Why is healthy food soooo expensive?

TheMrWobbly

Went for lunch and, frugal as ever as money is always tight nowadays, went to the supermarket - weighed a conference pear, 70 pence for 1 pear, SEVENTY!!! I ventured to the ready meal aisle and compared a popular 'diet' brand to standard meals, sure the low fat option has less calories but then again it has 15% less content is twice the price and packed full of salt.

If I buy raw ingredients I will end up throwing half of them away before I get to use them so not any cheaper there either.

Almost every offer on the end of an aisle was bad stuff, cheese, pizzas, ice cream, biscuits, fizzy drinks. Come on supermarkets - give us a chance...

rjordison

I know it sucks, it makes it even harder to be good when all the healthy stuff is expensive and all the bad crap is thrown in our faces. With regards to your problem with the fresh food and throwing them out, try your local fruit and veg shop. We have a local farm shop who delivers individualized boxes of fruit and veg at very reasonable rates direct to your door. They are often cheaper too because you aren't buying the whole pack to only then chuck out the left overs.
If you are not able to do that, try using up your left over veg by cooking extra meals and freezing them, it's great when you can't be bothered to cook and the naughty urges to order takeaway creep in. Just take them out of the freezer in the morning and voila, just nuke it for dinner time! This really helps me save the pennies cooking and buying in bulk, also frees up time on an evening too.

Good luck on your quest to find a reasonably priced supermarket NOT charging the earth on healthy food.

junlex123

It's a pain in the *kitten*, especially if you live alone and can't buy non-frozen stuff in bulk without it going to waste. Dunno how big your supermarket is but definitely check the clearance sections; got a huge tesco on my doorstep and typically find fruit and veg at 50-75% off in the clearance section. Quite frequently find fish on clearance at 30-40% off too. Does mean a lot of small frequent trips rather than being able to do a weekly shop and be done with it though.

savouryduck

I cook in large batches and then freeze them into meal sized portions. I live alone and eat healthy foods for about £4-5 a day at most.

farway

Try local greengrocer, just buy looose what you need, and buy what is in season, pears are not.Try Waitrose or Morrisons calorie options, ignore the Weight watchers stuff

Morrison's and Lidl plus greengrocers and maybe other supermarkets have loose veg, there is no need to buy a lot, if you want one carrot, just buy that

TLwineguzzler

There's a lot of veg that you can buy in bulk and freeze in useable batches. Probably have to blanch them first. My husband brought home the biggest cauliflower I'd ever seen for 69p out of Aldi a few weeks ago - did us four meals!!

ricomincia

Greengrocers/ markets/ Famers market shops are usually better prices and quality than supermarkets from experience.

plantboy2

I do agree that supermarkets are the pedlars of obesity and encourage unhealthy choices in our population (as well as blanding our culture, taking money offshore and basically being b@stards)

But...

It is quick food that is expensive, not unhealthy food. You can feed yourself on next to nothing using dried pulses and fresh veg from a good greengrocers. I can make lunch for myself for a whole week on about £6:

Half a bag of bulgar wheat
Half a bunch of flat leaf parsley
One large tomato
One shallot
Half a cucumber
Glug of olive oil
Half a lemon
Salt, pepper
All = tub of tabouleh that will last for 5 days in the fridge

I can then cook up a load of turkey steaks and add one each day for protein.

The investment is spending an hour on Sunday night making it all....

I do a different thing each week - daal recipes, east asian bean recipes, middle eastern, etc. Beats the crap out of a sandwich.

TheMrWobbly

Really liking the ideas guys - changed my routine so I finish the gym and go to tesco at 'price-drop' time and getting plenty of salads and veg with the odd bonus of some meat (though IMHO most of the meat that gets reduced looks well past it). Going to try a few other suggestions as well mixed in.

TLwineguzzler

Really liking the ideas guys - changed my routine so I finish the gym and go to tesco at 'price-drop' time and getting plenty of salads and veg with the odd bonus of some meat (though IMHO most of the meat that gets reduced looks well past it). Going to try a few other suggestions as well mixed in.

I do that with Asda they seem to reduce a bit more than Tesco

cw106

today in the sun newspaper is a£5 off voucher when you spend £10 on meat at morrissons.easy to stock up freezer on proteins.

Savlona

Lidl, Aldi and Farmfoods are my friends, but I do cook for a family. Although the range of fresh stuff at farmfoods is limited, it's a good price - a sack of potatoes for £2.75, bags of 20 apples or pears for a pound and so on. Also a good range of frozen veg, fish and meat. We also get vouchers through the door from them regularly, making them even cheaper. Their giant bags of pasta are cheap too and I just use a 250 ml scoop to measure out portions to stop me cooking too much.
The super 6 at Aldi is good and Lidl often do good deals. Look out for coupons in the tabloids for them - MSE is a good place to check.
Certainly the frozen stuff, pasta and potatoes should store fine, even if you're just cooking for yourself. They have lots of weight watchers type ready meals too - not something I use (no snobbery, just that if I'm cooking for everyone else, I may as well join in), but you could stock your fridge with apples or pears, your freezer with ready meals and take them into work with you.

ChrisM8971

I would second using Lidl and Aldi as alternatives to the main stream supermarkets. They sell salad and vegetables at much lower prices than the mainstream ones and they sell many of them loose.

Meat is the problem for me because I think lean cuts tend to be expensive but once again Lidl often sell 1 Kg of chicken breasts for the same price as 5-600 g at the other supermarkets.

Also bulk out salads and other meals with pulses, cook up a batch of puy lentils using stock and add them to salad for fibre and some extra protein

Not sure why you would think that cheese is bad though?