Cost of grocery shopping getting you down? Maybe you're buying the wrong stuff.
Lately I've seen and/or gotten killer deals on:
- Grains -- rolled oats, 2.25 cents per bowl; rice, 60 cents a pound.
- Fruit -- apples, 58 cents a pound; bananas, 59 cents a pound; grapes, 99 cents a pound; dried plums (yeah, prunes got an image makeover), about 6 cents per serving.
- Vegetables -- carrots, 59 cents a pound; frozen corn, 99 cents a pound; dry beans, 70 cents a pound.
- Protein -- eggs, $1.49 for 18; whole fryers, 69 cents a pound; ground beef, $1.66 a pound.
Most of the above deals were loss leaders, and a few required coupons. But clearly, cheap eats can be had, and they're not limited to ramen noodles. The foodstuffs I'm talking about are not only cheap, they're healthful -- to you and to your budget.
Of course, they also take a little work. You don't just rip open a container, nuke the contents and declare it dinner.
Food tends to be one of our biggest fixed expenses, but it's also the one with the most wiggle room. It's hard to renegotiate a mortgage or a car payment, but you can learn to roast a chicken or soak some beans.
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I asked a few experts for some ideas about healthful nourishment that costs less than $1 per serving. Often, that dollar will get you a lot of servings.
If you can read, you can cook. So read on.
Where to find inexpensive eats
Supermarkets are great for loss leaders. Most of the deals I mentioned were from traditional grocery stores. But, as I noted in "The dollar food pantry," it's wise to think outside the supermarket. Inexpensive and healthful food can also be found at drugstores, grocery outlets, big-box stores and dollar stores.Yes, dollar stores. The ones near me don't have fresh or frozen items, but they do sell rice, pasta, dried fruit and canned tomatoes. I'm not as lucky as Billy Vasquez, who writes a blog called The 99 Cent Chef. His neighborhood's 99¢ Only store carries things such as potatoes, acorn and spaghetti squash, onions, dry beans, frozen tilapia filets, rice, pasta, beans and other tasty basics.
Vasquez also shops at grocery stores and ethnic markets for intriguing ingredients. "I'll go anywhere for a bargain," he says.
So will I. Two doors down from my local dollar store is a grocery outlet whose stock is ever-changing but always includes cheap basics. An Asian market in my neighborhood sells some of the cheapest produce around, plus chicken-leg quarters for 89 cents a pound. That's also where I get dry beans and rice, in 10-pound bags. (The per-pound cost tends to drop as the bags get bigger, but I don't have room to store larger quantities.)
Specialty stores such as Trader Joe's or Whole Foods can feature surprisingly low prices as well. Even drugstores offer loss leaders such as canned fish and dried fruit. Walgreens, for example, has a line of $1 raisins; dried figs, cranberries and mangos; and other shelf-stable fruits.