Do you struggle to decide what to have for dinner? Or spend way too much on eating out or shopping at the grocery store? Food can be one of the biggest budget busters, but I’m here to tell you that you can eat well AND save money.
Are you thinking you don’t have time to meal plan or decide what to eat? Don’t worry. I have an easy system to help you plan and shop for your meals.
This post is going to take you through a meal planning process that you can follow to save money and time. Just how much can you save on food? To give you an idea of cost, I spend an average of $80 per week for two people (So $40 a week per person).
You can spend even less if you are ok with really planning around grocery store sales and not eating expensive cuts of meat or using pricey ingredients. I like to eat things I enjoy as well as buy quality ingredients. I used to average around $40-$50 a month but once gathering with others was restricted due to COVID, I decided I’d rather make more fun meals rather than save a little extra money each month.
Lunch out can cost $10 or more per meal, and you can pack a full lunch for only a few dollars. We utilize dinner leftovers or sandwiches for lunch to save money. The average of $40 per week per person includes ALL our meals – breakfast, lunch and dinner (snacks too). You will eat healthier and save money!
Another huge bonus of meal planning is the time it will save you! You won’t need to go to the store multiple times a week (or day!) Nor will you have to spend time asking what you should eat for dinner. Now you will have a list of ingredients and recipes that are ready to go when you need to cook dinner.
7 easy steps to creating and following a meal plan:
- Create two lists – you can use a paper list or an app on your phone. One list should be called “grocery store” and the other “meals” (Or whatever rendition you want to call them).
- Find meals you want to eat. I use Pinterest (check out this link for my recipes board). If I am craving a certain food or recipe, I’ll just google it and sometimes I do a hybrid between recipes. I am not a structured cook – I just go with what sounds good. If you aren’t a skilled cook, stick to the recipe so it turns out ok!
- Add any recipe you choose to the “meals” list you’ve made (I use ToDoIst on my phone)
- Next I look at the recipe, and have my phone open with my grocery shopping list. I use ToDoIst for creating this list as well. I read through the ingredients in the recipe I’ve chosen, and anything we don’t already have, goes on the list for the grocery store.
- Depending on how much you eat and how many people in your family, you will want to choose 4-7 meals. We as two people usually do 4-5 per week.
- Go to the grocery store (we try to go just once a week – occasionally we forget something and have to go back but only for an item or two). Eat before you go to the store, otherwise you’ll be hungry and tempted to buy extras. Going to the grocery store just once a week will also keep you from making more impulse purchases!
- We don’t do this, but you can decide ahead of time what recipe you will make on what day. We just look each day and choose what sounds good. If you like a good journal, this is a great paper meal planner where you can write down your meals for each day.
After grocery shopping, I always like to check Ibotta to see what rebates I can get on the items I purchased. Ibotta gives you cash back for your purchases. You just have to select the item and then upload your receipt.
Check out my related post about what to do with receipts before throwing them away.
There are services out there for meal planning if you don’t feel like doing it yourself. The one I would suggest if you don’t want to look for recipes and ingredient lists yourself is $5 Meal Plan. Try $5 Meal Plan Risk Free! $5 Meal Plan provides the shopping list and recipes for you so you don’t have to do it yourself.
Do you plan your meals? If you’re just starting out, try to replace one or two meals eaten out at restaurants with a meal made at home. Any small changes you make toward eating out less, will add up to big savings in your pocket. Just think of the things you could buy with an extra $100 or more a month! You can go to more horse shows or buy a new saddle – just by taking time to cook for yourself.
Give meal planning a try, and let me know how it goes!
Leave a Reply