Keeper of our Home - Rising food costs and keeping to one's budget Part1

Keeper of our Home

Apr. 12, 2008

Rising food costs and keeping to one's budget Part1

Over the next few posts I aim to cover some ways we cope with the rising food costs and our budget.

I'll start with breakfast. The children and I all eat oatmeal for breakfast 6 days of the week. On Sundays the older children eat cold cereal and milk as a treat. I still like my hot bowl of oatmeal, so I have it on Sundays too, as well as my 4 yr old and baby daughter.

So from Mon- Sat we eat hot oatmeal. My daughter soaks 2 cups of oatmeal with 6-7 cups of water the night before and then just cooks it up in the morning. We add a little milk and brown sugar- yum! This costs us 5-7c per serving! ( depending on the price of the oatmeal)

We drink a glass of juice every morning also, and my hubby eats fruit for breakfast, which I buy from the orchard at the moment. We have stewed fruit on Sunday mornings with our breakfast. I have stewed up enough for a year and it's all in our freezer ready to use.I bought the fruit from the orchard for 40c per kg.

Cost for the week:

Oatmeal $2.60
Cold cereal 70c
Stewed fruit ( Sundays only) 20c
Brown sugar $1
Milk $2.50
Juice $4.50
Fruit for hubby each day 70c

Total: 12.20 approx divided by 7 days= $1.75 per breakfast.

$1.75 divided by 8 people= 21-22c per person for breakfast each day.

Now, if we didn't drink juice our breakfasts would be quite a lot cheaper, but we like our juice!

If we ate cold cereal and milk every morning I think our costs would be quite a lot higher. If we ate weetbix every morning we would need 1 1/2 large boxes @ about $7-8 and then 10 litres of milk $25. So just for cereal and milk it would cost us $32-33 alone. We would be closer to the $40 mark for our week's worth of breakfasts, so $5 per person per week as opposed to $1.50 per person per week.

By not eating cold cereal every day we save $20 per week which is quite a big saving.This amounts to $1,000 per year! This is one area that you could save some $$$ if you're trying to cut back and cope with the rising food costs. What would you do with that extra $1,000!!

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Comments

Apr. 27, 2008 - Untitled Comment

Posted by Anonymous

We have also switched to eating oatmeal at 5 breakfasts of the week - what a huge savings!! We had been spending about £60 or so on cereal and milk per month - oatmeal breaky only costs us £10 for the month. That equals huge savings of £50 per month for us. Milk has gone up £0.10 per litre here in the last year. It all adds up so fast! - Naomi

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Apr. 28, 2008 - Oatmeal Savings!

Posted by happyathome

GREAT job Naomi!

I love my oatmeal!

What are you planning to do with all your savings?

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Apr. 30, 2008 - Thanks for this!

Posted by praiseherinthegates

Dear G,
Thanks for the information, and the series! Good for you this is just wonderful.

Blessings,
Rebecca ~Momto85boys3girls

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I love being a stay at home mum with our six beautiful children from the Lord. Each day we strive to live faithfully for Him in thankfulness for His gift of full and free salvation.