Is It Expensive to Eat Healthy Food? Part One
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As we dive into our No More Excuses series, I decided to first tackle the excuse that it is “expensive to eat healthy food”. This one seems to be the most popular complaint among those of us who are working to eat and feed our families a healthy diet. I ended up with so much to say on this topic, I divided the material into three separate posts that I will be sharing throughout the week.
To begin part one of these posts regarding the thought that “healthy food is too expensive”, let me just start out by saying, “I hear ya!”. That was my biggest complaint too, my loudest excuse, and one of the main reasons I didn’t think eating a healthy diet was possible for our family. After all, I’m the girl who used to get everything for free or cheap with coupons. The thought of actually spending money on food was painful to me when we started our healthy eating journey. I had no idea where the extra money for healthy food would come from in our already very tight budget.
After lots and lots of research, experimentation, and tweaking of our budget, we finally figured out how to make this work for our family. Ultimately, I had to surrender and let go of the idea that spending money on food was bad, and instead embrace the truth that spending money on good, nourishing food is a wise investment for our family.
But still, it is a fact that coconut oil and olive oil cost more than canola oil and crisco. Real butter costs more than margarine. Whole wheat pasta and real cheese costs more than a box of mac and cheese.
So, does that mean that healthy eating is indeed expensive? I think it’s a matter of perspective. Our grocery budget has definitely gone up since we began our healthy eating journey. The way I cook now is completely different than the way I cooked when I bought processed and unhealthy foods with coupons, but does that mean that our healthy food should be considered expensive?
Pardon my geekiness spewing forth, but just as I did a few years ago, I did a new break down of what it costs to feed my family on an average day. I think it’s very interesting to take a nitty-gritty look at what it costs us to feed one person per day, and to analyze that number to see if in fact I could or should cut back our budget in any way.
We currently spend about $600/month on food. Because there are six in our family, this means that we spend about $100/person/month. This divides into an average of $3.33/day/person, which means that it costs about $1.11 per person per meal.
I don’t think $1.11/meal/person is very expensive, but that’s just my opinion, and as I said earlier, it is a matter of perspective.
As always, remember that there is no comparing or guilt allowed. If you spend more than $1.11 per meal per person – great! If you spend less than that – great! If you could come help me clean my house – great! Oh wait, sorry. I got carried away there for a second. ;)
Above all, we all need to remember that we are all humble people, working to do the best we can with what we have. I feel like there’s a lot left unsaid in this post regarding the expense of healthy food, so stay tuned! In part two of this mini series on Wednesday, I’ll share thoughts on the following three points:
Then, I’ll wrap up the week by sharing some practical ways to eat a healthy, whole foods diet while keeping your costs low.
For today, I’d love to hear a little about your grocery budget break-down. Join my geekiness and do the math. If you care to share, how much do you estimate that it costs to feed one person in your household for each meal?
If you’re concerned that you may be spending too much on food,
I’d encourage you to read this post: Do You Need to Cut the Grocery Budget?I’d also like to encourage you to check out Once a Month Mom’s Get Real 2012!
Laura, if you find someone to take you up on cleaning your house, send them to mine when they’re finished ;)
I’m a little embarrassed that we spend so much on food…but I have been lumping the toiletries into it. We spend a lot less in the summer when the farmer’s market is in full swing.
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We have a family of 4 and I spend between $400 and $500 each month. We buy most everything in bulk, but we live up in the mountains which, as some have stated, is more expensive. I have a friend who spends $1200/mo for her family of 4; two of which are boys under 5!
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We spend about $500 per month on food for family of 4. We buy about 75% organic. We buy from Costco, Trader Joes, and Azure Standard. We don’t buy junk food like candy bars, chips, pre-portioned snacks, juice boxes, little cans of this, etc except special treats like maybe for a camping trip. Cutting this non-essential stuff from your groceries trips save tremendously.
Honestly, eating an organic, whole food diet cooking from scratch is tons cheaper than the old way of eating. And, the $500 per month still includes splurges like steak and shrimp.
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Way to much. but i am started to change the way. i cook and buy groceries. I was given a juicer and now i have problem with the kids getting there fruit,but vegetables are another story working on that to.
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I am so glad you are writing this series. This, the money factor, is one of the biggest reasons we don’t eat healthier. I also have a family of 6, and I spend more than you on our grocery bill! I’m so surprised, and very curious to see how you do it! I also appreciate your gracious tone. So often, health food people turn me off big time because they use it as an identity and a way to look down those of us who have chosen the “lower path” of potato chip consumption. thank you thank you thank you for grace and humility.
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jaime Reply:
January 24th, 2012 at 11:05 am
So true Laurie!!
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We spend about $300 per month for four people, which includes 2 teens. I do include toiletries and natural cleaning products in that category. I don’t include our dog’s food and other supplies. I grow a bit of my own vegetables and fruit, though I’d really like to try and do more. I take advantage of our local farmer’s market (it’s small but good) when it’s in season, I buy a mix of conventional and organic produce. I buy marked-down organic produce whenever I find good buys (last week it was about 7 pounds of organic apples for $3.49). I also buy from Vitacost and Amazon (the latter using Swagbucks earned gift cards and gift cards from some surveys/panels I do). It’s a juggle sometimes, but I think we’re doing okay. I should also note that our family is largely vegetarian (my son eats everything, my daughter is a vegetarian, and my husband and I eat some fish from time to time).
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I had to go into town today, because I never go that far I always stop by the health food store. I didn’t see raw milk but for a gallon of organic milk was 8.00 a gallon and lb of organic ground beef was 7.45. I can only shop at walmart and meijer but the only carry small section of organic. When they have farmer market in the summer. I buy all my fruit and vegetablethere. I get our beef from some friend and i end up paying 2.29lb.
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I love your perspective and encouragement! And, if you find someone to help you clean your house, would you see if they’d come my way too?
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We are just starting our transition from a full-time coupon family to a part-time coupon / full-time healthy eating family. Our grocery budget has been $350/month for the past year-and-a-half. That is for a family of 4 (2 of which are in diapers). That amount includes everything – food, all baby products, all toiletries, all cleaning supplies, etc…
When we first decided to make a switch and no longer buy processed foods, I wasn’t sure how it was going to work with our budget. After a lot of prayer and several days of working on our budget, I am happy to say that I have figured out a way to make it work – still using coupons on toiletries, cleaning supplies, pet products, baby products, and anything not considered “food”. We will be combining the following: a few coupons here and there, trips to Earth Fare and Whole Foods on occasion, joining a CSA, learning to can and preserve, and ordering some items from Azure Standard.
We have already started the process and can’t wait to see how everything works out!
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I just recently did a rough calculation, and in 2011 we averaged $5.50 NZD per meal for eight people. However, we have a cow and a large garden, which two things saved us approximately $4,000 NZD over the course of a year (compared to our first several months here, when we bought EVERYTHING out of the supermarket). I cook practically everything from scratch; all I buy in cans is baked beans, corn, mackerel, coconut milk, and occasionally tomatoes, for example.
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We spend $600/ month for me, my husband, and our 2.5yo daughter. When we lived in Oklahoma last year it was $400/ month. Now we live in Northern California and my husband has a better paying job, so we raised it. We’re comfortable with this. That number includes cleaning and hygiene products (but not diapers or menstrual pads) and all our supplements (and y’all know fermented cod liver oil is *expensive*!). I think we could cut that number down if we could buy our meats in bulk, but it’s just not an option at the moment. Oh, and we may have a slight chocolate chip addiction problem which doesn’t really help. :-)
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I budget $500 per month for 6 of us. The boys are 12, 12, 4, and 2. (I am pretty sure the 2yo out eats them all right now.) We were gifted a lot of beef for Christmas and I made payments on half of a pig that was being organically fed. SO, I am hoping that with that little boost we can start managing our food budget much like you do Laura. Meaning that some months we may spend a lot of money but others hardly anything. I buy wheat from a neighbor and grind my own flour, we have chickens for eggs and I am going to raise my own meat chickens this summer. We have a baby calf that will be our Milk Cow in another year and a half, so I will need to figure her food into our budget also at some point.
That being said, as far as dairy goes, I don’t by processed, but I don’t buy raw either because you just can’t find it here. I have shopped through Azure Standard and love it, but it is 2 1/2 hours to the drop now, so that isn’t feasible every month. My goal is to be as self sufficient as we can with our food. Growing as much of it as possible ourselves.
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I have no clue what we spend on groceries at this point in time. My husband has been taking care of most of the grocery shopping for us and we’ve been eating out 3 or more times a week. We aren’t really worried about what food costs us at this season of life.
Almost 9 weeks ago the children and I were in a head on collision. A man without a driver’s license or insurance came into our lane. Honestly we’re just happy that we’re all alive and that a few broken bones were the worst of our injuries. I am just recently physically able to stand long enough to make meals for us so I’ll be able to start making our meals from scratch again and hopefully get back to our $500 a month grocery budget that we previously had. With food prices always increasing though we may need to increase our budget. We are very blessed to be able to increase our food budget as needed.
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Thank you so much for your “geekiness!” I’ve been feeling a little guilty that our grocery budget has gone up now that I cook whole foods instead of couponing. Not to mention that I now have two smaller, but still very hungry mouths to feed! And I have a hard time explaining to my husband why our costs have gone up. But breaking it down into how much you’re spending per meal really puts it into perspective. I’m really not spending that much! In fact, if I stick to my budget of $160 every two weeks, plus $30 for my produce co-op ($350/mo. total), I’m spending less than $1 per person, per meal. (97 cents to be exact.) That seems super reasonable to me, especially considering that we pay way less on doc. bills because we hardly ever get sick.
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Just came across your site today and I’m glad I found it when I did! I am going to enjoy this series and look forward to seeing how I can incorporate better food choices into our menus. I do try to make most things from scratch, and I’m beginning more and more to stock up on bulk products to do this more fully. I need to sit down and crunch the numbers from this past month to see where our grocery budget goes. I feel like I can never quite keep it to what it should be, but most of the ‘extra’ goes to things like milk and produce, so I shouldn’t feel too badly about that. Looking forward to the rest of this series.
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