The Food Budget

Over the weekend I received several emails asking me what we spend on food, cleaning needs, and paper products per month. These folks asked what our family spends as a simple living family. I think this is a great topic and thank you to whoever it was that started the subject.
We have kept a tight budget for years. When all 4 children were home and boys do eat a lot, my budget was $400 a month for everything, meaning that included the cleaning needs and paper goods. We never have used a lot of paper products, they seem wasteful to me. We use cloth napkins, and dish rags and towels in place of paper towels, leaving only toilet paper to buy. For many many years I made my own laundry soap, which costs very little. Its a simple soap, cleans well and the only bother to it was the grating it. I get kinda lazy now and purchase laundry soap most of the time.
Cleaning needs are simple too. Furniture polish, Pine cleaner, dish soap, and some steel wool are all we buy. I have made my own soap for years now so never have to buy that.
When the children were all home I did the Once A Month Cooking which saves lots of money and time. Buying in bulk and cooking 30 meals or more in a couple days time. I never did it all in one day, had too many other things going on, which did not allow for a full day of just cooking. Homeschooling took up every morning except weekends of course.
I have always made my own bread, never used mixes and do not buy prepared frozen meals.
When the children were growing up we had our own goat milk which allowed us to make our own cheese and yogurt. Since we no longer have goats, I purchase milk.
Healthy eating is important to us. I have been blessed with children that were not sick with colds, ear infections, broken bones etc. I feel confident that our healthy eating played a real role in that. Emery is soon to be 61 and I will be 53 this summer. Neither one of us is on any medication and neither has any health issues. I believe we have been blessed with good health due to our healthy lifestyle throughout life.
Melissa and James spend about $240 a month on groceries and Melanie and Casi spend a little less but that might be in part to a couple things, first Melanie has been sick with morning sickness their entire marriage making cooking difficult. Plus they live nice and close to us and I tend to invite them over for a few meals a week due to the circumstances.
Steven and Priscilla eat out way more than the rest of us so their food budget is much higher than anyone else in the family. They spend about the same on groceries as we do but then have a hefty eating out budget.
Our meals are simple but nutritious and there are three meals a day for each of us.
We like hot cereal for breakfast, Bear Mush is my favorite. Lunches are simple, but nutritious. We all like fruit so that is part of our daily intake. We skip having juice as its expensive, and high in calorie and you often loose out on the fiber end of it. We do make carrot juice a lot though. I buy banana's on sale when they are over ripe, which I freeze for "ice cream" (frozen bananas run through the Champion Juicer) and we make smoothies a lot. Sometimes a good smoothie is my noon meal.
Emery takes his lunch to work. Often times I make trail mix for him to take in his lunch box as a treat. It gives him added nutrition and tastes good.
We have never bought soda. We love water, all of us do.
Our evening meals are actually very simple too. I make casseroles often and cook many Amish meals. Throwing in some ethnic food here and there for diversity.
When the children left home, we kept the budget the same pretty much. It means we eat more organic foods and more health food type items. We feel at our ages its a good time to really watch what we eat. Your body does change as you age, nutritional needs are different. We have gone to using only olive oil for cooking, which does cost a bit more.
So there you have it. $400 a month for everything, food, cleaning and what few paper products we use. I do not use aluminum foil, or much plastic wrap. Aluminum foil leaches into many foods, and plastic wrap is costly. I use glass storage containers that come with plastic lids and reusable washable plastic "shower cap" type covers for lids on bowls where some would use plastic wrap.
I cover casseroles etc in the oven with a cookie sheet in place of foil.
If we did once a month cooking again, I know I could cut our food budget in about half, so might think about getting back into that. Right now doing the shopping and planning for that is not something I have the time for. Maybe after things settle down a bit I will be able to.

Items purchased on a shopping trip to Whole Foods
Our own eggs
Cabbage in the garden
Weekly bread making, no bread making machine for me : )