I can eat for $40 a week, Chuck.

Wow, I'll go all the way down to $20, but only if alcohol isn't included. $50/week I could do by going out to eat for two meals a day. There's a lot of cheap food carts here, I can easily get Asian or Mexican for 14 meals a week for under $3.50/meal. I know where to get a huge slice of good pizza for $3, fairly healthy huge burritos for $3.25, happy hour deals for $2, so $50 doesn't sound like the slightest challenge.

Especially counting happy hour deals, I could easily eat out for $50/week.

The Icelander 2009-11-03 08:32:16 PM How to Eat Well on $50 a Week: Step 1: Learn how to cook. This has been "How to Eat Well on $50 a Week"
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Heh. Pretty much.


Or some cool alternatives: Buy a dominoes medium pizza for $4 on Wednesdays. There's 3 meals for ya, $4 total.

$50 sounds about right if you don't have kids. I would imagine having a kid would increase that.

The fiance and I get paid twice a month, and contribute about $100 every two weeks for food. The key is buying bulk and learning to cook your own stuff. It's really not that tough.

We still eat out, just not nearly as often as we used to.

Step 1: Get Food Stamps

Anyone else have the article constantly jump back to the top of the page when scrolling? Annoying.

Anyway...

...salads, chili, soups, etc. Whey protein/frozen fruit/yogurt/milk smoothies every morning. $50/week is easy.

seriously? since when is $50 a budget? That's my groceries budget, WITHOUT trying to save money.

I'll admit that if you add in eating out and coffee/snacks I'm over that, but those are because I have money to do so.

I spend about $20 every two weeks and that includes dog food. Well, actually that only includes dog food. Iams is pretty tasty kibble...

www.grocerygame.com

I spend about $40 a week on a family of three. Yes, there is some processed foods in there but hey my wife and I both work and get tired some times.

If you are eating on $50 a week you are really missing out on life.

Is this just a Canadian thing?

If I don't include alcohol, I could easily spend far less than $50/week on food. You can make a HUGE pot of nearly any soup you can think of for under $10, and if 6 gallons of soup doesn't last you more than 2 days, you're doing it wrong. Supplement it with some salad or pasta, or maybe a good casserole, then a couple of times a week you can "splurge" on something "expensive". Eggs can fall under that budget easily, as can steak if you buy it before it's cut into "steaks". A bonus to buying steak in bulk is you can make your chili with cubed tenderloin. A whole tenderloin can be as cheap as $20, and even a $20 beef tenderloin will have 7-10 steaks in it.

People that think it's a big deal to eat for a week on $50 go out to eat too much, and this is coming from someone who goes out to eat to much.

The Icelander: f you can't eat well on $50 a week you are really a moron.

Can I get the details on what your $50/week diet consists of? Honestly just curious.

Steezy: The Icelander: f you can't eat well on $50 a week you are really a moron.

Can I get the details on what your $50/week diet consists of? Honestly just curious.

3lbs of store brand pasta: $5 on sale
4 cans of Hunts canned pasta sauce: $4
Frozen vegetables: $15
Bulk chicken(3ish lbs): $10 on sale

That is what I survive off of at school. It may not be terribly healthy but it's damn cheap.

Steezy: The Icelander: f you can't eat well on $50 a week you are really a moron.

Can I get the details on what your $50/week diet consists of? Honestly just curious.

Right now I'm in a household with 3 adults, and excluding random meals out (about 1 dinner a week with friends), and coffee/candy at the snack bar, we eat for about $50 a week.

here's how it goes:

CSA for our veggies. We get a variety, though we're thinking about dropping it after this year because of the abundance of leafy greens (there's only so much). so, we get squash, swiss chard, spinach, green peppers, potatoes, onions, garlic, rosemary, cauliflower, lettuce, etc.
We also sometimes got a watermelon or other melon.

For fruit, my parents have plum and apple trees, so we get a lot from that. Over the winter we get our fruits and veggies from the local asian market. Bananas, melons, yellow squash, sugar peas, cherry tomatoes, raspberries, strawberries, lettuce, just got some mangos, um, mushrooms, bean sprouts, carrots, cauliflower, etc etc.

We do our primary shopping at Sams Club: potatoes, ground beef, ground turkey, boneless skinless chicken breasts, frozen veggies/fruit, pasta (white or whole wheat blend), whole wheat bread, rice (basmati and jasmine), tomatos. Orange juice, juice (grape right now), milk, eggs, butter, etc.

I like Trader Joe's- often get cookies, chocolate, pasta sauces (including pizza sauce), and a few other prepared foods.

Safeway, Giant, Weis and such for on-the-spot shopping. Milk, bread, butter, whipped cream, tea, coffee, other on the spot things that Sams doesn't carry.

What else would you like to know?

FTFA: "I'm sure you could survive on $10 of rice, groats, and mung beans a week"

Why don't you lay off the Asians, Lou?



My method for paying less (way less than $50/week, for as many as three people): Shopping at authentic, no-English Hispanic and Asian markets. Prices are a fraction of what I see anywhere else, and I regularly get about four to five bags of groceries for about $20-something.

Steezy: The Icelander: f you can't eat well on $50 a week you are really a moron.

Can I get the details on what your $50/week diet consists of? Honestly just curious.

Saturday I'll make a large meal, ham or chicken or roast or something. Sunday, I'll make soup of some sort, using leftovers from preparing the meal on Saturday if possible. Monday-Friday I'll have a small breakfast and take several sandwiches or maybe a bowl of soup and some sandwiches to work. I don't eat when I get home at night. There's a $20-$30 food budget for 1-2. I spend the extra cash on beer snack food, buying steaks a couple of times a month. I do prefer to cut my own steaks, but that isn't always feasible since the butcher shop closed, causing me to deal with whatever whole cuts are on the rack when I go through at midnight.

I also go out several times a month, but that breaks the budget. I reserve the cash for dining out as separate from the food budget, that's pleasure.

The Icelander: Steezy: Can I get the details on what your $50/week diet consists of? Honestly just curious.

Whole wheat spaghetti with Italian sausage, onions, mushrooms and green peppers.

Stuffed pork chops, steamed snap peas and red potatoes.

Chicken Tikka Masala from scratch.

Kielbasa in a tomato sauce with peppers, onions and celery over rice.

Roasted pork loin with garlic mashed potatoes and brussel sprouts.

Homemade chicken marsala.

Granted, I make big meals about every other day and eat leftovers a lot, but it's good food.

oh, are we doing dinners?

Today I had:
steak, white sweet potato (from the CSA), and a salad- spinach, cherry tomatoes and carrots.

yesterday was hamburger, tomato and pasta mix with a large spinach salad.

um, sorry, I'm a little out of it lately. We had eggplant parmesan on friday. turkey and chard stir fry on thursday. I'm not certain what I ate saturday or sunday. I think it might have been boxed mac and cheese- I was doing a lot of homework, and I tend to not eat.

$100 a month family of 4.

Coupons

Bulk buys

Lots of grains/beans/vegtables

Don't go out to eat ever.

Miserable.

But our bank account is happy.

That's only 1/3 of the way there. What about breakfast and lunch? And how much does all of that shiat you listed cost?

Steezy: That's only 1/3 of the way there. What about breakfast and lunch? And how much does all of that shiat you listed cost?

dude, seriously?
breakfast is cheerios, oatmeal, toast or a bagel. with fruit, fruit juice (teh good stuff), and an egg or two. I don't like bacon, so its not an issue here.

lunch is usually a sandwich made a home, or more likely, some premade meal- lean cuisines, these pasta things I found at trader joe's, etc.

The Icelander: Cheap food tip: Ground turkey dark meat is virtually indistinguishable from ground beef in sauces, but only costs $2 a pound.

Ground beef goes for $2 a pound on sale and freezes well.

I have 50% custody of my 2 kids and my "grocery store" budget is $300 a month. That includes anything we need from Safeway, not just food.

CitizenTed: $50/week on food really cuts into my hookers & blow budget.

The trick is to have a rotation wherein you spend a little money on food every couple weeks. The rest of the time, however, the blow will take care of the hunger.

jst3p: The Icelander: Cheap food tip: Ground turkey dark meat is virtually indistinguishable from ground beef in sauces, but only costs $2 a pound.

Ground beef goes for $2 a pound on sale and freezes well.

I have 50% custody of my 2 kids and my "grocery store" budget is $300 a month. That includes anything we need from Safeway, not just food.

ground beef, I've never seen for less than $3 a pound here, whereas I can always pick up ground turkey for $2 a pound, though it never goes on sale.
Maryland sucks for grocery prices.

laterthanyou: $100 a month family of 4.

Coupons

Bulk buys

Lots of grains/beans/vegtables

Don't go out to eat ever.

Miserable.

But our bank account is happy.

Compromise is the key, I would rather be broke than miserable. I eat on the cheap so I can afford to eat out once in awhile.

I know which places do "kids eat free" on which night of the week around here.

The Icelander: jst3p: Ground beef goes for $2 a pound on sale and freezes well.

Yeah, but that cheap ground beef usually tastes like shiat.

\Is used to $4 a pound grass-fed ground beef
\\Only uses it in hamburgers

"Ground beef" is ground beef because it is the least tasty part of the cow anyway.

I can take $1.99/lb ground beef and make it taste great, I am pretty awsome.

jst3p:
Ground beef goes for $2 a pound on sale and freezes well.

If you watch for sales, you can get it for a buck a pound or so. Stock up, freeze it, and you're set.

Nightjars: jst3p:
Ground beef goes for $2 a pound on sale and freezes well.

If you watch for sales, you can get it for a buck a pound or so. Stock up, freeze it, and you're set.

As someone else pointed out it varies by region. $1.79/lb is as cheap as I have ever seen it around Denver, but I would love to be proven wrong.

Steezy: Can I get the details on what your $50/week diet consists of? Honestly just curious.

I'm a vegetarian, so YMMV, but it's generally potatoes (baked, hashed browns, home fries, au gratin, etc), baked tofu, veggie burgers, grilled cheese, burritos (bean/cheese/rice), maybe some corn on the cob, broccoli, or other veggies, etc. Definitely lots of Mexican and Asian-influenced dishes, usually I try mixing and matching.

A bunch of veggies, rice, and tofu in a tortilla with African hot sauce can be an awesome snack. Total cost is about $1.25 to $1.50. I make 3-4 dinners worth of burritos for about $6-8, so roughly $1.50 to $2/meal. Homemade fries? That's about $.50 per serving for a tasty side-dish. $50/week per person is simple, like finding a decent place to rent in most cities for $1000/mo.

I've been living on a food budget lower than this for over two years. In Manhattan, nonetheless. And I consider myself to eat very, very well. In fact, that column is usually the most in-the-green on my monthly budget spreadsheet. The "reporter" covering this probably needed something to meet a deadline, and happened to know these attention whores.

/caveat: booze gets its own column in said budget

Another tip to eat cheap: Park one of these bad boys in your back yard and dip all your food in it.



HFCS is great to cook with. Costs about $2.50 to fill and contains about 2.5 million calories. Mmmmm-mmmm cheap.

Steezy: That's only 1/3 of the way there. What about breakfast and lunch? And how much does all of that shiat you listed cost?

Breakfast and lunch are just meals. You can eat a cheeseburger with fries and a half-dozen wings for breakfast if you want. My breakfast is normally some leftover I have in the fridge.

The Icelander: Cheap food tip: Ground turkey dark meat is virtually indistinguishable from ground beef in sauces, but only costs $2 a pound.

Get pork shoulder, it usually even cheaper, cook it up at the beginning of the week and you can use it in just about anything. It also tastes far better then ground turkey, and pretty much most ground beef.

1. Breakfast: Whatever the fark I want.
2. Lunch: Whatever the fark I want.
3. Dinner: Whatever the fark I want.

Jeebus Christo McClanhanry I am SO farkING GLAD I AM NOT POOR!!

Fast food dollar menus & ordering tap water. Done.

mmm, 2 tacos for 99 cents.

The Icelander: jst3p: "Ground beef" is ground beef because it is the least tasty part of the cow anyway.

Well, maybe that $1.99 stuff you buy.

Mine's ground chuck and a little sirloin.

Says the guy who advised using ground turkey instead. Dude, you are all over the map on this one.