Dinner For Less

A few semesters ago I took a Personal Finance class at school. My professor was an extremely educated business women with multiple degrees, a Masters in Business and in addition to teaching, she also runs two of her own very successful business's. She speaks with a thick Jamaican accent and takes sass from no one, I loved every minute of that class! She taught us many important lessons and I am grateful for a seat in her classroom. I learned so much. Her teachings changed my approach to our finances at home and taught me the skills to manage my budget and my time in a more effective manner. I was able to develop a better system that has saved me time and money. This little system has helped me slash my grocery budget by $175 a month. 

If I told you that you could make dinner for two weeks for less than $70 would you believe me? That breaks down to around $5.00 for a meal that feeds a family of 4. I am not talking about Extreme Couponing or anything like that. I am not a die hard couponer. I use them now and then but I don't really bother with them too much overall. I don't really have the patience for all that mess. 

My mother does though, she is the original Extreme Couponer. I can remember sitting at the kitchen table every Sunday, helping her clip, sort and file coupons. Sandi got the easy job, she just had to pull the expired ones. When we argued about it, mom made us stand there nose to nose with a coupon in between. Followed by our extreme couponing, was the trip to the store. It was at least two hours and most of the time two carts. I understand now why it was necessary, mom was trying to feed 8 people on a budget. Not an easy task.  Needless to say coupons sort of left a bad taste in my mouth and I am not a big fan of grocery shopping with them. If you are though, more power to you, save that money!

Now the 411 on my big secret system is .............. preparation. I choose 15 meals that we will be eating over the next two weeks. I tally the ingredients, make a list and then buy in bulk whenever possible. I shoot for 5 chicken dishes, 5 beef dishes and 5 hamburger dishes. It is much cheaper to buy a large family package of beef or chicken and cut it up my self, than it is to buy them individually packaged. I buy good cuts of steak and cut them up to make them go further. Today I bought 4 huge new york strip steaks for $14.00. I was able to get 5 meals out of all of that.

I head to my local fruit market to get the veggies, and then over to the supermarket to get the rest of the ingredients. When I get home, I put the meat in the fridge while I wash and cut up all the veggies. I separate them into bowls, then cut the meat.  Once I am finished with the meat, I bust out the Ziplocks and start filling them.  I put in veggies, raw meat, and seasonings then zip up the bag, making sure to get out the air and freeze. 

Now dinner is essentially ready. All I need to do is decide what we are having, pull it out the night before, then toss it in the skillet or oven and dinner is complete in 30 minutes or less. If I used the crockpot, dinner is waiting when I get home.  

This little system is simple and although it will eat up a whole afternoon of your time from start to finish, it is well worth it.


The benefits are that I have prepackaged dinner ready to go. There is no temptation to pick up dinner on the way home saving me from budget destroying  impulse spending.  We waste less food and subsequently less money, since everything is chopped and then frozen. No veggies are wasted and none go bad waiting to be cooked. I also get to spend my evenings with my family instead of spending an hour and a half in the kitchen preparing dinner. My family is still eating healthy and nutritious food with no preservatives and food additives, helping us all to monitor our sugar and salt intake as well as carbs and calories.  We are still eating very well and there are never ending combination of foods that can be explored. In the next two weeks some of the meals we are having are: meatloaf, beef stew, pepper-steak, chicken tenders,  chicken & steak fajitas, chicken noodle soup, beef stroganoff, chicken and broccoli, tacos, spaghetti, lemon chicken & rice, goulash, and grilled chicken ceaser salad.

Preparing meals this way has had a positive effect on our overall budget. I am more organized, we are wasting less food, we are eating healthier and the bonus to this system is that I am not subject to as much neuromarketing in the grocery store.


We all know that the grocery store can be a money trap. We go in with the best of intentions to just get a few things for dinner and then we leave $50.00 lighter. It happens to all of us at one time or another. The experts advice to avoiding it is to stick to a list, shop the perimeter of the store, and limit impulse purchases. Since I am doing most of my shopping from the perimeter of the store and I have a list, I am less likely to impulse purchase, over buy just because there is a sale, buy something I already have at home and buy something more expensive out of convenience.

I hope that these tips help you out as much as they have helped us. I know it is a pain in the ass to spend a whole afternoon preparing, but the benefits so out way the negatives in this case. You will be eating fresher and healthier while you save money.