PLAN meals. FOr a week at least. Then buy what is needed to make those instead of aking whatever sounds good and doing small trips several times a week. Sit down with the sale flyers to plan the meals.
Frozen veggis and fruit are not just less lost due to spoilage of fresh foods, they are also far higher in nutrition. Most frozen fruits and veggies are frozen within about 24 hrs of harvesting. They are fully ripened in the field and they have far more nutrients than the fresh food int he stores, esp that shipped in from other countries. The "fresh" produce must be picked before it is ripe, meaning that it ripens in a truck as it travels. It never gets all the nutrients that the frozen food has. Even with the processing that frozen produce gets, it still has higher levels of nutrients than the "fresh" stuff at the stores.
The exception is locally grown food at farmer's markets that you will use that day or the next. But you have to KNOW that it is locally grown. There are a LOT of people like Shari's cgfg's mom who buy stuff off of trucks and then sell it as "fresh". We are truly lucky in my town because our farmer's market is run by a group that makes the sellers PROVE that it is grown or made in our state. NOTHING can be sold there from out of state, period. The man who sells bread and canned veggies etc... there not only shows that he makes it locally, he actually can tell you where the wheat, rye, tomatoes etc... are grown. But most farmer's markets are NOT like that.
Don't be afraid to toss the froz veggies into the water with the pasta when it is boiling, or to add a bit of extra water to the rice and toss the froz veggies into the rice pot or cooker. Takes some trial and error with rice, but it saves time and energy because you are not heating up the food using 2 sources of energy. Also the rice usually can absorb all the water so it will absorb the nutrients the water takes out of the froz veggies.
Keep a container for liquid in the freezer. If you cook veggies in a bit of water on the stove, or chicken or even add some to eggs and cover them to steam them gently instead of frying them, put that water into the container in the freezer. Add to it and then use the liquid for soup. Usually won't add much flavor but will add nutrients.
Don't buy canned beans. It is EASY to fix dried beans. You can use your freezer to help you get them ready to use as fast as canned beans! Watch this video on youtube for great, easy instructions to make it super convenient to use dried beans and not spend the extra money on canned ones:
http://www.youtube.com/user/thewheatguy?blend=21&ob=5#p/u/41/r06xLWF5BeM
The other videos by this person are also wonderful. I have yet to try any of her tips that didn't work. One super easy money saver is a Doh! thing. WHen you buy a bag of apples or oranges, many of us will weigh them to get one that weighs more than the others because there IS a difference in weight. But is this REALLY saving money or just giving you bigger portions because the fruit is bigger? Instead, look for the bag with the highest number of pieces of fruit. It will save a few calories per serving and give you servings that are lower in cost. ONe bag might have 8 apples and another might have 10 or even 11. Same weight, but you eat one apple per serving. So theo ne with 10 or 11 apples gives you more servings at a cheaper cost for each one!
When you buy chicken, compare the cost with bones and skin and without. IF the boneless kind is less than 2 times the cost of the kind iwth bones, then the boneless kind is a better deal. When you buy chicken with bones, HALF of the weight goes to bones, a little mroe than half for bones and skin. SO if you do NOT plan to keep the bones and boil them for stock then it is far more cost effective to buy the boneless kind if it is 2 times or less thant he cost of the chicken with bones. I had a food prep class that we had to weigh the weight of the bones after we cooked each kind of chicken. This was true no matter what we did with the chicken as far as how we cooked it.
check out ebay for buying coupons. yes, sounds like heresy. But you can get a list of all the coupons you are getting and they come pre-clipped which saves time. I look for auctions with free shipping so I know the entire cost of what I am buying up front, rahter than biddinga nd winning and then realizing I have to tack on more for the shipping. It is a great way to get hard to find coupons.
Don't buy hummus. either cook the dried chick peas or garbanzo beans or buy a can and mash them. just rinse the canned liquid off (helps reduce gas in your system) and mash them up with a fork or potato masher. Add in whatever spices you want and some heart-healthy oil if desired and you have a FAST and yummy hummus for a TON less than the prepared stuff. I can make up twice the amt of one of those little tubs of hummus in about 5 min or less. I just take the can lid and use it to keep the beans in as I drain them, add water to rinse, use the lid again to keep them in, drain the rinse water, dump into a bowl, eyeball the spices, mash with a fork until as thin or chunky as I want, and then serve.
Also don't buy guacamole. Buy a few avocados and when ripe just scoop out the flesh, dump in your spices, mash with a fork and serve. WOn't be as green as many store bought ones but that is because you odn't add food color. Be sure to add a bit of lime or lemon juice. Keep the color from turning and perks up whatever spices you use.
Either eat something with PROTEIN before you go or get a protein bar or some of the popcorn chicken or deli meat and eat at the beginning of the trip or if you start to feel hungry. This will keep you from buying as much junk food and keep you from being as impulsive. If the kids are hungry and this won't work or they ahve eaten, get a bag of baby carrots and let them eat those (sold by the bag and not the pound, otherwise you have to pay before they eat some.).
Consider cabbage instead of iceberg lettuce. Iceberg lettuce has almost no nutrients. Cabbage has more nutrients and at some tiems of the year is far less expensive. If it is cheaper it can be used for salad or you can even make cole slaw.
If you buy fresh broccoli don't toss the stems. Most of the nutrients are in those stems. Peel off the outer layer of the stem and shred them with a grater or food processor. They add an awesome kind of spicy flavor to slaw - broccoli slaw is really nutritious and the kids I know will eat it when they won't touch the same dressing on shredded cabbage. You can also use it in quick bread or carrot cake to add more nutrients - just sub the shredded broccoli for part of the zucchini or carrots in the recipe.
Don't buy plastic containers to organize little things. Cut up shampoo bottles, 2 liter bottles, etc... and use the bottoms as containers to organize. When you buy things like ice cream, consider the packaging when you make your choice. My family loves ice cream. Left alone they would eat some three times a day. Obviously that isn't okay but I do buy the big gallon or 5 quart containers that come in plastic buckets. Then those get re-used to store flour, sugar, beans, even pre-wrapped snacks. I don't have to buy tupperware to store those in and they are still in airtight containers. Plus ice cream is cheaper in the big buckets. Then I have saved enough to indulge in the pint of ben and jerry's or hagen daz that I love and eat maybe one every 2 months. When we lived in OH I would get my splurge ice cream from Graeters because they used plastic containers instead of the cardboard ones. I will get the frozen cream puffs from walmart or sams for parties and then I have a nice square container to keep things in.
Get copies of The Tighwad Gazette and read them. Consider making your own mixes and beauty products. Not all, but even if you just do some you can save serious money. Cheaper and Better by Nancy Birnes is available used on amazon.com for 30 cents and has many recipes for homemade food, cleaning, gift and other items. It even has a recipe for Bailey's Irish Cream that is cheaper and tastes AMAZING. Of course the prices quoted in these books for the store bought and homemade items are out of date, but they are still money savers.
For mixes, consider Make a mix Cookery by Eliason et al. Check out used prices on amazon for books as shipping is a flat $3.99 from other sellers. Also check out
www.abebooks.net and alibris.com to compare prices.
Buy dvds used. Period. Amazon often has them for far less than the new price and has a flat $2.98 shipping that is lower than many other sites. I just got the entire collection 1 of Are You Being Served for husband for father's day for $10 plus $2.98 shipping. IT is in brand new shape, totally unscratched and the box and dvd cases are immaculate. Even if tey were scratched a little bit it would be a HGUE savings.
Get some CD/DVD scratch repair cream. A bottle is about $8 and can treat over 100 discs. Often it can make a disc playable again and costs far less than the $3 per disc resurfacing fee that many places charge. One place here was using this as a treatment for $2 each disc as an alternative to resurfacing - until an employee told his mom and it got known around town. Now they just sell the cream.