Another thrifty tip is simply eat less meat. Meat is one of the most expensive things to buy, so if you cut down on meat consumption, you can cut your grocery bill WAY down.
Confession: this is not something we do a lot of, because we are a meat & potatoes kind of family. But we do eat a few meat’less meals here and there. There are a TON of vegetarian recipes out there that are really yummy. Also, if you grow your own garden, you can get away with buying very little.
I’ve touched on stockpiling before, so if you must eat meat, then it’s best to buy in bulk.
Also, if you eat a lot of chicken, it’s usually cheaper to buy a whole chicken.
This will totally gross out my brother, because he doesn’t like pulling chicken away from the bones, but if you buy a cut up fryer, boil it for about 45 mins, let it cool, and then take the meat off, you’ll usually end up with somewhere around 6-7 cups of chicken. If you’re worried about the skin, it slides right off.
You can freeze it into 2-cup increments and use for all kinds of things: chicken salad, chicken quesadillas/fajitas/tacos, chicken stir fry, ad nauseum. I like using the whole chicken, because I prefer dark meat while Ken likes white meat. And again, it’s cheaper.
But if you find boneless breasts for $1.99/lb, grab as many of those as you can! It doesn’t happen often around here.
