I bought groceries on Friday night – mostly frozen veggies, fresh meat (ground beef, pork chops, tuna, and steak), and some misc items like milk and corn tortillas.  The total was $53 which I felt pretty good about.  But how far does that go, pledging not to eat out at all?  I’m not going to do something like this every day, but I’m curious about how much it cost me to eat today.  My meals:

Breakfast – 3 eggs (50 cents), 2 slices of toast (15 cents?), coffee with sugar & creamer ($1.25) = $1.90
Lunch: 1/3 steak ($3), carrots (50 cents), black eye peas (50 cents), banana (50 cents), milk (75 cents) = $5.25
S: peach yogurt (75 cents), frosted flakes cereal (35 cents) = $1.10
D: leftovers from earlier – steak ($3), carrots (50 cents), black eye peas (50 cents), milk ($1.00), 1 slice of toast (10 cents) = $5.10

Total Cost to eat for the day = approx $8.35

The way I calculated these costs (which are approximate) is based on the total cost of the item times the fraction I used/ate for my meal.  For example, a dozen eggs is about $2.00.  Divided by 12, gives you about 17 cents per egg.  Multiply by 3 eggs for my breakfast, and you get 50 cents.  

So in an entire day, for 3 full (yummy) meals and snacks, I almost spent less than I would have for a meal at Sonic.  And just imagine the caloric difference!  So, just for fun, let’s do this..

$8.35/day x 7 days/week = $58.54/week in food cost.  So for a month I’m looking at about $235 in groceries.  Since I haven’t kept very good tabs on my monthly grocery expenses, I’m not really sure how this stacks up.  But I do know it’s wayyyy better than the cost of eating out!

I feel a little more motivated – hope you do too!

-Becca