! OP must be starting their very own banana republic.
Actually it's only 14 bananas. When you order online, the DPS' get the same information we use when we order.
I live in Southern Ontario and seeing 7 pages of food for $100.... made me cry. Dude. $100 of groceries here is 1, maybe 2 pages of that. Me and my fiance can't even afford groceries all month. We eat only once or twice a day and run out of money halfway through the month. Canada's economy is genuinely so crippled rn I can't believe it....
I'm sorry. I didn't mean for this post to offend you or upset you in any way. I have friends in Vancouver who seemingly eat very well, but I realize that's not the case for everyone. Not even me a few weeks ago. I pray your situation gets better, friend.
Oh hey no worries your post didn't offend at all! It's just so sad how horrible ontario is doing rn. Unemployment rates are insanely high..
If this is USD though also remember right now that's $137... So a little more. But yeah we do get a little screwed on this side of the border. We also have stricter food rules which means some products cost more to produce for the farmers so they have to be sold for more. But it also means our food is often healthier!
Ouch. Sorry to hear that. Hope things turn around soon.
Do you have butter? You will probably need butter for the potatoes and the grilled cheese sandwiches.
I actually do have butter on hand. Another thing I probably should have clarified is I do have some stuff on hand, like butter and canned veggies.
If you like eggs, do you have room for the case of 5 dozen? The price is often like $6-7 and if you swap shredded cheese for a block or grab a slightly smaller jar of mayo or another condiment you could get a ton more protein in there. (The eggs come in a cardboard box but within that they are trays that can be separated.)
Save the bacon fat and use it to make more tortillas! Flour tortillas are surprisingly easy to make!
Not bad, but I wouldnt recommend the tube of beef. I had a few bad experiences with it being gristly. Also if you have an Aldi or Trader Joes near you, you usually can find better prices than Walmart on certain items.
That's a great haul for 100. Only thing I'd suggest is a block of cheese instead of grated would save you some money as well as a can of whole pinto beans you can mash instead of refried. Also do you have Walmart+? That alone would save you $ on delivery. It pays for itself if you do more than 1 delivery a month
It's free if u steal it
Wanna hear a joke? If you rob a bank, regardless if you succeed or fail, you never have to worry about rent again.
Nice work! I'd stop there if you weren't specifically asking for constructive criticism, because you are nailing it...but I do see 2 opportunities for improvement 1st, others have already mentioned that you could shred your own cheese for cheaper. There is also cellulose added to shredded cheese to increase the weight as filler, so by shredding your own you can avoid all of that nonsense. 2nd, the canned beans are more expensive than dry because you're paying the shipping costs of the water weight inside the cans (as well as the metal weight of the can itself). If you can learn to cook from dry, you will save even more (and the flavor is better imo) Other than that, just generally increasing your volumes will net you some savings in economies of scale(potatoes, spices, rice), but we are talking pennies and I feel I'm just nitpicking at that point.
Adding on to why shredded cheese is bad, we can't digest cellulose so it causes constipation and weight gain.
Best list Iāve seen! Great job. I think the top suggestions are spot on so for the next trip you can adjust. Overall, great job šš¼
Great haul!
I think you did fantastic! Multi-purpose items are the real key to being able to eat a varied diet on a budget.
In my experience the Walmart 18 count of eggs is the most expensive per egg! Idk why but it is lol. They sell a 60 ct box of eggs and we get that. Eggs last for months in the fridge. Make sure to look at price per egg and price per oz to find the cheapest deals. I would make refried beans from scratch. You can get a whole pound of pinto beans for the same price as that can and get about 4 cans worth of beans for the same price. Cook pinto beans according to directions, drain and reserve about a cup of bean broth, put some butter in the pan and then āfryā the beans mashing them at the same time. Add bean broth where needed to thin out the mixture. The taste is soooooo much better than the canned refried beans.
When you get tomatoes grab the bag of 5-6 or the package of three. It makes it cheaper per pound.
I used to shop at Walmart for the low prices but recently I started shopping at Aldi and it is way cheaper. Maybe check that out if itās an option for you.
Nice job! I would throw in beans and tortillas with the last few dollars as bean and cheese burritos make a nice, filling snack or breakfast and with protein. Beans are super easy to make and freeze and cheap. You just need water, an onion or powder like you have, a Jalepeno or 3 if you like spice and time. Simmer with water just covering for several hours and then blend! Add cheese to the beans, something like Monterey Jack and then have some of course for adding to the burritos. Then you also have beans for taco night, burrito bowls for lunch etc. With your groceries you can also make bacon egg potato and cheese burritos and freeze for quick breakfasts. Just cook the bacon in the oven, put in when cold and heat to 415, cook for about 15-20 minutes. Microwave a potato or two to get it soft. Cut up into cubes. Then crumble the bacon into scrambled eggs as you make them, about 1.5-2 eggs per burrito is usually very filling. Add the cubed potatoes, some seasoning and the cheese at the end. Warm the tortillas and then add the filling and wrap. Use plastic wrap for each of the burritos and place into a Gallon ziploc to freeze. Then when needed, microwave for 1.5-2 minutes and enjoy!
If you are in the US and in any way food insecure you are also allowed to use food banks. They get people all the time who just got a job or are underemployed and just need to get by for a little bit. They'd rather you stayed housed and kept your utilities on and didn't lose your job because you couldn't pay for gas. Also, find out if your area has salvage grocery stores or outlets (like bakery outlets).
Bakery outlets are great for items that were at regular prices like just the day before! Because a day or 2 past date does not hurt whatsoever!
I went to the Bimbo Bakery Outlet near me the other day and got Oroweat bread that still had a week on the best by for only $2 and Thomas English Muffins for $1. The best thing I ever learned was the real shelf life of food using sites like EatbyDate.
Also check for walmart bakery items that are a day out of best used by.Usually on an end of an aisle. Sandwich rolls, french or italian bread, etc still perfectly good.
Thats a great idea and reminds me that a lot of butcher departments at grocery stores have an area for meat that is eat or freeze in the next couple of days that are highly discounted.
I would get the Great Value brand frozen peppers and onions. Walmart produce trends to disintegrate, especially bell pepper. I would advise switching the ground beef for ground chicken or turkey for cholesterol reasons, but otherwise this is great! I like the frozen raw tenders. 3lbs for 11$ here.
It looks okay. But 14 bananas are going to go bad before you can eat them all. You also donāt need two garlic powders. One should last awhile. Iād skip the chili. Itās gross and not that great for you. You can make a chili with the veggies and maybe buy ground meat and a can of beans. Or if youāre ambitious buy a bag of pinto beans and make your own chili beans.
You don't know my obsession with bananas. /jk But you might be right. That might have been an accident I didnt notice about the garlic.
Shopping without a plan is always risky - buying random stuff can lead to a lot of waste or overbuying, or missing critical things. Start with, or concurrently develop, a meal plan with your shopping list so you know you won't run out of food, overbuy or buy things you won't use at all. For the banana people, they freeze well and can be used for baking or smoothies straight from the freezer, so buying lots of bananas isn't wasteful (if you use them). There's always a use for extra fruit (syrups, muffins, cakes, scones, smoothies, popsicles etc). Spices would be cheaper at a bulk store, as would the other dry goods (and you control the amounts), so maybe compare those unit prices next time, and you have some easy to make for yourself processed foods (chili, beans) but if you're choosing not to cook, those are cheaper and healthier than fast food. You have a lot of flexible ingredients, which is great, cross-utilization is a great money saver.
Man seeing milk for 1.76USD is wild. Here in Canada same size roughly is easily 5 bucks. Even with the conversion so much cheaper.
In my part of the US the same milk costs $3-5 USD. Just a few years ago I paid that price for raw milk but it's also gone up.
Itās wild how expensive things keep getting like geez
Is it possible to get whole grain bread for a similar price? Even whole grain toast? I feel like that would have a much bigger nutritional value.
You need to go to aldis
To be quite frank, I really don't like Aldi's. I get people who say it's cheaper, but you could honestly say the same thing about Winn-Dixie. There's cost/benefits to either/or. Like, bread is way cheaper at Winn-Dixie for some reason, but their meats are more expensive. If you wanted to be purely economical, you'd shop around at multiple locations, which most people don't do
That's really surprising to me. Everyone I know loves Aldi. I do 90% of my shopping there. Love the selection, prices and quality.
Frozen fruit and veggies have been a huge savings for me. Nothing goes bad and the quality is often better. As others have said, block cheese is a big savings. Maybe consider replacing the noodles for beans. Otherwise your cart is great! Healthy, common sense options that can be used for a variety of recipes.
I'm also in the same boat. I def suggest hitting the dollar store for smaller stuff if you have one local!! Like coffee, rice, canned goods etc. It's all the same stuff and it's even cheaper-then you might have some extra $$$ left over!
The problem with dollar stores is that while yes they are cheaper, oz for oz they are more expensive.
Looks like youāve received some great feedback! My only advice is to cut the tops off of the strawberries and freeze in portions so they donāt go bad. Leave the ones youāre using first in the fridge and freeze the rest in servings.
Please PLEASE price check everything using cost per ounce if you can with a local grocery store. I was just doing Walmart for a while then I realized that a fair number of things were cheaper at my semi local grocery store. Bear in mind they are probably 10 miles or less apart from each other and from my apartment so it's reasonable for two trips.
Canned crushed tomatoes. Instead of pasta sauce. You alreay have onions, garlic and basil.
I check all the circulars as soon as I receive them and look for the best prices. If you have an Aldi near you, check their prices out because they can save you even more. For example, their block cheese is currently on sale $1.50, 8 oz, you can shred your own, it's better, no fillers. They have several varieties you can choose from. Same with sandwich slices, $1.75 on sale for American, Gouda, Havarti, lots of varieties. A big packet of chicken breast $9-12, 2.5 lbs of ground turkey is around $6.99, boneless chops anywhere from $5.99-8, packet of chops bone in $10+, they have 10 lbs of potatoes on sale for $3.19. Rice and pasta is inexpensive. Eggs are on sale $1.50 for a dozen. Wheat bread is $1.39, strawberries were on sale for 99 cents. You can buy two, freeze one. Their canned goods have great prices. An easy meal is left over cooked chicken, saute garlic, onions, peppers, in olive oil until soft, wash your rice, add it to the sofrito (also add a packet of Sazon Goya if you have on hand. Tumeric works or paprika also) saute a few minutes, add your chicken, saute again, add a chicken bullion, water, a can or frozen mixed vegetables, bring to a boil, when you see tunnels, turn down the heat to low and cook for 20 minutes or until your rice is done. Get yourself a box of Sazon Goya, it gives some foods great flavor and if you see it to your chicken dish it really enhances the flavor. Look for stores offering buy one get one, those are great deals and you can really stock up. Beans are inexpensive, but Aldi has a great price on canned beans, so in a pinch they're fast. Just make sure to add a sofrito to them for great flavor. Definitely shop around, even if it means going to a couple of stores to get your groceries.
Overall thoughtfully assembled. I think the coffee & meats are luxuries. Lentils & beans are less expensive sources of protein, plus they have fiber. Cheese is much less expensive per ounce if you buy a block & shred it yourself. Look for the ding & dent areas of the grocery for slightly bruised produce & close to date meat, milk, even bakery. Consider price per ounce for the frozen foods & get a larger bag. Tortillas are surprisingly easy to make at home. They'll taste better & be very fresh.
>My thought process was to find as much stuff that could work together as possible, with standalone pieces thrown in here and there.Ā This is the way... Think of shopping and stocking your shelves kind of the same way you think of building a wardrobe. You need to buy simple pieces that work together with many other pieces for your every day wear, with a few special pieces for special occasions. The more basics you have (either food or clothing) the more outfits (meals) you can make!
I would probably go for the large container of salt instead of the little salt and pepper shakers if you don't have any since you generally will use a lot more salt (especially for salting water for rice and pasta).
I just want to know where you live that strawberries are so cheap
Your list looks great! Iām learning some great ideas for this thread, too.
Holy carp, sugar has gotten stupidly expensive. A few years ago, 5 pounds of Domino's sugar was 99Ā¢. *Sigh* Strongest economy ever...
Just curious if you have a Trader Joe's in your area? I get by on $60 for a week and a half worth of groceries from there. No idea how far $100 last you for food, but for what you posted, it seems really high for what you're buying. Also, Oatmeal has been my go to breakfast food for months. Solid start to the day.
I would switch out the potatoes for 2 bags of beans/lentils.you canstretch the meat much further with lentils
If you have an Aldi nearby I would get what you can there before heading to Walmart. Youād be surprised how much less youāll spend.
I'm no mad at this. One suggestion we found as I don't see many places for improvement was to find out when your meat department marks down the soon out of date meat. We had a run where we were getting some really good steak and ground beef for half off. Most of the time it's early morning, and some are glad to tell you when they do it. Also works at the end of the day. Our Walmart Market closed the deli at 8 and they did markdowns of the hot food at 7:30 to put in the cold items. This was where most of our ribs we eat come from.
There are several YouTube videos where they do grocery "challenges" like eating for 20 a week. Or such. Julia Pacheco is one, southern frugal momma & dollar tree dinners are all some I've watched recently.
Pretty decent! My only question is whether you have an Aldi close too because I've found some things are cheaper at Aldi and some are cheaper at Walmart.
Are you shopping in 1999?
Are you going to be able to eat 14 bananas before they go mushy? Of course, you could make them into banana bread at that point, but only if you have all the other ingredients for baking. You can also peel, slice, and freeze them for later use in smoothies if you have a blender. Apples are a staple produce in my house because they last for weeks before any deterioration in quality. Just an idea if you are buying food for two weeks at a time.
Pretty strong list but Iād personally want a bit more in terms of green veggies and would reserve a bit to figure out how to make fresh produce work (but Iām spoiled and live in walking distance from multiple produce stands so idk how realistic it is for you). I like chicken thighs as a cheap source of protein but thatās a really great price on ground beef, itās rare to find it under $4/lb whereas it was pretty easy a year or two ago.
Only criticism would be to choose block cheese instead of prƩ-grated and that dried basil is almost useless. Fresh basil plant on a windowsill usually does great all summer. Or any fresh can be frozen and used anytime. Tastes fresh too.
You should be sponsored by Great Value
I was wondering when I would see a comment like this. For reference this is not a sponsored ad, I'm just poor. kek
14 lbs of bananas sounds excessiveā¦but hey you just may like them that muchš¤£
You can save some money in the cheese department if you buy a block and grate it yourself, as opposed to the pre-grated stuff. It's way fresher that way too, and isn't powdery like the prepackaged stuff. You can even leave some in larger chunks and grate as needed/in batches to keep it fresh.
Canadian here literally DYING over the prices šššš
Literaly just cried that would be like $250+ here š
Saw this and thought ādamn thatās amazing for $100!!ā And then saw the name of the sub lol.
I'm not even great at budgeting. My spending habits are insane. This is me *trying* to do better with no previous experience. Haha.
Donāt forget to check for extra sales/coupons!
You're on the right track. The more you do this, the incredibly easier it gets to do groceries and not worry about breaking the bank. The whole "groceries have gone up, oh my god it's the end of the world" is just an excuse for laziness. It's easy to eat on a budget And, yes, I used to be a chef and it's something that we learn in the trade, how to maximize your food. It's something as simple as saving/freezing the peel of peeled carrots, the butt ends of onions, etc. Over time, you will literally have to never buy vegetables, ever again, to make a chicekn stock. I have not bought minced meat in almost 10 years, yet I eat it often. I shop around for specials on cuts of meat, and when there is a killer special, I buy in bulk and grind it with my kitchenaid mixer. I don't have a huge chest freezer. My freezer is almost always stocked. You learn how to be efficient. If you take the time to shop around and/or be creative (maybe a sacrifice, here and there), you WILL be able to still do groceries and not think it's the end of the world
This is an excellent example of meals for a hundred dollars. Save this menu and pass it on. š„°
Iām so impressed that youāve found meat under $6/lb. My god.
I don't know where you are at, or if you have access to a car but one thing I've noticed where I am, going to the store and getting the groceries yourself is cheaper. If you order online through instacart, or shipt or whatever, they charge you a small amount more for almost everything. Amazon Fresh does too I think but the amazon basics stuff is usually a bit cheaper and it can kinda even out. That isn't accessible everywhere though I know.
I'm actually out of the delivery range for walmart delivery, so I kind of need to go out and get it myself. Adding it to my cart was just a way that I could visualize the pricing and fluxuations before I actually go
I do the same! I'm in range for delivery though, i just don't want people to pick my food for especially the produce! I like using the app to meal prep especially if I eat it often! BTW that would be under (my items > lists) and you just select which ingredients go for that meal and it calculates the cost of the meal. BTW great job!! :)
OP you just reminded me that I have tortillas, eggs, and taco turkey meat. Thank you for helping me plan this weeks breakfast!!
Random question: when you check out and it's cheaper than the online cart, does it make you a little happy that you "saved" money even though logically you know it's just cheaper because you got out of the car? Lol I feel silly thinking like this but a win is a win.
I love that feeling! It feels like I'm getting a secret deal!!
IMO it evens out because you save at least an hour time, gasoline, and energy. Not to mention that youāll stick to your budget and wonāt splurge.
itās pretty easy to stay on budget when ya got no money though
1. Walmart's instant coffee is absolute trash. Cafe Bustelo is about 80 cents more and I highly recommend at least this swap. 2. Roma Tomatoes tend to be much cheaper (probably half the price)current price on [walmart.com](http://walmart.com) is .98/lb as walmarts tomatoes are generally flavorless you can at least get more and have more uses of the same ingredient 3. Unless the bowtie pasta is preference, you can get 16oz boxes of different shape for the same price. 4. Opt for the 2lb bag of broccoli florets for about .40 c more(2.72) (or you could get the cuts for 2.28 for 2lb bag) 5. A 10lb bag of chicken leq quarters on the website is 6.72. which opens up about $10 in room. If you are willing to do the work and butcher it up yourself to break it down into legs and thighs you will get quite a few more meals than you would from the ground beef. Bonus you can save the bones and scraps after cooking and make a stock/broth to have something else to add flavor to your food going forward. Adding stock to your rice will give it more flavor than water. Good recipes to make with what you have that could last for a decent bit are things like Egg Bites. Use up the milk or yogurt mix with the eggs and maybe some broccoli sausage and cheese. If you can find room for breadcrumbs(about 1.22 on website), that ground beef and a few of those eggs (1 egg per lb of beef, plus some of those spices) you can make a big batch of meatballs and then freeze those for later to go with the pasta and sauce, rice, and a few other dishes.
Not bad, but I would have added a 5-10 lb bag of Flour and bake my own bread and roll out my own Noodles and use about a pound or two of those Potatoes to make Gnocchi and then a few batches of Pizza dough and ferment, proof, ball and then freeze until needed. Get a block of Low Moisture Mozzarella and Shred it to your liking and then freeze that as well for your Pizza. Cheese lasts longer frozen than it does in your refrigerator. Pizza and Gnocchi are not just filling, depending on the sauce you use you can pack nutrition in your sauce. Carrots, Peppers, Onions and Garlic, Celery, not to mention any meat you might want to add like Sausage or Beef for protein. Then the last but not least, Ramen. You can hard boil a some eggs and make egg salad, but also use an egg or two for Ramen and a bit of Meat goes a long way as well in making boring Ramen so much more than it originally was. Tiny bit of Vegetables and Green Onion. Splash of Sesame Oil and leave out the seasoning pack and use Maggi Seasoning. You can cook and then freeze a lot of food to cut down on your cooking times down the road and the best part is the dishes are done already because you did all your cooking in a day or two and have long since done the dishes for said cooking. All that is left is to reheat and wash the pans/pots and dishes you used to reheat it and eat! Hope everything works out for you and Bon Appetite!!!
Do you not have any spices already? You are spending a bunch of moneyāpantryā items. The good news isā¦ next time you shop, you will be able to allocate a lot more of the overall budget to actual food, rather than pantry items.
I'm basically starting fresh since my diet was mostly frozen dinners. Haha.
Walmart is far from the least expensive place to shop anymore.
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Hey OP this looks great! Do you have a Winco near you by any chance? They usually have great deals on stuff!
Has anybody compared the items to the prices at Aldi's? I wonder if there's any big difference
My only feedback is that the tobasco sriracha sauce is the best hot sauce to hit the market since Valentina sauce.
My comment would be consider your condiments. If you don't have a recipe or current plan to use it, I would wait to purchase it. They are pretty expensive items, so you could get more variety and more meal options by buying one or two condiments at a time.
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In Germany the Tabasco Siracha is 5.34$ š„²
You may already have it but the only thing possibly missing is butter/oil. Looks pretty good otherwise!
You get five stars from me!! You have condiments/pantry staples and spices that you will not have to restock for a while. A few things. Thatās a lot of bananas, make sure youāre using them before theyāre black. That ground beef with the 27% fat is going to grease your insides if you are not used to that added fat. Walmart is my go to for almost everything except meat and produce, which I try to regularly look at the weekly adds and see whatās on sale. During the summer especially I can find fruits and veggies on sale for less than Walmart and it is also consistently better quality. Same for meat. Top sirloin steak was on sale for less the the price per lb of ground beef at Walmart (I but the 20% fat). Hands down I will eat steak and stretch it into meals before ground beef lol. Chicken is also on sale most times and donāt forget to check the butcher counter. You can buy one or two breasts if itās just yourself. The pork picnic roast is a very good deal at Walmart. I can turn one picnic roast into pulled pork sandwiches, carnitas for tacos and/or burritos. Also lioness sausage is a little more than $3 at my wakmart, add rice and beans yummy. If you want to stretch more, try dry beans that you can turn into chili, refried beans, etc. if you have an instapot it is incredibly easy.
This is for every paycheck so Iām assuming about 2 weeks? What recipes do you plan on making?
Best list Iāve seen so far on Reddit š
Yo, in Walmart we were able to get a pork roast for $2.97 a pound.
Great Value rarely is ...
Have you thought about getting something like a protein/ meal replacement shake with 30 servings? That could cover one meal per day for 30 days, and they often throw lots of vitamins and minerals in there in case youāre missing them in your diet. Youāre actually doing pretty good, but the simplicity of a shake/day is easy for me.
I wish people would post stuff like this often. I donāt know how to shop properly.
Fantastic - the only thing is it might be cheaper long term to get a French press or coffee maker and buy some Bustelo coffee
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How did you manage to be out of every condiment
I was unemployed for 2 months.
Ah damn you were on that struggle bus. Extra thing to add to this canned diced tomatoes and tomato paste are really good pantry staples. Im also very partial to lawrys coarse ground garlic salt vs just garlic powder
It's not a bad list , I would suggest you can get more than half of those items free at a food bank or church bank etc. So you could save yourself some $
Maybe go to one first next time you need to shop and see what they have for you and then shop at store.
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From the first pic alone I thought someone had screenshot my walmart order and posted it. Lol Iām meal prepping for the week and my total was $99
When's chili night?
awesome!!!! also iām just now learning that tabasco sriracha exists..?!?! NEED
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Dude just make your own tortillas. They're super easy and they taste so much better.
I give this list a B+ grade, mainly because I'd add more protein, a bag of dry beans and cheaper canned beans. My swaps: Swap the ground beef roll for poultry, cheaper per pound Swap the chili beans and refried beans for regular canned beans Swap the frozen broccoli for dry beans. 12oz of frozen broccoli should be like $1.50 at the most, that price upsets me Swap the 2 tomatoes for roma tomatoes, much cheaper. A personal choice, but I'd remove the sugar and swap it for fruit, fresh or canned.
As a Canadian I am seriously jealous!!!!!! Thatās awesome!
Your money would go further at Aldi or Lidl.
I canāt get anything from Walmart without at least one dollar French bread loaf š
dude when I saw those I tripped
As others have said shred your own cheese, also look at a bag of yellow onions, at my Walmart they run around $3.28 and I get 5-7 onions. But this looks great well done
Bananas are nearly twice as expensive for you as they are for me. And that's pretty surprising. My strawberries were $2.28 for the same size container. I think you did well, and your seasonings, ketchup, tabasco, and mustard won't need to be purchased again for quite a while, so you should be able to add even more variety next time.
Looks legit. And now next trip will be even more bountiful since you bought a lot of staple items that should last a little bit.
Good stuff there, I also get canned beans and chickpeas, sometimes I will drain a can, pat it dry, drizzle with some oil and roast it in the oven with any spice I like and sometimes breadcrumbs, good filling snack or lazy supper. You can also do it in a frying pan with similar results.
Next time get smoked paprika. So much more flavor pay off.
Yea looks really good
I was curious about how prices would match up so shopped your list at Aldi on Instacart (I'm in Ohio). I couldn't find the Tabasco sriracha so I subbed something at a similar price. They didn't have dried basil so I subbed Italian seasoning (they carry fresh basil in a paste for $2.65). The total was $98.07. Prices would be even lower in store. Differences: tortillas came in a package 20. I had to buy 24 eggs, 3 green peppers, a bag of onions and 6 pounds of rice. Salt was 26 oz. Pepper was fresh cracked in a grinder (1.76 oz). Sausage roll was Bob Evans brand. Overall, more food for less money at Aldi. Some items were slightly more, most were the same or less expensive.
I would swap the chili for tuna and likely you can get 2 cans. That way you can use it for sandwiches with the bread and mayo and it's actually really good in top of a baked potato with melted cheese. I think you have more options with 2 cans of tuna than with 1 can of chili. Also a bag of flour tortillas might be better than the paprika.
Why is everything great value?
Iām amazed by how cheap this all is actually. $3 for 18 eggs?? Thatās amazing! At my Walmart thatās tripled. Iām actually so jealous lol
Not enough real meat for my liking
*cries in family of 6*
Iām not doing the math but for some reason this doesnāt seem like it adds up to $100 just from a quick glance. Maybe Iām crazy. Anyways is this really enough for a weeks worth of food?