9 Simple Ways to Save Money on Your Groceries

It never fails, we budget for our groceries, but the bill always ends up being more. We underestimate, run out of things faster than expected and overall, everything is becoming just too darned expensive! To make things a little bit easier, here are 9 simple ways you can start saving money on your groceries.

1. Go with a List: Yes, I know…it’s a pretty obvious suggestion, but it’s amazing how effective it can be. You can purchase only what you need and avoid all the other yummy distractions of the grocery store.

2. Meal Planning: Planning your meals in advance makes it easier to get your list together and ensure you buy only exactly what you need. You can get help with your meal planning at Dine Without Whine AND they actually put your grocery list together for you too.

3. Eat Before You Go: Another classic tip. If you’re hungry, you’ll want to buy (and instantly eat) everything! Have a meal or good snack before you go to avoid impulse purchases.

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10 More Reasons to Gather Around the Dinner Table

I received a lot of compliments on my post about “24 Reasons to Gather Around the Dinner Table” – well, compliments and a challenge: come up with even more reasons families should sit down to dinner together.

But first, if you find the idea of family meals daunting, take a look at Dine Without Whine. It’s a monthly subscription, which gives you weekly meal plans, recipes and grocery shopping list. Dine Without Whine definitely simplifies meal planning and preparation.

Ok, now back to my challenge. It’s been hard, but here you go, 10 OTHER reasons to gather around the dinner table:

1. You’ll have a ready audience for your jokes.

2. You can get instant feedback on new recipes you’ve been wanting to try.

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Diabetes Meal Planning Made Easy

If you have diabetes, it’s important to watch what you eat to maintain your health. Meal planning can help manage your diabetes, as well as save you time and money.

The bestselling Diabetes Meal Planning Made Easy is a comprehensive but easy-to-understand guide to all aspects of meal planning for you.

Meal planning is one of the most crucial—and sometimes most difficult—aspects of managing diabetes, but this book makes meal planning simple.

This newest edition incorporates the most recent nutritional recommendations of the American Diabetes Association (more…)

Menu Plan Monday – Vacation & Baseball Edition

Hubby is on vacation this week, and we are finally catching a baseball game (first this season) on Friday. Should be a fun week! Here’s our menu plan for the week…

Monday – hubby is grilling ribs, baked beans, corn on the cob

Tuesday – spaghetti and meatballs, salad, garlic bread

Wednesday – grilled chicken, mac & cheese, corn

Thursday – chicken enchiladas, Spanish rice

Friday – baseball game… hot dogs & beer at the ball park!

Saturday – brisket on the grill

Sunday – headed to family’s for dinner

Don’t forget to head over to Meal Plan Monday for even more meal and recipe ideas!

Meal Planning Benefits

Meal planning can help you to successfully organize the daily routine of preparing meals for your family.

If you often find yourself searching for something to prepare for dinner, meal planning may be just the thing you need to make meal time less stressful.

Below are some of the benefits of meal planning.

1. You’ll save time.

Knowing what you’re going to cook for dinner means you can get the meal on the table faster because you won’t have to decide what to make.

In addition, when you plot out what meals you’re going to fix for the week, you can simply make one trip to the store and buy all the food you’ll need for those meals.

You won’t have to search the refrigerator or freezer when dinner time arrives, and you can eliminate trips to the grocery store looking for something to eat that everyone likes.

2. You’ll save money.

Meal planning can also help you save money.

For one, when you know what you’re going to cook for dinner, you won’t eat out as much during the week because you can’t think of anything appealing to make.

By simply eating at home more instead of eating out, you’ll keep more money in your pocket that you can use for other important things.

3. You’ll be able to eat healthier.

If you tend to eat burgers and fries from fast food places a few times a week, meal planning can help you to eat healthier by replacing those meals with healthier ones.

Instead of greasy, fatty hamburgers or having pizza delivered, you could have a nutritious meal of vegetables, salad and a lean main course of chicken or beef for dinner.

In addition, if you need to restrict sugar or salt from your diet, menu planning can help you to consistently cook meals that fit your nutritional standards and stick to your diet.

4. You’ll be able to reduce meal time stress.

If you have your dinners planned out, you won’t have to figure out what to make while everyone is hungry and in bad moods.

You’ll already know what you’re going to make, and dinner time can go smoothly as everyone looks forward to the delicious meal they’re going to eat.

5. Meal planning is easy.

Planning what you’re going to prepare for dinner over the weekdays isn’t difficult.

It just takes a little time to decide beforehand what you want to eat, and then purchase the food.

You can plan your dinners for the week days, the entire week or longer.

However, start small by planning out, for example, five dinners for the weekdays.

Once you see what’s involved, you’ll have a better idea how many meals and how far ahead you’d like to plan.

Conclusion: Meal planning can help you to save money and time. Meal planning can also help you to eat healthier, reduce meal time stress, and isn’t difficult to do.

After you start meal planning, you may find that dinner time becomes family time again.

Menu Plan Monday – May 25 (Late)

I’m late posting my menu plan this week, but here it is…

Monday – pork chops, potatoes, green beans, rolls

Tuesday – hamburgers on the grill, mac & cheese

Wednesday – tacos, homemade spanish rice

Thursday – date night!  going out to eat

Friday – steak, baked potatoes, salad

Saturday – grilling out, probably a whole chicken and typical bbq fixin’s

Sunday – brisket (didn’t make last week), bbq beans

Don’t forget to head over to Meal Plan Monday for even more meal  and recipe ideas!

Menu Plan Monday – May 18 Edition

This week is full of graduations and graduation parties, so I only have to plan dinner for a few nights this week

Anyway… here’s my Menu Plan Monday for the week:

Monday – meatloaf, mashed potatoes, hot rolls

Tuesday – hamburgers on the grill, grilled veggies

Wednesday – graduation ceremony, will either eat out or eat leftovers

Thursday – dh’s birthday, plan is to go out to his favorite steakhouse

Friday – steak, baked potatoes, salad

Saturday – graduation party, will be eating at sil’s house

Sunday – brisket (yum!), homemade mac & cheese, corn on the cob

Hope everyone has a great week.  Don’t forget to head over to Meal Plan Monday for more great meal ideas!

Quick Healthy Dinner Recipes

photo credit: Bill HR

One of the challenges of meal planning is having dinner recipes on hand that your family will enjoy and eat.

Here are some of my favorite places to find quick healthy dinner recipes:

FoodNetwork.com – not only do I love watching the Food Network, I love trying out the recipes too.  You can find all of the recipes from your favorite shows and more on the Food Network website.

AllRecipes.com – this is my go-to website when I need dinner ideas or if I’m looking for a recipe.  There are thousands of recipes and ideas on this site.  One of my favorite sections is Budget Friendly Meals.

CookingLight.com – a great site to find healthy recipes for those who are dieting or just trying to eat better.  Check out the Vegetarian section, or my favorite, the In Season section.

EatingWell.com – this is the Eating Well magazine website.  In addition to finding tons of recipes you’ll also find articles on topics such as cooking for kids, food and travel, food and entertaining, and much more.

KraftFoods.com – this is another one of my favorite sites for finding meal ideas.   This site is frequently updated with recipes for the occassion.  For example, right now you’ll find Mother’s Day recipes and Cinco de Mayo recipes.  They also have a new BudgetWise section if you’re looking to stretch your food budget.

Menu Plan Monday – May 4 Edition

I can’t believe it’s time for Menu Plan Monday already!  Where did last week go?

Anyway… here’s my Menu Plan Monday for the week:

Monday – steak, stuffed pasta shells, salad

Tuesday – spicy beef sandwiches, french fries

Wednesday – leftovers! we (still) have tons of stuff in the freezer, so it will be a buffet leftover night

Thursday – salad, grilled chicken breasts, fresh green beans

Friday – pizza (still haven’t gotten the Papa Murphy’s we’ve been craving)

Saturday – ribs on the grill, corn on the cob, baked beans

Sunday – meatloaf, mashed potatoes, green beans, rolls (my favorite Sunday night dinner)

For more menu planning ideas, head over to Meal Plan Monday. Have a great week!

Make Meal Planning Fun

Meal planning can help you save time, money and energy, but sometimes it’s hard to come up with a fresh new meal plan each week.

One way to keep the meals fresh and fun is to get the kids involved.  Ask your kids what some of their top choices are for dinner for the week and choose one or two.  Your kids will be happy because they’re getting some of their favorites and you’re happy because you’ve got some dinner ideas for the week.

Another idea to make meal planning fun is to have theme nights or theme dinners.  Have a Mexican night one week with all the fixin’s for a taco bar or burrito bar, and have a Chinese “take-in” night the next week where you prepare your own stir fry at home.  You can make these nights even more fun by decorating or using fun plates for your theme nights, or including entertainment such as a movie or book that fits your theme for the night.

Although the point of meal planning is to make dinner easy, it helps to shake things up and plan some fun in your menus as well.  Have fun!

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