The Grocery Game - A Tiered Approach
My wife is far smarter than I am in many ways (and far more attractive). She also cooks 10 times more intuitively and creatively than I do, which helps. This is actually something I fully attribute to her in making us smarter grocery shoppers.
We have developed a pretty good routine of getting food cheap, and for buying groceries for the week. We do a bit of a tiered system to get what we need starting at the cheap places, and working our way up for specialized buys:
- IF you have a deep freeze and you eat meat, why not buy your meat in bulk and/or on sale? Go in on a half or quarter cow / bison / pig with some friends from a local farm. Cheaper by the pound, much higher quality, and tastes way better than that watered down shit you get at the supermarket. And when you find Manager's Special prices on beef, pork, fish, buy it up, and either cook it quickly or freeze it.
- Get produce and the basics super cheap. We have a local farmer's market that has been going strong for over 200 years, so we start our week, usually on a Saturday after the gym. $20 and we're pretty well set. ($5 bag of spinach or greens, assorted veggies for a few bucks, etc.)
- THEN, if we still need some additional stuff, we hit up Aldi (almond milk, eggs, avocados, cheese).
- THEN, if we need to, we work up to Trader Joe's (1 pound bags of nuts, wine, etc.)
- THEN, if we really want specialized stuff, we'll go to the more specialized grocery stores, especially if they let you buy a beer or glass of wine while you're shopping (Cave aged cheeses, meats, etc.)
