35 Money-Saving Grocery Tips | Kitchen Economics

One of my goals for Family Balance Sheet for 2013, is to get back to posting more money saving tips to help my readers (and myself) reduce our grocery bills.

A couple of years ago, I coined the term, Kitchen Economics, after I read a dictionary definition of the word "economics": "the science that deals with the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services, or the material welfare of humankind." Doesn't that sound familiar? On a daily basis, home cooks produce, distribute, and consume in our kitchens for (and with) our families. My job as my household's kitchen manager is to ensure that my family is eating healthy and delicious food without blowing our budget.

Here's to a low-cost, yet delicious New Year!

35 Money-Saving Grocery Tips to Help You Reduce Your Grocery Budget

Produce Tips

• Revitalize Dried Out Baby Carrots
• U-Pick local, seasonal fruit
• How to Freeze herbs, How to Freeze Basil
• Freeze your garden harvest - green beans, hot pepper
• How to Save Money at the Apple Orchard

Organizing Tips

• Know Your Buy Price
• Organize your pantry and your spices
• My grocery list/menu clip board
• Plan your weekly menu
• Make one night a week, "raid the fridge night".
• Buy/Use store brands
• Utilize your freezer.
• Compare unit price.
• Have an emergency back up meal in freezer or pantry at all times.
• Shop your freezer/pantry

Meat Tips

• Don't shy away from meat markdowns
• Make your own chicken stock on the stove top OR in the crock pot
• Create vegetable freezer bags for making chicken/turkey stock

Batch/Portion Control Tips

• Freeze cookie dough.
• Make brownies in a muffin tin rather than a pan.
• Batch griddle extra pancakes and freeze for later.

Organic

• Become a member of a CSA.
• Use your grocery store's private label organize brands.
• Compare price per unit.
• Stock up on organic meat that has been marked down.

Misc

• Homemade buttermilk substitute.
• Cut out the crap, save the dough.
• 10 Paper Products to Cross off your grocery list.
• Stock up and save with pre-holiday grocery sales.
• Stop wasting food.
• Shop at bread outlets.
• Make homemade bread crumbs from bread heels.
• Reuse glass jars.
• Homemade window cleaner for just pennies.
• After-Holiday clearance sales aren't just about gift wrap. 

What's your #1 way to save money on your grocery bill? Let us know in the comments.

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