Grocery Shopping

This is our first blog with the new format! We will discuss a topic and how each of my books would address each. Today’s Topic is Grocery Shopping:

TimerDiet—TimerOrganizer—TimerSavings

Make Menus

When grocery shopping you want to make sure that you know what you are going to do with each item that you buy. How will each purchase be consumed? Do you have a purpose for each purpose that is well-balanced? Can you combine your purchase with other purchases or things you have at home that will make it well-balanced including dietary fat, protein, and carbohydrates. 

Each week when it is time to grocery shop take a few minutes to make some menus for the week. They don’t need to be specific—fish, green vegetable, and some rice the details can be decided later, based on the sale items. Perhaps it is taco night or pasta night…either way make sure that you include dietary fat, protein, and carbohydrates.  This includes your breakfast, lunches, and mini-meals (i.e. snacks)

Organize Your Fridge!

You may have so many groceries in your refrigerator and freezer that you have no idea what is good, expired, or even goes together to make a well-balanced meal. It is better to have less groceries in your fridge that you know are fresh and good for you than be filled with many foods that are “not in your best interests” or have already expired and will not be useful when it is time to make dinner.

Take 15 minutes with the trash can in hand and get rid of anything that you would not be willing to eat right now. In other words if you don’t think it is fresh today, then toss it. Now organize what you have left by areas that make sense to you! Some people like to organize by breakfast, lunch, dinner, or snacks, while others like to organize by products, cheeses, meats, salad mixings, cooking vegetables, toppings, etc. Whatever organization makes sense to you go for it, keep it, and make it work for you to save money and use all the groceries you bought instead of throwing them out because they went bad.

Save Your Money

Grocery shopping is the one area that you have the MOST control over your budget. You decide what you buy and how much you buy. I read a statistic that the average family throws out a little over $1,000 each year! Do you have something that you could spend $1,000 rather than the trash can? I know I do! I am not perfect I promise I have to deal with the same thing that all of us do. But, most of us don’t even realize what we are doing. We throw food out in the trash without realizing the actual $’s that we are throwing out. So when you are throwing out food, take a note pad and write down an estimate of how much you are tossing. So if something cost $10 and you used ½ of it then you would write down $5 as the amount that you wasted. Do this for at least a month and get to the point where you are throwing away less than 2% of your food budget. Life is all about choices and the wisest choice is to buy what you want AND need and to not waste any of it (well not much of it anyway!)

Sherri Sue Fisher, author of TimerDiet, TimerOrganizer, and coming soon TimerSavings

Grocery Shopping and Cooking on a Budget

So in last week’s #TimerDiet101 Blog I talked about grocery prices being on the rise and it was mentioned in a Facebook posting that it is expensive to buy groceries and eat healthy. So I made this the topic for this week’s #TimerDiet101 Blog (so thanks Linda!)

What Kind of Foods are Best?

Think cooking “whole” and eating “parts.” If you buy a whole chicken, ham, or a roast then you can have what you want of the whole for dinner, then separate into parts and create different parts to eat throughout the week. Slices for deli meat and chunks for soup. The ham can be broken down into even smaller parts to add to an omelet for breakfast. Slices of your meat can be added to a salad the next day and eaten cold!  

Go For the Sales and Freeze!

Sometimes a whole chicken is not what you were thinking? Maybe you would rather have some fish or a steak. There are so many different kinds to choose from, so ask your butcher and look for sales or items that are priced to sell. Sirloin and tilapia are usually reasonably priced even when they are not on sale. If you do find a great sale do not hesitate to freeze some of it when you get home so you are not forcing yourself to eat the same thing every day.

 

Let’s Not Forget About the Fruits and Vegetables

Probably the biggest mistake people make when grocery shopping for fruits and vegetables is buying too many. They all look so pretty and yummy, but make sure you have a plan. Stick to the sales and switch it up. Buy strawberries one week and blueberries the next. Avoid buying large prepackaged fruits and vegetables if you are not going to eat the majority of them. Also, look them over very carefully and even open the package and make sure they are 100% fresh! However, if you have a large family then go for it and buy a bag of potatoes! If you can go to the store about once a week this will allow you to have the freshest foods on hand.

 

Be Sure You Have a Plan for All of Your Food!

The best way to make sure you don’t waste food is to have your menu’s figured out before you go to the grocery store. Having your menu’s written down before you go grocery shopping means you will not be buying foods that have no purpose and will probably will go to waste.

 

If you want dessert your best options are individual chocolate squares or ice cream!

 

Sherri Sue Fisher, author of TimerDiet

www.timerdiet.com

 

 

 

Rising Grocery Prices Creates Need

Rising Grocery Prices

When grocery prices rise not only does it affect our own wallet, it affects those of our neighbors, friends, family, and those who were already struggling either due to illness, unemployment, or just hard-times. When we are asked to give to the local food bank, do we? Do we look into our cupboards and see what more than likely we will never eat or what has been there for a while and may be expiring next month?

 

Buy Wisely

Grocery prices are rising extremely fast and there appear to be few sales in sight. So when you go to the store be sure you have a purpose for everything that you purchase. When you buy foods that go together and have an intended purpose you will have less waste at the end of the week. When you buy fruit do you know when or how you will eat them? Will you want to add cottage cheese or cheddar? When you buy the meat that is on sale are you making sure that you can eat it before it spoils and freeze what you can’t? There are so many ways we can buy wisely…

 

Make Your Menus

Know what days you will be at home and which days you will not. Buying food for an entire week and then only eating at home for ½ of it will waste money, unless you can freeze everything you didn’t eat and then remember to use it later. Be sure to know how many lunches you need to prepare and how many snacks. Your menus can be very basic: meat, two vegetables, salad and bread and butter. The details can be ironed out at the store when you see the sales.

 

Give What You Can

If you have canned or boxed foods that you have not eaten recently or thought you might want at the time and now wonder why, consider giving them to those in need. Saturday May 10^th is the United States Postal Service food drive for non-perishable foods. So go through your cupboards see what you can give and buy wisely from now on.

 

Sherri Sue Fisher, author of TimerDiet and to be released in June TimerOrganizer

www.timerdiet.com