We may love it or we may hate it but we all must do it: grocery shopping. Whether you do it weekly, daily or monthly, you have to go and buy food and fuel for your home. All of you need to be able to eat and you need to be able to eat well, so when it comes to food budgeting for you all for the whole family, it can make anybody’s head spin that you have to budget for your groceries as well.
The thing is, grocery shopping doesn’t have to be difficult even when you are on a budget. You also don’t have to sacrifice that delicious and easy corn tortilla recipe that you saw online. As long as you are creative with it and you are happy to plan in advance, you can eat those balanced and healthy meals that your whole family loves, you just have to know how to budget for them. That’s what we have for you below. Take a look at our tips to ensure that you can budget for your household groceries much much easier than ever before.
Shop online
You may not want to buy your fresh produce or your meat online, but you can shop for your non-perishable items online. Protein bars and dried fruits are ideal from buying from online retailers like Amazon because you can buy them in bulk. It saves you money because there is no food tax to pay, and if the shipping is free over a certain amount, it’s an added incentive. Always check the expiration date, though.
Buy fresh fruit as you need it
You usually know what you’re going to eat within a week, and if you are sending lunch boxes with your children to school then you’ll know how many perishable items will be in them. You can still buy your fresh produce as you need it, but make sure that you are buying what you’ll use and not excess. If you know the kids are not going to eat 10 bananas, don’t buy ten bananas.
Buy things in season
Choose to buy in season. Papayas, apples, bananas, strawberries, they all have seasons on them. Not only will you save cash by buying seasonal fruit and vegetables, you will be able to enjoy the most wholesome food on the market. Go online and search for what’s available per season and pop that list of produce onto the fridge. This way, you’ll always be aware of what’s in season so when you are planning your meals for the week you’ll be able to buy accordingly.
Buy your meat in bulk
If you have a freezer at home, you can cut down on your grocery shopping for a month or so by buying all of your meat in bulk, portioning it into freezer bags and popping it into the freezer. As long as you use it up within six months it will still be in good condition. Cubing your meat into chunks as you would need it and portions everything out individually will mean that you only defrost what you’re going to use and there is no food waste.