Food cost
Every month we try to spend less on food/drinking/eating out, but that rarely happens. In fact, for the past 3 years our grocery spending has been going up and up.
Last year’s food spending worked out to this (average per month):
Groceries - $540
Coffee/Eating Out - $43
Alcohol - $30 wow! (I mean, not much at all)
Supplements - $91
Total: $740
This is for a family of 2 adults.
We don’t eat out or drink alcohol much, as you can see; and we rarely buy pre-packaged foods of any kind. 99% of what we eat is cooked by us at home from raw ingredients. We’ve also been switching to an all-organic diet over the past 3 years, and we’re practically there. The only exception are fruits and vegetables that we buy from local farmers, especially in season. I will take a non-organic local cabbage over imported organic one any day (all berries are an exception).
We shop downtown Toronto at the St. Lawrence Market & Kensington Market (15-20% combined); at Dominion, Loblaws, sometimes at No Frills (35-40% combined); and at the Whole Foods in Yorkville (45%).
Buying organic and/or fresh local food is a personal choice. Even though we grumble at the end of the month seeing how much money we “ate”, we don’t want to start eating lower-grade food. If you live on boxed mac-and-cheese and microwavable “soup in a bowl”, you may save money in the short term, but I firmly believe in spending money on health and prevention today, rather than fix health problems down the road. And bad food WILL make you sick. “Let your food be your medicine”, said Hippocrates.
I can talk about food quality for hours, so I better cut it short now.
We allocate about 30% of our monthly budget for food, that’s almost as much as Americans used to spend on food in the 1930’s. Very interesting graph here: Food, clothing, and shelter see different historical spending patterns.
Unfortunately, I don’t think there’s a money-saving workaround for this. I use coupons and like sales, but those are rare for items that we buy.
If you think we’re just wasting money, and in general are gullible suckers, well… I have eaten really good nutritious food for most of my life. And then I also felt what generic mass-produced pesticide-laden food did to me in US and Canada, when I wasn’t so selective about what I ate. The contrast in my well-being was stunning, and it only took 3 years to go from feeling fabulous, to feeling crappy. Again, what to eat and how much to spend on food is a personal choice. If you grew up on TV and happy meals, you just don’t know any better. You weren’t taught about food and what it should be like. But if you know better, this is a corner you shouldn’t cut. If you buy premium gasoline for your car, and cheap mass-produced food for yourself - is it because your car is worth it and you are not?
If you have 48 minutes to spare, and even remotely curious about the meat you eat, check out this video.
Wow, first post under “Frugality” and here I am, defending wasteful spending (pardon the pun?)
Subscribe in a reader
You’re not wasting money. Ever talk to people who’ve lived to be 95 or 100, and still have all their faculties intact? I have, and the two common threads are good, home made food and low stress working lives (or the ability to let the stress roll off them). Don’t feel guilty!
Jamesonandwater,
yes, I have met people like that and it’s very inspiring.
I think in a weird way eating well takes discipline. It’s somewhat similar to saving on consumer goods, so you’ll have more money accumulated down the road.
It would be way easier to buy cheaper food and save money now, but you would slowly “spend” your health over the years. I don’t want to be wealthy at 50 or 60 if I have to spend money and time on medical procedures and drugs.
It also takes discipline to cook food at home, of course. People seem to not take pleasure in it anymore and proudly admit that they’re lousy cooks.
A whole change of attitude is needed, and health should be treated as the most valuable asset of all.