Cutting food costs
When I quit my job to go back to school, Nick and I had to re-evaluate our spending habits and find ways to trim our new one-income budget. We tracked every penny of our spending and had agonizing conversations over what was necessary spending and what was discretionary. (FWIW, my $63 haircut from Cherise at Bella Sirena is a necessity.) Then we looked at ways to cut spending where we could.
To this day it constantly blows me away how much money we spend on food. I’m not talking about dining out here; I’m talking basic groceries. Even when we try cutting out extravagant items like triple cream French brie, rustic loaves of bread or asparagus in August, we still spend hundreds of dollars. This is even more amazing, considering that people on food stamps must eat on $21 a week. How do they do it?
I guess the USDA had the same question, so they created a database of recipes and then used cost data from stores (gathered by AC Nielson in 2001, and adjusted based on the CPI) to calculate the cost of each dish. Even if you’re not on food stamps, the USDA’s Food Stamp Nutrition Connection Recipes Finder is available for free.
It’s kind of a cool tool. You can search by recipe name or by ingredient - the latter being very handy if you bought a bunch of something because it was cheap and are now trying to find a new way to use it. It provides not only cost per recipe and per serving, but also nutrition facts - a nice chart exactly like the one you find on any packaged food. It also lets you print the recipe in several different formats.
Another cool feature is that it will maintain a shopping list for you - click “add to shopping list” for the recipes that you plan to make and it will keep track and give you a list of everything you need.
If I understand correctly, adjusting 2001 prices with the CPI is likely to underestimate actual costs. Inflation adjustment aside, because the data is based on national averages, regional and seasonal variations will probably be a greater source of inaccuracy.
Still, despite its limitations, it seems like a cool free resource for anyone who wants to make cheap, healthy meals out of real food.
Comments:
As verification of the story above, we have indeed cut down on extravagant items. For example, I no longer routinely pick up a six of Full Sail Amber. Instead, dirtbag boys and girls, we’re throwin’ back Trader Joe’s Mission Street Pale (check it - less than a fiver) and our brie consumption is positively lowbrow at single cream.
Next entry: Tort Law Back
Previous entry: Tamale Feast