Expensive Healthy Eating

[Shwa Girl]

OP, some have already talked about pink sticker fruits and veggies.

Metro rip and stick meats, poultry and fish are great quality.
Loblaws/RCSS/No Frills has the Blue Menu products on sale 3 -4 times per year. These are low sodium, low fat, high protein and some actually taste really good.
Back to school time has breakfast items on for a great price, including oatmeal. Don't forget that great coupon combined with the Loblaws sale making the oatmeal free or close to free.

Lactancia or Natrel milk on sale with coupon, brought down the price of milk = freezes well too.

Dozen eggs for $0.50 with Loblaws sale and coupons. Eggs can be broken, whisked with a pinch of salt and frozen too.

Europe's Best frozen Fruit and Veggies with no salt and no sugar - remember those great coupons making it free or under a dollar. Our freezer is still happy and full.

Pom juice, Pom aryls, Pom pistachios - free or near free with great coupons.

Free Liberte yogurt when you like them on Facebook.

Right now, Dollarama and Giant Tiger have the seeds on for 3/$1. Grow your own and freeze for winter savings on healthy, "organic", grown in Ontario food.

And I haven't even mentioned Costco - so you don't need to spend $55 for a membership.

That's off the top of my head.

[krysta lynne]

i spend somewhere around $500-$600 month on groceries for my family of four. the veggies and fruit make up about half that. its ridiculously expensive

[kidsteph]

You can Google "nutritious food basket" for your community, often public health offices provide those figures so you can estimate if you are over spending. I recall my family of 4 is about $650 a month. They provide the weekly cost per person based on age and sex. I under estimated the normal costs..guess I still thought I ate like a student, lol.

[itchy54]

Would never consider not eating healthy.....
It is not expensive, or maybe I am just used to it. For three adults I spend $100 a week and that includes toiletries
breakfast is steel cut oats, coconut oil and half a large banana. Meat is purchased at the local university and their meat cutting program...wonderful grass fed, hormone free, and local products for a fair price.
lots of veggies, whatever is on sale that week and homemade goodies for those who eat them. I am GF and I do not eat the GF foods that are premade and generally awful....just don't eat bread products at all.

Never drink pop or juice, just water.
Greek yogurt, pricey but a good source of pprotein

My family is worth it!

[anisa]

^ water the ultimate health drink!

if your local tapwater is safe, then hook up a filter to take away the chlorine taste and you are set.

[Shwa Girl]

You can Google "nutritious food basket" for your community, often public health offices provide those figures so you can estimate if you are over spending. I recall my family of 4 is about $650 a month. They provide the weekly cost per person based on age and sex. I under estimated the normal costs..guess I still thought I ate like a student, lol.

Plus they can tell you where to get the $15 fruit and veggie good food box each month. Some are every two weeks.

[anastasia1009]

I use to find healthy food expensive maybe a few years back them I learned its cheaper than eating out. A hamburger meal anywhere for two people is $10 or more and close to $20 with kids. I can feed them meat, rice or potatoes plus a few veggies for around $5.00 and lots of home made snacks for lunch for when I am at school. Plus if I plan my meals from stir frys, crock pot meals, soups etc I can make it tasty, healthy and cheaper than eating out.

I use to buy pink sticker for veggies but a few times we got pretty sick so we eat fresh or flash frozen from the veggies I got in the summer/fall time. We don't buy bagged veggies or fruit too many weird health scares out there and I rather know where the veggies or fruit came from cause some places like Mexico & China grow products in human feces and after reading Health Canada articles we stay away from it.

Only thing we buy is bottled water for the machine. After my hubby worked for Health Canada in Ottawa awhile back he read reports saying when it rains too much most places in Ontario sewage seeps into the water. They treat it but they don't tell the public till way after the fact. Lived in Ottawa for awhile and it happened way too often. We don't drink pop last time coke or pepsi was in the house was late last year.

[sarah_cio]

I agree. We eat healthy and spend about $400-$500 a month on food for a family of 4. We eat yogurt, fruits and veggies, fish, lean meats, tuna, eggs, etc. I only eat fish and no other meats. I try to eat higher protein, lower carb and lots of fibre and fruits and veggies. I envy those who can spend lower but we can't do it!

[dizzyb]

Anisa, please do try making loaves! You sound like you're already familiar with kneading, so it will be no problem for you at all. If you know your yeast is fresh, and your ingredients are room temperature or a bit warmer, your bread will almost definitely work!
I have to add whole chicken to the list of relatively inexpensive healthy foods. Of course this depends on what type you buy. Organic will run at least twice as much, if not triple the cost of a non-organic bird. I like to buy multiple chickens when they're on sale and freeze most of them. Like this week, Loblaws is selling them for $1.99 lb, so a whole chicken is about $6. This should feed a family of 5 for one meal (with veggies and rice or whatever of course), and the carcass can be used the next day to make divine soup!
Lecale, split pea soup turns out very well in a slow cooker if you have one. 'k we really have to stop talking food, 'cuz now I'm drooling. :D

[roseofblack25]

Wow I just did the nutritional food basket calculation and apparently I should be spending $218 and change per month to eat healthy! I guess I don't feel so bad now spending 100-150 each month on food. I am still trying to bring that cost down but it's just not possible for me. I only buy on sale, rarely eat meat, and never buy bread (my mom brings me homemade from the bread maker). I do love pasta and carbs so things like rice and pasta are staple foods for me so I guess that keeps my cost down a bit since pasta and ingredients are cheap enough. I usually buy the giant 1kg or whatever bags of frozen veggies since it works out cheaper and lasts longer than buying fresh. Truthfully I don't eat a lot of fresh things in the winter because of the cost and the fact that I don't eat them fast enough since I like my comfort foods in the winter. In the summer I will basically only eat fresh foods and the cost seems to be cheaper when they are in season.

Thanks for the heads up on the good food box. I'm researching it now to see if cost wise it will be cheaper to order those instead of shopping myself. If it works out to be cheaper compared to what I currently buy I will definitely look into signing up for that.

[Brooke_]

I don't find it more expensive to eat healthy. I actually was saying the other day that I can't believe how inexpensive my grocery bills are. My BF and I went grocery shopping together and his bill was far higher than mine, with all of his junk food. Whereas I eat meat, veggies, and some fruit and nuts. You can get so much good food and I feed myself for less than $60/week.
Besides, imagine how much the medication and unhappiness will cost you when you're body is sick from all the crap people put in them these days.
Healthy eating is an investment.

[danip467]

A couple tips:
1. only buy sale items, plan your meals around them. That includes produce-price match! And get a freezer to store those sale meats.
2. good food box!
3. Buy more of each item when they go on sale, many veggies and fruits will last up to a month in the fridge and can spread out the sale for much longer! IE: carrots, cabbage, apples, oranges, etc.
4. Watch fruit/veg pricing-make sure you're aware which is the better deal, and take a calc. with you to figure out the costs down to the 100g for comparison. Those pre-bagged salads are usually not your best budget friend!
5. Cut down the meat-either meatless meals, or reduced meat meals. I buy in club pack size, portion everything and freeze. I have a vac. seal thing to take the air out, and I pack our hamburger less than 1 lbs, chck. breast 1 or 2 in a pack. I usually never use more than one pack at a time, adding in beans or veggies to taco meat, etc to make it seem like more. I don't put a 6 oz. piece of meat on our dinner plates anymore. Ever. my husband doesn't notice, and if we do end up 'needing meat', we have saved enough to go out for steak.
6. Eat brown carbs, you'll eat less and they are often the same price.
7. Use those leftovers! I roll almost everything into another meal: my favorites are 'scrambled eggs', fried rice, soups, etc. You can puree almost anything into a soup and no -ones the wiser
8. Get into food preservation/storage. Canning, freezing, dehydrating-I change pink sticker produce into long lasting food storage, and then I've always got it on hand when something hasn't gone on sale.
9. 3 mo. supply of food-at least . No sales this week? eat out of the pantry and buy only the essentials. It's crazy to me how many people shop weekly and only buy that week's food! No storage? get low drawers and store under the bed. I keep mine updated regularly and make sure to rotate. My hubby's job is not secure and it's nice knowing we've got something to fall back on.

That's my 2 bits

[hollyquaiscer]

I just want to let you know that couponing in the states in nothing like the show extreme coupons. I'm here almost 6 months a year, and it doesn't matter what state you're in, all the Smart Source coupons, and most of the Redplum ones have the same wording..."Maximum 4 like coupons per person per day" "cannot be combined with any other coupon offer" "do not double (some of them have this)" and some even have " maximum of 2 like coupons per day and per transaction" some stores do allow for an overage, but they are very few and far between. I find couponing in Canada much better. The coupon value's down here are also much, much smaller, for instance the Yoplait yogurt coupons.... .40 WUB 6 (they are talking about the single servings but the single servings are anywhere from .40 to .75 each) the latest Campbell soup coupon that came out in Sundays Redplum .50 WUB 3 ????? Yes, we get inserts every single Sunday from SS and RP, and 8 times a year from P&G and General Mills, and about once a month there will be an insert from a random manufacturer, but give me Canadian coupons any day.

[hollyquaiscer]

Now, as far as costing a lot to eat healthy. I disagree with that statement, but it's only my opinion. I've been eating healthy and clean for quite some time now, forced to due to illness. If you purchase what is in season as far as fruits and veggies, it of coarse is cheaper (If you're purchasing something for that days meal, look in the clearance section, great deals) Citrus in now in season, so since oranges, lemons, limes and such keep well, purchase larger quantities when you find a great deal and make in the and snacks around what you have. Garlic, a lot of squashes and potatoes are in season here currently, so I purchase them. If you purchases a whole chicken, you could have a roasted chicken meal, then you can make sandwiches with leftovers, then you can make a large pot of soup with the leftovers. If your feeding a family of 4, and a large chicken cost say $10 , then that works out to only .80 per meal, that's pretty cheap. Cooking from scratch is much more cost effective than purchasing pre made items, and if you only purchase the fruits or veggies that are on sale that week, you save money. JMO of coarse.

[GeorgiaK]

I find we are eating much healthier NOW that I am couponing. Remember, we all have a set budget for food/personal/household items. Since I don't spend any money or very little money on H&B, cleaning and laundry supplies, there is more money in the budget to buy fresh fruit and veggies, better cuts of meat. etc. It is the choices that each person makes.

I agree with the poster who questioned why we have no problem dishing out $10 for a burger and fries but balk at the thought of spending $10 on fruit that will last the week.