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University of Maine Cooperative Extension Bulletin #4332
Once you have planned your menus and made a shopping list, you’re ready to buy the food. The prices you pay will depend on where and how you shop. It takes time and effort to become a food buying expert. But it’s well worth it. To make your food dollars count:
Decide where to shop.
Compare while you shop.
Keep your shopping skills sharp.
Choose whole-grain or enriched products for good nutrition.
Buy cereals in large boxes instead of small, individual packages.
Look for bargains on day-old bread and bakery products.
Add your own seasonings and sauces to rice and pasta.
Buy cereals plain, without added sugar. Add your own sugar if you don’t need to worry about weight.
Buy regular-type rice and regular- or quick-type oats, and cereal. The instant types cost over twice as much per serving.
Select the largest container you can use without waste. Larger containers are usually less expensive.
Grate cheese yourself. Packages of shredded cheese cost more than the same amount of cheese in wedges or blocks.
Watch for good buys on fresh fruits and vegetables in season.
Buy plain canned or plain frozen vegetables instead of those with added seasonings and sauces or boil-in-the-bag packages.
Look for large bags of frozen vegetables. They may be bargains, and you can pour out the exact amount you need.
Look for specials at the meat counter. Buying sale cuts can mean big savings for you. Some higher-priced meats may fit your budget when they are on sale.
Cut up meats and chicken yourself. For example, stew meat usually costs more than a chuck roast. You can cut the roast into cubes and save money. Chicken parts often cost more than whole chickens, too.
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These foods cost more and some will increase the fat, sugar and salt in your diet, too:
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For convenience, buy larger containers of prepared frozen foods such as meatballs and chicken breasts. Use only what you need, and keep the remainder frozen until you need them.
Some foods have parts you can’t eat—like the bone and fat in meat or the cores, pits or peels of fresh fruits and vegetables. For these foods, the lowest price per pound isn’t always the best buy. To find the best buy, you need to compare the costs of the amounts you need for a meal or for a serving.
From past experience, you probably know how much of these foods you need for a meal. To find the cost of a meal:
First, think of how many meals a package will serve.
Then divide the number of meals you expect to get into the price for the package. This gives you the cost per meal.
The example below shows how to compare costs for meats.
At the meat counter: |
For some foods—especially fruits—it may be easier to compare the cost of a serving than the cost of a meal. To find the cost of a serving:
First think of the number of servings you can get from a market unit—such as a pound of bananas, five grapefruit or one pineapple.
Then divide the number of servings into the price for the market unit to find the cost of a serving.
The example below shows how to compare costs for fresh fruits.
Food labels can tell you a lot about what's inside the package. To see what you are really paying for, read the label.
Look for the list of ingredients. Ingredients are listed on the package in order from largest to smallest amounts.
Look to see if breads, bakery products, rice, flour and pasta are whole-grain or enriched. “Whole-grain” flour still has most of the nutrients that were originally in the wheat or other grain. In making white flour, however, some of those nutrients are lost. “Enriched” means that those nutrients have been put back. Sometimes, you can tell if a food is whole-grain from its name. For other foods, you’ll need to look at the ingredient list.
Be alert to the ways foods are displayed. Watch out for foods placed at the end of the aisle or in an attractive display. They may not really be bargains. Be careful using “cents-off” coupons, too. Often these coupons are for name brand products that cost more than the store brand products, even with the coupon discount. Be sure to compare costs!
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the produce section: Compare the cost for a serving. Which of the following three is the better buy?  |
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Bananas at 1 pound for 60¢ and grapefruits at 2 for $1.00 are the better buys. |
Other fact sheets in this series include: |
Prepared by Nellie Hedstrom, Extension nutrition specialist
Source: "Thrifty Meals for Two: Making Food Dollars Count," USDA Home and Garden Bulletin #244.
Published and
distributed in furtherance of Acts of Congress of May 8 and June 30, 1914, by
the University of Maine Cooperative Extension, the Land Grant University of the
state of Maine and the U.S. Department of Agriculture cooperating. Cooperative
Extension and other agencies of the U.S.D.A. provide equal opportunities in
programs and employment.
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