Could you eat on $30 a week?

[lxskllr]

Easily. $30 is more like two weeks.
Aldi FTW.

Yea, no kidding. Between Aldi, and BigLots there's very little i need from anywhere else.

 

[jlee]

No nearby Costco?

93.3 miles away.

 

[HydroSqueegee]

i feed 5 people on ~$60 a week
my wife does a great job shopping sales + coupons, and we eat well. Shop at Meijer

 

[M0oG0oGaiPan]

Agree on aldi. Love that place. Another thing to do would be trolling the grocery subforum on slickdeals. You can get all kinds of stuff for cheap at shoppers/cvs. Or use the grocery game for like 3 months to stock up and then cancel the service.

 

[SillyOReilly]

Everyone suggesting costco is good. Slightly less than $1 a week on the budget for the 50 a year membership.
You can hang out there all day and fillup on samples too.

 

[cuppkake]

$5 hot n ready. So, yeah.

 

[AreaCode707]

My roommate is a professional musician, and she lives on $25 a week. Quite well, I might add.

She buys a whole chicken, debones it, and slow cooks it with beans and veggies.
The chicken bones make a nice soup with veggies.
She buys a big bag of flour and makes her own bread.
She eats rice with a fried egg for breakfast.

Stuff like that. We have Grocery Outlet and a lot of Asian stores that are way cheaper than the regular supermarket, so basic ingredients don't cost that much when purchased in bulk.

 

[Apple Of Sodom]

I'm not sure. Depends on prices in your area. How much for a 2 liter bottle of grape soda?

 

[ussfletcher]

I used to spend about $90 every two weeks, and that was with the purchase of quite a bit of alcohol. I probably spent about $70 every on everything else, and I wasn't even trying to save money. So yes, I believe I could.

 

[IceBergSLiM]

Curious, those of you eating "ultra cheap" <$50 a week......how much of that food isn't processed not including minimally processed(flash frozen veggies etc)? What percentage? 1&#37;-5%?

 

[GundamW]

$30 a week is too easy for 1 or 2 person.

How about $30 a month for a family of 4? 2 adults, 2 kids, 3 meals a day, no Costco membership, no backyard for homegrown garden. Now, that would be a challenge.

 

[KeithTalent]

I could, but I wouldn't.

KT

 

[lxskllr]

Curious, those of you eating "ultra cheap" <$50 a week......how much of that food isn't processed or minimally processed(flash frozen veggies etc)? What percentage? 1%-5%?

I eat a lot of canned vegetables, and canned food in general. I also eat very little meat aside from fish. Spam and Italian sausage is about all the meat I buy.

 

[Anubis]

No nearby Costco?

living in western NY, 29 of the closest 30 costcos are in fucking canada

the 30th one is the only one in the US and its 4 hours away

 

[blinblue]

Curious, those of you eating "ultra cheap" <$50 a week......how much of that food isn't processed not including minimally processed(flash frozen veggies etc)? What percentage? 1&#37;-5%?

Typical items for me would be milk, flour, rice, non-frozen ground beef, non-frozen ground turkey, eggs, fresh fruits and veges, pasta, tomato sauce, cheeses of various types, orange juice, other juice, frozen veges, frozen chicken (chicken breast strips, orange chicken), frozen waffle fries or tater tots, some diet soda.

I would say about 50-75% is unprocessed or minimally processed depending on how you define it.

 

[SandEagle]

$30/ week? lol fattos. of course that is more than enough for a week.

 

[IceBergSLiM]

I eat a lot of canned vegetables, and canned food in general. I also eat very little meat aside from fish. Spam and Italian sausage is about all the meat I buy.

so like i said 95%+ of your food intake is processed crap.

 

[IceBergSLiM]

Typical items for me would be milk, flour, rice, non-frozen ground beef, non-frozen ground turkey, eggs, fresh fruits and veges, pasta, tomato sauce, cheeses of various types, orange juice, other juice, frozen veges, frozen chicken (chicken breast strips, orange chicken), frozen waffle fries or tater tots, some diet soda.

I would say about 50-75% is unprocessed or minimally processed depending on how you define it.

You aren't buying all that on 30 a week....show me a reciept

 

[M0oG0oGaiPan]

Curious, those of you eating "ultra cheap" <$50 a week......how much of that food isn't processed not including minimally processed(flash frozen veggies etc)? What percentage? 1%-5%?

You get more if it's less processed from my personal experience. A cup of oats is 300 calories, takes 1.5 minutes to heat up, keeps you full. I usually mix in a scoop of whey (and blueberries if I'm trying to gain weight). Tastes awesome.

Milk, chicken breasts, lean ground turkey/beef, lean steaks, beans, eggs, cottage cheese are cheap protein.

Oats, frozen veggies, bread, rice, pasta are cheap carbs.

Olive oil, almonds, peanuts, natty pb are cheap fats.

 

[darkewaffle]

Those prices are so expensive. You can buy a gallon of milk for $2.49. Pasta sauce for $0.99 a bottle. Pasta for $0.99 per pound. Ground meat for $1.99 per pound. Smarter shopping would allow you to buy additional food items including vegetables.

Man I wish, at the grocers around here (Food Lion, Giant, Weis) even a gallon of store-brand milk runs nearly $4 most of the time.

 

[DominionSeraph]

Curious, those of you eating "ultra cheap" <$50 a week......how much of that food isn't processed not including minimally processed(flash frozen veggies etc)? What percentage? 1&#37;-5%?

Aldi has fresh fruits and vegetables on the cheap.

Strips of home-cooked rotisserie chicken with roasted pepper, lettuce, diced tomato, shredded cheddar, and gobs of sour cream in a warm flour tortilla.

Yummmmmm.

 

[lxskllr]

so like i said 95%+ of your food intake is processed crap.

How do you figure? The Spam and sausage are, but there's nothing wrong with canned vegetables, or canned fish. I'd say 50% of my food is processed, and that's largely due to cereal consumption. That's me default snack/dessert.

 

[Jeff7]

Probably. I'm probably at around $50/wk right now, and I'm not really trying to keep costs down.

Changes might be:
1) Shop at Walmart instead (I primarily shop at Giant Eagle - nicer store, closer, and always a shorter wait at the checkouts, though usually there's one open right away.)
2) Cheap hamburger
3) Ultra-generic bread-like hamburger buns
4) More pasta-based meals
5) For a soft-drink that's much cheaper than soda: Kool-Aid. Yeah there's no Coca-Cola flavors, but some are acceptable. The sugar + tap water are terribly cheap.
Or generic fruit concentrates.
6) Bring a calculator and figure out the unit price on stuff that doesn't provide it, to make sure that you're really getting the best deal. And sometimes the stuff in the larger package isn't actually cheaper.

You get more if it's less processed from my personal experience. A cup of oats is 300 calories, takes 1.5 minutes to heat up, keeps you full. I usually mix in a scoop of whey (and blueberries if I'm trying to gain weight). Tastes awesome.

Milk, chicken breasts, lean ground turkey/beef, lean steaks, beans, eggs, cottage cheese are cheap protein.

Oats, frozen veggies, bread, rice, pasta are cheap carbs.

Olive oil, almonds, peanuts, natty pb are cheap fats.

Good stuff too.

 

[blinblue]

You aren't buying all that on 30 a week....show me a reciept

Of course not in one week. For example I buy a 4 pack of ground turkey (about 6lbs total) and that lasts me about a month (use two within the first week and a bit, freeze the other two for use later in the month). The frozen items are usually a once a month type of purchase (or even less frequently). Weekly purchases usually would include milk, fruits and veggies (bananas, oranges, strawberries, apples, avocados, peppers, etc), ground beef.

A few other things I forgot, cereal, frozen waffles, yogurt, pulled pork, organic tortilla chips, olive oil.
So yeah, I'd stick to my 50% or so. If you want receipts I can dig them up for you

 

[IceBergSLiM]

How do you figure? The Spam and sausage are, but there's nothing wrong with canned vegetables, or canned fish. I'd say 50% of my food is processed, and that's largely due to cereal consumption. That's me default snack/dessert.

Canned veggies have a fraction of the nutrition found in fresh produce not to mention they have very little "calories" to "fill you up" so I think your low balling your number.

But 50% is scary figure anyways....50% of your diet is nutritionally empty