Save money on meat

For Thrifty Thursday I thought I would share some tips on how to save money on meat.

When we had our son almost 2 years ago we went from spending around $250 a month on groceries to now shooting to spend below $160 a month. This is for 2 adults and 1 toddler. When we first decided to cut our grocery budget by about 30% I thought for sure we wouldn't be eating much meat. Then I realized there are ways to actually save money on meat. Here are 5 ways that work for us.

1. Don't make meat the center of the meal.
For example don't always have steak or chicken breast by themselves with sides. Find recipes that include these items, but that don't make them the main dish. Often you will use half the amount of meat. For example we eat a lot of casserole type things, or we have burritos, tacos, fajitas, chicken quesadillas- you get the pictures. Have meat at the center of your meal in moderation. Save it for special occasions. Not every night needs to be a 5 course meal, especially if you have young children.

2. Buy hamburger in bulk.
Buy a 3 pound package and split it into quart size baggies when you get home and pop them in the freezer. So often we see a great sale on ground beef that is 1.99/lb and under. So we buy what looks like a 1 pound package. If you actually check what the lb. amount is you will find it is often more than 1.25 pounds. Chances are you will use that 1 package for one meal, even though your recipe only calls for 1 pound of meat. So you have now spent more than that 1.99 pound for that meal and have spent around 2.25 instead. You may think this isn't much of a difference, but over the course of a year you could probably save a lot of money by paying attention to the pound amount of hamburger you are buying and buy in bulk since those packages are often closer to the 3 pound mark.

For example this past week I bought a 3.01 pound package of ground beef for 5.39 (1.79 a pound). I will get 3 meals out of this. Had I bought 3 separate packages at 1.25 ponds costing about 2.24 a package I would have spent around 6.71 for ground beef for the same 3 meals... so I saved almost $1.50 just by buying the 3 pound package and splitting it into 3 bags! $1.50 is a lot of money on a $40/week budget!

3. Realize that frozen bags of chicken breasts are a great resource!
These bags generally cost around $6 at Aldi and are 3 pounds a piece... that is about $2 a pound. You will often spend more than this per pound on fresh chicken. Also I have learned that buying a whole chicken, cooking it in the crock pot and then shredding it is a great way to use chicken in casseroles and for other meals that calls for cubed/shredded chicken. You can usually get about 4 meals out of a whole chicken.

4. Learn to look for marked down meat.
Most grocery stores will mark down their meet when it is getting close to expiration. Most Dillon's have an area where they stick their marked down meat. I have often found many steaks, roasts, and stew beef for 1/3 of the regular cost. Also if you aren't going to use it right away, meat is freezable!

5. Wait for BIGI sales
Many times at our local Dillons they do BIGI sales on pork loin, roasts and sometimes steak! I say stock up on this type of meat when a good sale like this comes around!

Those are just a few ways. Feel free to share any tips you may have in the comments section below

Note: This is was originally posted in May of this year and has been updated and changed for this re-post.

The Grocery Budget

If you know me well you know that I love Crown Financial Ministries. This is due in large part to the approach taken in helping people with their finances. Crown’s main goal is to help people learn what God’s word has to say about handling His money and learning that financial freedom means being free to serve the Lord, not live your material dreams.

Good friends of ours introduced my husband and I to Crown when they talked with us about some budgeting software. We had never budgeted before and knew we needed something to help us get out of the “oh no we only have $30 to last us the next 5 days” cycle, other wise known as living paycheck to paycheck. As we read and prayed about our finances we were lead to create a spending plan, which became very helpful when it came time to go from 2 incomes to 1. We knew exactly where our money was being spent and knew very easily what could be cut out of the budget in order for me to stay home with our little boy. Go here if you would like to read more on the need for a spending plan, or about things here  that can "bust" your budget.

In fact one of the easiest places to cut money is usually the grocery budget. When I say grocery I am talking strictly about food. Many of us don’t realize the actual cost of the food we are buying, and most of the time we don’t really pay attention to what is going into our cart. Then when check out time comes we wonder how we just spent so much money at the store. In this article it is my goal to give practical tips and advice concerning buying groceries on a budget.

The first thing I always recommend is to know what a good price is. That is really the foundation of this blog. Know what the maximum amount is you will pay for an item. If you shop long enough and pay attention you will come to find that you usually know what the price is of one particular item at a particular store. For example I have shopped at Aldi long enough to know that cans of kidney beans are usually .45 cents a can. I have also shopped at Dillon’s long enough to know that I have never seen kidney beans .45 cents a can there and so I know that my best price is always going to be at Aldi and I will not pay more than I have to for this one particular item. Same thing goes for all other food items, start to know what the price is of the item and try to figure out if it is less expensive somewhere else or if the off-brand will do. Many times you will find that the off brand is just as good.

The second thing I recommend is to cut out unnecessary snacks. Lets face it, we all love a Little Debbie snack cake every now and then, but our budget often doesn’t and neither do my thighs. We have found that by not buying over priced snack food we have been able to cut down significantly on our grocery bill. If we do have snack food in the house it is because I paid next to nothing for it. Same thing goes for breakfast foods. Consider making homemade pancakes/waffles and freezing them or eating cereal you get on sale in stead of over priced frozen breakfast, boxed muffins, and pop tarts that don’t give you a whole lot of nutrition anyway. Your husband or children may miss these things at first, but get creative enough with other snack alternatives and they won’t miss them at all.

Thirdly, we also cut way down in our grocery budget by not buying soda and juice. If there is soda or juice in our house it is because I paid very little for it. Soda and juice often add very little nutritional content to your diet (I am a pop junkie though)  and it is better to eat fresh fruit for the nutrients than drink juice. So in our house we stick to milk and water to help cut costs.

Fourth, don’t be afraid of canned or frozen vegetables. I am aware of the grand debate concerning these items and whether or not you get the same amount of nutrients from these as you do fresh veggies. However, canned and frozen veggies are often an okay alternative. You could simply cut down from eating fresh veggies every night to eating them only half the time and eating canned and frozen the other half. There are often great sales on canned and frozen veggies that fit the bill a little better than fresh veggies. If you absolutely feel disgusted at the thought of eating anything canned or frozen, than just menu plan around what fresh veggies are on sale for the week or grow a garden. As for fruit, by a few types for the week and call it good. You don’t necessarily have to have 5 different types of fruit on hand at all times. Shop what is on sale and stick to that for the week. We often eat a lot of apples and grapes around here and in the winter we sometimes just stick with canned fruit, in water or light syrup of course!

As for meat, you can read my thoughts on that here.

And lastly I would recommend menu planning if you are trying to stick to a budget. Having a plan helps you shop with a purpose and come out buying very little impulse items. One of the things that helps me to menu plan is to have a list of our favorite (staple) meals handy that I can make for the week depending on what is on sale. We have about 30-40 total that I know my family will eat, and most weeks I can make these by shopping the sale items at the store. At least twice a month I try a new recipe to change things up a little a bit and most often the new recipe gets added to our staple list. My menu can often change with the seasons. For example in summer I am more likely to grill and in the winter we eat a lot of soups. I always make my menu based on what the sale items are for the week or what is in my pantry. If I find a good deal at the store on meat I will stock up and use it for the next week. I often have plenty ingredients on hand from great sales that have given me a chance to stock up. Or if I go to Aldi I always make sure to buy the items I need that I know I will not get cheaper anywhere else.

We made our grocery budget based on the bare necessities because that is the place we are in life. So it has been my goal to find good, yet inexpensive meals I can make on our small weekly budget. Below is a list of some web sites and resources I have used:

• The Aldi Queen Blog- I stumbled across this about a year ago and love this blog. It is dedicated to menu ideas that you can make purely by shopping at Aldi.
  
• Living on a Dime- I also stumbled across this and have found some of the recipes here to be good
  
• Crystal at Money saving mom does have a great super market savings course where you can find e-books about menu planning and some of her own frugal recipes!
  
• Miserly moms has a great site here for recipes

These are a few sites to get you started.  I plan to write up some of my own recipes and post at a later date, but for now you can check out my menu for the week when I post my weekly menu plan on Mondays.

Above all else in this whole budget process you should pray and ask the Lord what he would desire for your grocery budget.  He is always capable of giving us the wisdom we need.  And of course if you are married talk with your spouse also and agree on the budget you set forth.  Remember a budget is just a guideline and is subject to change from time to time.  Please be sure to check out the weekly posts about Dillons and Hy-Vee.  My goal in writing these to help you learn what the best price is and become a wise grocery shopper.  Happy shopping!

Organizing coupons

My first suggestion when it comes to coupons is always to start accumulating and organizing them.  As I have talked about, you can get most of your coupons from the Sunday paper along with printing them from many coupon sites (note: see side bar on blog for list).  If you don't want to buy the paper you could ask neighbors, friends and family for their coupons. I personally get coupons from 3 different family members along with the coupons from the paper I buy.  That amount of coupons is almost to much to handle sometimes!

Fact: Only roughly 2% people actually cut coupons from the Sunday paper... so chances are you know somebody who will gladly give you their coupons. 

As for organizing there are several ways to do this... it just depends on what works best for you. If you are in my MOPS group and were there when Blaire shared about coupons you saw a big coupon binder for the very meticulous couponer.   That binder actually belonged to me. Another fellow MOPS gal has a binder much the same.  I must admit I learned everything about the coupon binder from her.  You can check out the binder here

Now if that is overwhelming you can do a simple envelope method that Crystal does a good job of talking about here  Crystal also links to some other blogs and sites that have other ideas as well.

As for restaurant coupons (usually you find these in postal mailings or the Wednesday paper) and store coupons (like Jc Penny's, Home Depot, JoAnn's, etc.)  I have a big according style binder that I keep these in.  I organize them buy the type of store/restaurant.  

How much time does this take?  It depends on how many coupons you have and your organizational method.  When I first started it took a lot longer than it does now.  The longer you do it, the quicker you get.  My binder takes a good amount of time (roughly 1-2 hours/week)... however it is worth it when it comes time to look for a coupon- AKA- I am not shuffling through 100 coupons in an envelop looking for those 3 Cover Girl coupons I just know I have somewhere!  I usually try and cut my coupons and organize them in 1 sitting (often during the kiddo's nap time).  

One other note about the time it takes.  Figure what you save in a week and divide it by the hours you put into couponing... you will find that you get paid well to coupon! For example last week I spent 48$ on groceries and my savings was around 50%.  So that means I should have spent $96 but because of my planning and couponing I saved $48 (50%).  If I spent a total of 4 hours last week between planning/cutting/ and organizing coupons,  I technically made about 12$ and hour... not bad for a part time job eh?

If you have a way that you organize your coupons and would like to share about it, please do so in the comments section!

Doubling Coupons

Dillons is the only store that I am aware of around here (Topeka) that "doubles" coupons.  They double coupons everyday!  This is their policy.  Sometimes you will see a coupon that says "not subject to doubling or tripling", Dillons still doubles them anyway.  

The policy for Dillons is that they double every coupon up to a $1.00.  So for instance a .25 coupon is doubled to .50, and a .30 coupon is doubled to .60 cents off and so forth.  For coupons that are higher than .50 cents off such as a .60/1 coupons this is "doubled" to a $1.00 meaning Dillon's will add on the other .40 cents off.   Often at the bottom of your receipt you can see how your coupons scanned.  For example I used a .55/1 coupon and at the bottom of my receipt is looks like this :

MC Scanned coupon .55-c

SC Multiplied coupon .45-c

So for a .75/1 coupon, Dillons will give you another .25 cents off to make it a 1.00.  If you have a coupon that is for a $1 or more off that is all the discount you will get.  They do not double beyond $1.00.  As for tripling coupons, I have yet to see our Dillons stores do this, so we can cross that bridge when the time comes.

Where to get Coupons

Coupons come out every Sunday (Sunday only) in what is called the "Smartsoure"  and "redplum" inserts.  And on the 1st of every month Proctor and Gamble puts out what they call the "P&G Brand saver"  This contains coupons for toiletry and household brands such as herbal essences, old spice, tide, cascade- etc.  The Smartsource and Red Plum inserts carry all brands of manufacturer coupons (coupon language would refer to these as "mf" coupons).  These coupons can be used anywhere they are accepted.  Most common places are Dillons, Hy-vee, CVS, Walgreens, K-mart, Walmart, Falley's, Target and I am sure some others I forgot about.  Pretty much where the product is sold, the coupon can be used.  As a note:  Some stores put out "store specific" coupons that can only be used in their stores.  You will generally find these in the store ad, or in the store not usually in the coupon inserts in the Sunday paper.  Regardless the coupon will say if it is a mf coupon or not.

In the Wednesday Paper you will find coupons to restaurants and flyers for various stores, especially the grocery stores.  In my opinion if you are going to get the paper the Sunday paper is the best to get.  If you want the ads from the Wednesday paper you could get that too, however most of those adds can be located on-line. You have 2 options around here for coupons in the Sunday paper, the Topeka Capitol Journal or the KC star. In my 1 + year of couponing  I will tell you that the KC star consistently has better and more coupons.  So I only get the star. You can get this at the local convenience store for 1.50 on Sundays or order it on-line.  Go here to get the star for 26 weeks for only 25.74, that is only .99/week!  This allows you to get it F, S and Sunday and get the coupons on Sunday!  This is actually much cheaper than the Journal.  I have been told that you can request certain adds to be in your KC star that you may not get otherwise... such as Target, Walgreens and CVS.  These ads typically are not in the star since the KC stores will run different ads than Topeka.

One thing to know is that on holiday weekends there are usually no coupon inserts in the paper.  So if you buy one at the convenience store I would check to make sure there are inserts this weekend (being Memorial Day) before purchasing it.

Also, don't forget about the Parade magazine that is in Sunday's paper.  Once in a blue moon you will find some coupons in there also.

Coupons can also be printed on-line.  Some sites I reference here and check regularly are coupons.com, smartsource.com, redplum.com, bettycrocker.com, pillsbury.com, boodle.com, and couponbug.com  You do have to sign up and enter an email address in order to print coupons.  I have always felt very safe doing this and have never had a problem with spam in regard to these sites.  If you are worried about spam my suggestion is to get a different email address that is used for couponing purposes only.

One other way to get coupons is to sign up for free samples on-line.  You will often not only get a free product, but a really nice mf coupon that comes with it.  Usually the coupon that comes with the sample is worth more than the one you may get out of the coupon inserts.  For those of you who don't know Crystal, she is currently the best resource for knowing where to find "freebies".  You can also check here on Fridays for what Amy calls "freebie Friday"  for some other freebies.  

The last thing to mention is "All You" magazine.  This can be purchased at Walmart or ordered through those kids who come to your door selling subscriptions to magazines:)  This has had some very good coupons in it!

I hope this is helpful!  If you have questions please feel free to comment!