Food Budgeting Tips

When it comes to budgeting I know it makes us a little anxious sometimes and when I tracked my expenses usually the biggest expenses I spent were on food. Yeah, we need to eat everyday, don’t we? So in the past few months I started to take the food budget more seroiusly, sounds too seroius, does it? Hahahaha…

If you are single and living on your own, you need to budget your expenses and manage your financial, if you are having a family with children you should take budgeting to the next level, hahaha. I am not saying we should be stingy and suffer ourselves by creating a budget. It is more likely to be a wiser person in manage your money.

In this post I will focus on food budgeting, the biggest expenses we spend in our daily life. With this budgeting stuff I still can eat good food, I don’t waste many food that end up rotten in my fridge or expired in my cupboard.

Okay, first of all…..

Make Food Plan

I make weekly food plan. I write down daily menus for breakfast, lunch, dinner. I usually have a “free day”to buy take out or eating out at restaurant, cafe or bistro I fancy. So basically my weekly food plan is just 6 days food plan. Making food plan also avoid me getting stressful with what to cook especially when my work is going crazy and hectic. So I just need to stick to the plan.

Make Groceries Shopping List

This is the most important part. Often we go to supermarket or fresh market see all fresh veggies, fruits, meat and any other stuff that are so fresh so tempting then we buy all of them without knowing what to cook. Sometimes it will end up rotten in a fridge. So make a groceries shopping list based on the food plan. What to do when we see bags of chips or cookies that are so tempting? Just buy! I usually add budget in my grocery shopping list about how much money I will spend on snacks, tea, coffee.

Choose wisely

We are now living in the world with abundance of choice, how lucky aren’t we? What I mean by choose wisely is, see for promo, discounts on food that last longer such as rice, grain, pasta, noodles, sauces. Sometimes the shop have online promo, bundle discount, etc. So you may save up a little by buying discounted products. Once again don’t buy too much, just adjust with what you need, you don’t want to hoarding and end up those food rotten in your cupboard.

See Discount Section

Most in the supermarket in my area have discount section. Mostly the products are close to expiration, it usually one month to expiration date and the shop will reduce 50% to 70% off. So I will check if there are some stuffs I need that is on sale. For example, I will cook pasta this week or next week, I see a discounted pasta sauce that will expired in a month so I will buy it, but If I hadn’t plan to cook it then I won’t buy it. Because sometimes we can turn into an impulsive buyers when we are shopping, especially women hahaha….

So here are some simple tips I use to manage my food budgeting, although it is simple I find it useful and a bit life changing for me.

Enjoying Life While Living In a Tight Budget

We often hear that money can’t bring us happiness, but in life we need money for everything, right?

I know exactly how it feels, when you receive your salary, you wish to buy everything you want, but in the end it’s just a wish! You still have tons of bills to pay and it feels sucks sometimes. Even when you shop for your needs you really need to pay attention to your tight budget.

But, will you be grumpy all the time and miss a good things in life just because you live in a tight budget?

Off course not!

I think here are some things you can do when you live in a tight budget.

Make a grocery shopping list.

Stick to the list when you shop, so you will not buy things you don’t need. We often go to supermarket and be tempted by all the stuffs there and in the end we buy things we don’t need but simply just because we want it.

Less meat more veggies

I know how delicious steaks are and I also know how expensive they can be especially when we are living in a tight budget. But think of the positive side, eat more veggies will be good for our body. Eat red meat once a week, chicken or fish once or twice a weak, eat more veggies or other plant- based food.

Choose local products

Local products usually cheaper than imported products.

Cook at home

Cooking is always cheaper that eating out. Or some people love to buy frozen food, I know it’s simple and some of you might like it but trust me when you cook you save more money.

Make your own coffee

The smell of the coffee at the coffee shop nearby the office always so tempting, but you will realize how much money you save once you make your own coffee.

Enjoy free things

If you go to movie you can’t get ticket for free, go to amusement park and also you have to buy tickets. So why don’t you go to the park, exercise in the morning, get fit. Or go the park and have picnic with your friends. On the day you want to be alone, just grab a book you want to read and read it in the park.

Watching at home

Now you can enjoy movies at home since there are youtube, netflix, iflix, etc.

Give present for yourself

Once a month, give present for yourself. Buy a cake you want, or tea you would like to try, or anything you really want that is not a necessity but the price range should be still in your budget.

I know living in a tight budget is not what we want, but sometimes life give us things we don’t want to but still we have to go through it. The most important things is how we manage our life to get through the hard time.