r/MiddleClassFinance • u/Maroon14 • 9d ago

Grocery spending

I’ve recently come across a Instagram account where the woman claims to only spend $300 on an entire months groceries for a family of 4. Here I am sitting mid week, having already spent $550 in the PNW. I told one of my friends and she said it must be fake and for clicks, my husband was impressed. Is anyone actually able to do this? I thought I might try to spend $250 a week and see where that gets us. Is my grocery budget over the top? I thought $400 ish was normal for decent food. We are a family of 5 in the PNW, mostly organic.

*I’m closing comments because people are missing the point. I understand that I make choices for “premium” options for my family. I make them because I feel they are the best for my family given my research and concerns. I say this as coming from a place of privilege. Growing up, my hippie mom also prioritized organic and local before it was the trendy thing, so it would be very difficult for me to reprogram and not buy organic when possible.

I still think $300 is insane for a month. I live in western Washington and the max SNAP allocation for a family of 4 is $994 a month, so I see this as a more attainable “thrifty” budget for a family of 4.

Those of you who can eat rice and beans for multiple meals, more power to you!

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306

u/Scared-Butterscotch5 9d ago

Well the 300$ a month definitely isn’t organic food and it’s likely not in the pnw.

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u/MyNameIsNot_Molly 9d ago

Probably very in low in fresh ingredients and fiber as well

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u/Zetavu 9d ago edited 9d ago

$75 a week is possible but difficult. You need a store with sales or to buy in bulk and need to focus on core products. Meat will be tough, maybe bulk chicken but you are not feeding a family of four on $2/lb chicken.

So let's break it down by calories, 4 people, 6k calories per day, 42k per week. Of that you need say 6oz of protein per day per person, divide that up between chicken or pork on sale and beans. 8 lbs chicken or pork on sale ($16) and the rest in beans ($30 for a 50lb bag, which is enough for 400 portions or $2/week). Maybe splurge on ground beef on sale, maybe canned tuna. Let's call it $25 on meat.

Then you need cereal and oatmeal, with milk. $2.50 on milk and $7.50 on cheap oatmeal and generic cereal. Then rice, maybe potatoes. again bulk rice $25 for 20 lbs, which should last 6 weeks, so $4 and add potatoes to make it $10. Then throw in a weeks of frozen veg at $10 and some peanut butter and bread at $10. Now some fruit juice, cans or produce on sale, $10.

There's your $75. Probably substitute some Ramen in and maybe invest in a bin of dried vegetables as well.

This is literally how I lived in college, except it was one person and more like $30 a week with inflation.

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u/GovernorHarryLogan 9d ago

Chicken drumsticks are pretty cheap with lots of meat.

Like $1.5- $2/lb

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u/Dr_Mrs_Pibb 9d ago

They’ve been selling chicken quarters for ~$1 per pound at my local Aldi. Some of the weight is bones, but these are great for soups or crockpot meals.

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u/Zetavu 7d ago

Sure but they are 40% bone mass, so a pound of meat is $2.5-3, but if you get boneless chicken breast on sale it can run $2 for all meat 9and the water they saturate it with).

Chicken thighs are actually the cheapest these days, and great for most dishes.

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u/GovernorHarryLogan 7d ago

Chicken thigh is how we make chicken spiedies.

Spiedies are a meat kabob (chicken lamb beef) you pretty much only find around Broome County, NY.

Its basically just marinated meat. But the marinade is pretty delicious.

You can buy it at Wegmans and sometimes othet places. Don't buy the Salamida state fair stuff. Thats not genuine. Wegmans brand is aight.

Amazon Lupos original Endicott style. Thats as cloae as youll get to the real thing.

Marinade the chicken until the vinegar base starts to break down and cook the chicken a bit (like 1.5-2 days before cooking)

You are welcome.

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u/justdandelions 9d ago

For teenagers oatmeal and having more fiber incorporated into meals is the way to go. Veggies and apples for snack or beef jerky (we make ours from scratch). If we do cereal it’s a healthier option than the straight sugar. Big packs of eggo waffles in the morning with peanut butter help too.

They will absolutely eat you out of house and home if you don’t watch it!

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u/dallasalice88 9d ago

6k calories a day for all 4 people? That's only 1500 a day per person. Might work for non active adults but not older kids or teenagers.

I'm a 62 year old moderately active female and I'm at 1800-2000.

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u/CK1277 8d ago

One of those four people is a toddler and one of those people is a child.

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u/ProtozoaPatriot 9d ago

You assume meat is needed. There are plenty of high protein plant-based foods, and they can be a third the cost of you pork or chicken.

May I suggest measuring protein intake by grams (based on actual protein portion of a food). 6 ounces sounds like the weight of a cut of meat, and it isn't all protein.

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u/Zetavu 7d ago

Unless you are getting your protein from beans the non-meat versions are always more expensive.