I was browsing the archives of Credit Card Hell recently, and a commenter suggested living on a food stamp budget in order to save on grocery bills. I was curious to see what a 2 person household would get if elligible for food stamps so I checked Pennsylvania’s Food Stamp website . The amount: $298. I was surprised and happy because this is close to what our grocery bill amounts to every month. In fact its somewhat scary that we regularly wind up with a $60 (to the penny, excluding bag credits for bringing our own bags) grocery bill nearly every week without meaning to. I’ll try to post the numbers for our grocery bills in June including our actual purchases so there is a better idea of what constitutes a $298/month grocery bill. This $298 figure is also interesting for another reason because I’ve read complaints online that organic/local food tends to be expensive…but if a food stamp budget can get two of us organic, local food every single week that those complaints are baseless.

Our grocery bill used to hover at around $70-$80 about 2 years ago when we regularly shopped at Trader Joe’s. I wanted to reduce the bill and wound up cutting out much of the processed and packaged food such as juices, microwavable meals, etc. Back then we also ate out at a restaurant at least once a week, so our food bill was usually well over $400 per month. And we visited coffee shops regularly. We’ve reduced coffee shop visits…although this past month I didn’t go to one at all.

Below is what our typical grocery list looks like. We used to shop every week, but I’m trying to cut it down to biweekly to save time.

1. Veggies (usually what ever is in season). For the past couple of months we’ve been getting some sort of green leafy veggies, onions, potatoes, squashes, one or two types of root veggies, one or two types non local, organic veggies like cilantro, tomato, lime.

2. Fruit (whatever is in season). Its been apples and pears and cranberries for awhile.

3. Bulk food: coffee (fairly traded and picked by shiny, happy people), dry beans, grains (generally rice), sugar, oatmeal, other random things like nutritional yeast and baking yeast

4. Dairy - cheese/butter

5.  Oils (usually a 32oz bottle per month)

6. Eggs

7. Some sort of treat like chocolate, ice cream, pasta sauce, odd food item never tried before (most recently it was what I call Biblical pasta. Its really good and quite expensive for pasta).

Certain items I buy in larger bulks such as flour, honey, soy beans.

Today marks a one month anniversary since we ate at a restaurant. We’ve eaten every single meal and snack at home (or at a friend’s home). I didn’t have any sort of instant meal during the past 30 days (not even organic, local pies/tarts/cakes). I’m quite proud of that feat and don’t feel deprived at all. In fact neither of us have plans of eating out for quite awhile.  

Anyway…in late June I will have 6 months worth of a spending pattern on our food consumption. I usually write down exactly what we buy too as I’m working on a price book…this too will be posted mid year.