How to Buy Healthy Groceries on a Budget – #HEBC 3

Posted in Balanced Body, Balanced Nutrition | February 7, 2012 | 8 Comments

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By Anastasiya Goers

Healthy eating starts with healthy grocery shopping.

Saving money starts with cheap grocery shopping.

Can they be combined into one list without sacrifices to your health or the health of your bank account?

Healthy grocery shopping on a budget starts with a thought-out , timely and organized grocery list. Do you make lists when you go shopping? What do they look like?

I was browsing the Internet the other day and found the funniest website – The Grocery List Collection.

The author collects lost groceries lists and then puts them on his website. Some look pretty normal (diced tomatoes, spaghetti, soap etc.) while others just make you wonder what food that person was planning to fix.

My personal favorite from the website (written on a Disney Princesses sticky note):

Candy
Candy
Candy
Candy
Candy
Candy
Candy

I think they forgot gingerbread to finish their house.

But seriously, how do you make a grocery list that is healthy and budget friendly at the same time?

While I always tried to buy healthy food I didn’t put much thought into budgeting my family’s meals until recently. In August 2011 my husband and I ran an experiment and tracked every expense of our household. The results were shocking to us; they made us realize how unbalanced our finances were. About 45% of our monthly expenses were spent on food (grocery shopping and eating out) which is more than we ever wanted.

In January we ran the experiment again and we managed to cut our food expenses by 56%. While the financial change was drastic we didn’t really see any change in the quality of food that we were eating.

5 Tips to Cut Your Grocery Bill in Half and Still Enjoy Your Food

Make your grocery list healthy for your body and your bank account – Tweet this

1. Create your personal plan

We talked about personal healthy eating earlier but let’s freshen it up in our memory. What is your personal ideal grocery budget? What is your current budget? (You should know it by now if you were using the Grocery Budget template.) Now calculate the difference and let’s see where you can cut back.

Let’s leave the budget alone for a minute. What are your personal grocery favorites that you would like to keep no matter what?

My husband and I have a tradition of buying sushi for Sunday lunch. It’s not a necessity but that’s a little ritual that our family whole-heartedly enjoys (even our girls are crazy about sushi rolls.) When we were considering our grocery budget we decided to keep this little treat because, thankfully, we can afford it right now.
Do you have little treats/ traditions that you would like to keep (even though they might not be the most budget friendly decisions)?

Take a look at your Grocery Budget template and answer the following questions:

1. How much do you currently spend on groceries?
2. What is your ideal grocery budget?
3. Which grocery staples are real necessities and which ones can you eliminate?
4. Take a look at the health rating of foods and attempt to get rid of everything with a rating of 1 (junk food), cut back on 2 and keep as much of 3 as possible.
5. Talk to your family members and decide what “treats” you would like to splurge on in spite of the budget.

2. Read labels

Healthy and cheap eating is not rocket science. It’s just a lesson in reading. – Tweet this

Labels are your best friends when looking for healthy budget-friendly foods. Don’t pay too much attention to the front label because that’s usually the place where manufacturers try to deceive consumers with wishy-washy claims. Go straight to the Nutrition Information and Ingredients. Here is what you need to pay attention to:

1. Pick items with short ingredient lists that you can actually read and pronounce. At all costs avoid partially hydrogenated oils (they raise “bad” LDL cholesterol and lower “good” HDL cholesterol), high fructose corn syrup (causes obesity, hypertension liver disease and more), artificial sweeteners (while some are linked to cancer and depression all of them, surprise!, cause weight gain), MSG also known as monosodium glutamate, hydrolyzed soy protein, autolyzed yeast, and sodium caseinate (causes headaches if consumed too often, however it’s the least harmful ingredient of all the mentioned above.)
2. Pay attention to the serving size. Before you dive into dissecting the nutritional value take a look at the serving size. A protein bar can seem like a healthy and diet-friendly option until you realize that the serving size is just 1/3 of the bar. The same goes for breakfast cereal, granola bars and many others.
3. Calories: pay attention to how many calories one serving size has. I am not a big fan of counting calories, however when I am looking to buy ice-cream I will choose all-natural Breyers with 140 cal per 1/2 cup serving as opposed to all-natural Haagen Dasz with 260 cal/serving. You get the idea.
4. Fat: opt for items with less saturated fat, no trans fat and higher levels of Monounsaturated and Polyunsaturated fats. Be careful with no-fat or low fat items because they can often be high in sugar and sodium to make up for the lost flavor.
5. Cholesterol: don’t get overly zealous about it. While it is recommended to keep your cholesterol consumption under control it’s not the biggest villain. Trans fats, saturated fats, lack of dietary fiber and being overweight have a much higher impact on the cholesterol levels in your blood. Read more here.
6. Sodium: no matter whether you are at a high risk of heart disease and hypertension or not, limiting sodium intake is always a good idea. An average American gets about 3400 mg of sodium a day while the dietary guidelines suggest 2000 mg or even 1500 mg at the most. Most processed and packaged foods contain high levels of sodium (look at these surprising high-sodium foods) that is why using natural unprocessed ingredient is the best strategy to lower your daily sodium intake. Look at the serving size of the grocery item and the actual amount of sodium in it (not the percentage) and make your buying decision accordingly.
7. Dietary Fiber: opt for foods with higher number in this row. Obviously, looking for high-fiber milk or meat is ridiculous but opt for high-fiber varieties in any plant-based foods. Pay particular attention to fiber in breakfast cereals, pasta, granola bars (if they are part of your diet) and bread. Fiber is your best friend in weight loss, reducing cholesterol as well as risks of heart disease, diabetes and cancer (read more here)
8. Sugar: Sugar is the only ingredient on the Nutrition Facts label that is not important for your health and wellbeing. While fat and even sodium in moderation are essential for the proper work of your body, sugar serves no purpose besides triggering your taste buds and making you put extra padding around your waistline. Life without sugar would be very bland and boring but try to satisfy your sweet tooth with naturally occurring sugars in fruits, honey, maple syrup and agave nectar and limit the rest of your sugar consumption to a bare minimum.
   Keep in mind that a lot of foods that are labeled “diet” or “low-fat” are high in both sugar and sodium and don’t help you reach any of your health goals.
9. Protein: protein is an essential nutrient that is beneficial to your body. A balanced diet requires 30%-40% of your dietary intake to come from lean protein which equals to about 45-60g of protein/day. Protein keeps you full longer and helps you build muscle if you exercise regularly but there is a limit to how much protein your body can actually process. You can easily calculate how much protein you actually need using this formula:

   Weight in pounds multiplied by 0.5-0.8 g/lb

   My example:
   Weight in pounds = 113 lbs
   113 x 0.8 = 90 g – it’s the maximum amount of protein that my body needs for athletic performance

3. Be organic-smart

Please consider the Pros and Cons of going organic that I wrote about earlier and check out my simple guide to frugal organic eating. Right now I buy organic lettuce and meat all the time but I am not so strict with the rest of the ingredients. If I buy non-organic veggies or fruit then I try to peel them (since most pesticides “live” on the skin of produce) and wash them thoroughly. A good trick to buy organic without spending too much money is buying frozen produce. Like I mentioned before (http://balanceinme.com/balanced-nutrition/healthy-breakfast-on-a-budget/) frozen produce can have more nutrients and vitamins then fresh one that took weeks to ship and store before it got to your fridge.

4. Don’t get crazy with coupons

I once watched an Extreme Couponing episode and was shocked. First of all, women on the show had way more time to look for coupons than I do (they said it took them about 20 hours a week) and most of their savings were on foods that I wouldn’t feed to my family even for free (soda, candy, cookies etc.) I am not against using coupons when I see a good deal but at the same time I won’t be buying something unhealthy just because it is on sale.

5. Create meals around store specials

A lot of women swear by meal planning to cut back on their food bill but this strategy doesn’t work for me. Every time that I go to the grocery store I first check what produce is on sale that day. Most grocery stores have at least one green item on sale every week (broccoli, zucchini, cabbage, spinach, asparagus etc.) and I create my weekly meal plan around this item. The same goes for fruit and meat.

Next week we will talk about creating dinners from simple and cheap ingredients and having your own weekly meal template.

If you are still wondering what you should buy when you go grocery shopping then check out these articles that I wrote earlier:

• Cheap and healthy grocery list for a bad economy
• 13 Real Heroes among Health Foods (plus a free download)

Homework:

• This week focus on cleaning your pantry, freezer and refrigerator and stocking up with healthy (yet affordable) items.
• Share your kitchen staples in the comments below.
• Ask questions about cheap grocery shopping.

Keep it balanced!

photo credit: Bruce A Stockwell

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