<Mitch@...> wrote in message
>
> I have a family of 5, and my food budget is $500/month. That includes
> the kids' school lunch tickets. I've never gone over that.

Some of this is age dependant (younger kids just do not eat as much) and
some is the area (food costs vary).

> I'm pretty good about stocking up when things go on sale.
> I also make large batches and freeze things. I use coupons when I
> can.

I'd hazard a guess that you mostly use fresh produce and not too much of the
convience processed things. I'm the same way. When I walk out of a grocery
store stateside, it's with 100-125$ worth of food that will do us 3 for 2
weeks easy. In Sasebo Japan (just moved back 20 days ago) it was pretty
much the same but the products gotten just changed from seafoods (much
cheaper there than here) to other meat cuts. I still get lots of fish now
though and am having salmon fillets for dinner, while last night was
catfish.

I'd guess that I use probably even less convienece foods than you do and
this is where the difference mostly is. I do price shop for the lower
costs, but I dont just get the cheapest thing as sometimes there's a health
or taste difference we want in another brand. Coupons? I use them but
learned the trap of them too. They can make you think you are saving money
when in reality, even witht he coupon the item is more expensive than
another brand you like as well. Also can lead to impulse shopping for
things you don't really like that much or wouldnt buy as often.

> My brother and his wife, no kids, spend $500 a WEEK for the two of
> them.

What do they do? Eat out every day? Thats 71$ a day and something like 23$
per meal!

Sample: Last night's meal

1/4 cup butter- price save club used to get the butter in large lots, 1 lb
was abut 1.75$- about 21cents
1/2 a green pepper- 30cents?
1/3 medium onion - 8 cents?
2/3 lb catfish at 2.99lb (2$) (you probably eat more meat that we do so
calculate up if desired)

2 packs ramen noodle (kid loves it, we dont mind it either)- 20cents

2 ears corn- 50 cents

2 cups steamed bok choy cabbage (25cents?)

3.54$ if I added right? Multiply a cost like that for 2 weeks and you get
17.54$ (smile). If 3 meals a day cost the same price, yiou get 52.62$ but
we also have those other things like laundry detergent, toilet paper and
such to factor in like everone else. And yeah, some other things slip in
easy enough like mini-boxes of raisins for Charlotte's school lunch or Don
and i get a hankering for T-bone.

Now match that with hamburger helper. 2.59$ for the box and just about the
same for the meat. Oh I'm not perfect, I have a few of those on hand
because we like the zesty tialian one. We also like the chicken helper (we
add a few things to make it even better). But mostly f I want a
pasta-ground beef thing, I use a recipe thats like the box but with a 50cent
gravey package, a few extra seasonings, and some dried pasta. Done that
way, you are looking at 50-75cents for equal to the 'box', plus the meat
cost.

xxcarol