Quest Greek Islands

Save Money on Your Food Bill

Start shopping smart and save money too. Do you get annoyed when you can never stick to your set budget when it comes to your weekly shopping bill? It is understandable that you can get distracted, when in a supermarket, which leads you to buy many extra items that you wouldn't have planned to buy. Sticking to a budget can be hard, but if you don't have a budget in mind how can you expect to stick to it?

Many people are unaware that they can actually save a fortune on their weekly or monthly shopping bills if only they knew how. It is not impossible to actually cut your shopping bill in half if you know what to do. Take the first steps to saving cash and slice your shopping bill in half!

Make a list
Make a list and stick to it. Don't be tempted to buy anything that is not on the list, especially if it not something that will be useful to you. Be strict with yourself and if you see promotions and special offers advertised, then take the time to think about whether you're buying the product because it's cheap or because you can use it.

Monitor how much you waste
Many Western countries are now terribly guilty of the amount of food that they waste. Each meal time, the average family living in the Western world wastes enough food to make another meal for themselves. If you find that you are wasting a lot of food, then this is telling you that you don't need to cook as much. So decreasing your portion sizes could be a useful move here. If you don't think it's a good idea to down size your portions, then think about using the left overs for another meal the next evening. So many people are fooled in to thinking that food has to be thrown away if it is not ate that day, but this isn't always true. Yes, some food products should be thrown out if the date is not good or they can't be eaten or re-heated again, but the mejority of food can be recycled and re-used. Be creative and see what you can make out of leftovers and don't forget that this is saving you time and money!

I'll have what's on the menu
Have you ever thought of making a menu for the week? I don't mean that you should allow your family to choose their own meals from a menu and have you working hard to cook them. The idea of making a menu is to make a plan of what meals you will prepare for a whole week. This means that you will have seven days of meals already planned, so all you have to do is to make sure you have the ingredients in the house. Making a meal menu also helps you to write a shopping list, as you can write your list according to the meals that you have planned to cook for the week.

Shop around
Rather than getting all of your shopping from one shop, you should look around at where sells what products for the least amount of money. You may find that one shop sells some products cheaper than another, for example the local market usually sells fresh fruit and vegetables at a lower cost than in a supermarket - plus the quality will be better too.

Make your own ready meals
Shop bought ready meals are expensive and are not always very healthy either. If you rely on fast food and ready meals, due to your hectic schedule, then plan ahead and make your own. Designate a specific 'cooking day' when you can make numerous meals in advance and freeze them. You will be creating your own sort of home made ready meals, but healthier versions, so you will be benefiting your own health as well as the health of your finances. By making your own meals and freezing them, you will have a much larger choice of fast meals to choose from and can customise them to suit your taste too!