Originally posted on the Melaleuca Journal.
Shopper Alert: Grocery prices are going up, and up, and up, and up…
Do you sometimes wonder how in the world a few bags of groceries
could cost as much as a cart-full used to? With groceries and gasoline
in a battle to see which can do more damage to the wallet, shoppers are
finding it difficult to keep both stomach and gas tank full enough to
make it all the way to payday.
The good news, says
Melaleuca,
is you have many more options when it comes to grocery prices than you
have concerning gasoline. The bad news is you may have to make changes
in your
eating habits as well as in your
spending habits.
Smart shopping is about more than simply choosing generic labels over brand names. Smart shoppers consider the nutritional value of the foods they buy—and that can be an eye-opening experience.
Take the standard advice, add some thought, and amplify your savings
You probably already know the basics of getting the most out of your
food budget: tactics like clipping and using coupons, checking the
weekly advertisements for bargains, not shopping when you are hungry,
and comparing cost per unit are commonplace and fundamental.
The next step is to couple those standard tactics with some
introspection. If you will do that, the resultant savings can be
significant.
Smart shopping begins in your attitude towards food, and that means a
“checkup from the neck up” before you even begin to plan your
shopping. Work to develop an attitude towards food that reflects
reality: the primary purpose of food is nutrition, not pleasure.
Now we’re not saying that your food shouldn’t taste great, but
focusing on food as a means of satisfying some unnamed longing or
unreasonable craving is a sure path to overspending on the food budget.
That sort of thinking can also get you headed down the path towards
metabolic syndrome, prediabetes, or obesity. Focusing on food as a means
of supplying your body with nutrients casts grocery shopping in a
different light altogether.
The
following ideas are not meant to be a complete list. They are
suggestions pointing in the direction of health—both physically and
environmentally. They are meant to help get you going.
- Rather than eat from cans and packages, start as close to the source
as you can. Example: A crockpot of beans, cooked from a bag, saves
about 80% over canned beans (and doesn’t require the recycling or
disposal of a can). Cook a bunch of beans and freeze them for future
use. Basic food ingredients tend to be much less expensive than
precooked and prepackaged alternatives. Moreover, by cooking and storing
basic foods, you save money and have the makings of any number of
creative and fun meals on hand.
- Turn first to leftovers. Get creative. Try to never let food go to
waste. Studies show that up to half of our available food goes to the
trash—and much of that occurs in the kitchen. Here again, creativity is
the key. Staple foods can be used in any number of recipes—whether from a
cookbook, the family files, or made up as you go. Have fun. Let your
primary concern be getting the nutrients you need—and that is much
easier when you are working with basic ingredients instead of name-brand
concoctions.
- Revisit the basic food groups you learned about in school. The plate
has replaced the pyramid as a way of looking at how your diet should be
structured. Go to ChooseMyPlate.gov
to find out more. And think about this: the food recommendations call
for fruits, vegetables, protein foods, grains, and dairy—not McDonalds®, Betty Crocker®, Pillsbury® and Stouffer’s®.
Sure, there are times when prepared foods are handy—but it may be that
your wallet stays fatter and your body trimmer when you prepare meals
from scratch instead of from a package.
There is one more consideration though—one that is especially
critical today. Even when you start with basic foods, you may not be
getting all the nutrients you need. Most of the available food supply is
now produced by giant agri-corporations, and the methods they use have
resulted in foods that look good, but may pack considerably less
nutritive value than the foods our grandparents ate.
Smart shoppers are turning as much as possible to crops grown
organically or purchased from local farms that still work at building up
the soil through natural, instead of artificial, methods. Most of us
will need to add
quality vitamin and mineral supplements to our diet in order to make sure we get the nutrients we need.
