Is Healthy Food Really More Expensive?

For me its cheaper too. SERIOUSLY cheaper. no more $20 meals from pizza joints or mcdonalds. I mean really, a cut of lean meat, a baked potato and some greens, prepped at home is gonna cost you like 3 bucks, waaaaayyy less if you shop carefully. Come on, people who say its too expensive are looking for an excuse.

where do you shop???

I would LOVE to find a place where I could get a lean cut of meat for $3! ~smiling~

Is 97% fat free ground beef even that cheap?

I do think that when you compare eating healthy to eating out, you are going to be about equal!

I did have a Shrimp Boil this weekend that fed like 10 people that didnt cost too much and I consider it VERY healthy -

2lbs of jumbo shrimp $10
3lbs of medium shrimp $12
2lbs of medium scallops $10
5lbs of red potatoes $3
16 Ears of Corn $4
Seasoning $5

And it was MOST delicious!

Now if I wouldnt of put so much seasoning in it, I wouldn't of had to drink so much beer!

For me its cheaper too. SERIOUSLY cheaper. no more $20 meals from pizza joints or mcdonalds. I mean really, a cut of lean meat, a baked potato and some greens, prepped at home is gonna cost you like 3 bucks, waaaaayyy less if you shop carefully. Come on, people who say its too expensive are looking for an excuse.

where do you shop???

I would LOVE to find a place where I could get a lean cut of meat for $3! ~smiling~

Is 97% fat free ground beef even that cheap?

I do think that when you compare eating healthy to eating out, you are going to be about equal!

I did have a Shrimp Boil this weekend that fed like 10 people that didnt cost too much and I consider it VERY healthy -

2lbs of jumbo shrimp $10
3lbs of medium shrimp $12
5lbs of red potatoes $3
16 Ears of Corn $4
Seasoning $5

And it was MOST delicious!

Now if I wouldnt of put so much seasoning in it, I would of had to drink so much beer!

:laugh:

Well, I can see that it would be cheaper to eat healthy if you ate out alot pre-diet. But my family has always eaten out only once or twice a year! Therefore, going from enriched pastas, rice and flour, to whole grains, and from processed meat to fresh is way more expensive for us. Look at the dairy alone. Fat free cheese is at least a dollar more per package than full fat. A gallon of 1% milk is 3.67 while a half gallon of soy milk is over four dollars. Full fat margarine is at least a dollar cheaper than light. Olive oil! OMG! I think it all depends on your prior situation, and just how astronomically you were spending before. We've always been on a shoestring. Used to be a box of mac and cheese was a lifesaver at 44 cents

My family also never ate more than a bag of chips a week, and I've always done my own baking as well. So yes, it definitely depends!

Everyone who buys in bulk needs to break down how many meals they are getting out of their shopping, it may cost hundreds of dollars in a month or a week, but do those groceries last the entire month, maybe more? The initial cost of buying in bulk equals out over time.

But only if you can keep it fresh and/or eat it fast enough!

Bulk shaves pennies off here and there, but can sometimes hurt you if you dont do it right!

Personally, when I was eating crap food and adding chips and cookies to my grocery cart, at 4 bucks a pop, they added up. Now fruits and veggies are typically around 1.50 or 2 dollars a lb. But then again its only 2 people eating here, those lbs of fruits and veggies probably add up for a full family.
But also, eating boxed mac and cheese and hot dogs, as some one said before, was WAY cheaper than buying cuts of meat. But frozen processed food was very expensive as well.

In the end, my grocery bill is much less than what it used to be, now that I dont buy any processed meats or chips and snacks. I buy in bulk and freeze what I get into individual portions usually. I also buy my meat from a meat market / butcher now, prices are usually a buck or two less than at the grocery stores.

People also need to consider geographic location, shipping costs are going to affect certain foods. Living in the middle of the US and buying fish is going to be a lot more expensive than on the coast. Same goes for buying oranges and other fruits in the north.
My grandmother for years has shaved a lot off her bill by doing her own gardening of tomato, green beans, zucchini, squash, pumpkins, cucumbers and more. Its all in what you have and what you do with it.

I vote... more expensive... :huh:

What I find that what makes eating healthy most expensive is that fact that the best food for you is perishable... therefore it doesn't last very long. :frown: We often have to throw out food that's gone bad... i hate to even admit that out loud!!! :noway:

It is nice to think that we can make our own pasta, breads, meats, cut up your own fruits, veggies, etc. However, I hardly have enough time in the day to workout. :ohwell: I try not to be negative though... I once heard someone say "You pay now or you pay later!". :happy: I stand by that b/c I believe it!

All in all, I find that whether I am eating out or eating in... eating healthy IS more expensive... at least for me it is. :embarassed: BUT it's a sacrifice I'm willing to put in my budget if it means living a healthier, longer life.

KB

We've saved loads of money since we started eating healthy.

For one, we're eating less--instead of 3 pork chops a piece (yes, you heard me right!) at a meal, we eat 1 a piece. Instead of a whole huge steak a piece, we split one.

We've always saved about $200 or more a month by cutting back on not eating out anymore. The food all tastes so salty and blah! to me now that we only eat out about 2x a month instead of the 3-4x a week that we had been.

So my vote--LOADS CHEAPER!

We spend $200 a month to feed the two of us and our son, and we eat organically when possible. I've also got it down to a science on what we use, what we're not going to use, what we can spend our money on, etc. It took us a while to get our system down of what we use and what gets thrown away, etc. It just takes some time to figure out how to push your budget where it's supposed to go. We have to take advantage of sales, etc. But when you only have $200 a month to spend on groceries, you have to figure out how to eat healthy on that amount of money, and I've figured it out, at least for us.
Also, we spent a LOT more money on food when we were both eating crap all the time, because the stuff we bought went so quickly. I also make all of our bread, pasta, etc. from scratch, and that saves us a bit of money too. And I think it tastes better.

Wow...share your secrets...please! I know I could cut my bill down. Mine includes household items as well, laundry detergent, shampoo, cleaning supplies,etc. I would be absolutely ecstatic to get under $500

Well, making bread and pasta and things like that helps a lot. I like to do that because then I know that we're getting true whole grain bread, and I KNOW what went into it. We eat a lot of pasta with fresh tomatoes. We're also lucky, because my stepdad is a crazy gardening machine, so we get about half of his harvest, because they can't eat all of the stuff he plants. So we always have fresh produce during the summer, and I can or freeze a lot of stuff to tide us over the winter and spring. I also buy a lot of big bulk packages of meat and then individually freeze them into portions. That helps a lot too. A big family-size box of brown rice will last us a whole month, and it's really filling.
Oh, and I wasn't including household items. Those cost quite a bit during the month. With an 11-month old, we do a LOT of laundry. :bigsmile:

So essentially what you're saying is that you're getting free veggies.
And you weren't including household items.

So it really costs about 300+ or so a month for food (give or take cause I don't know what your family eats in terms of veggies).

It goes both ways, definitely my grocery store bill is WAY higher. As people on here said, the lower fat, sugar free, etc stuff costs more. Leaner cuts of meat, more money than the plain old hamburger for 1.19/lb. Since I have made the healthy lifestyle change, we only eat out maybe once or twice a month whereas before it was 2-3x/wk. So that saves a LOT there. We probably average out to about the same in the long run.

We spend $200 a month to feed the two of us and our son, and we eat organically when possible. I've also got it down to a science on what we use, what we're not going to use, what we can spend our money on, etc. It took us a while to get our system down of what we use and what gets thrown away, etc. It just takes some time to figure out how to push your budget where it's supposed to go. We have to take advantage of sales, etc. But when you only have $200 a month to spend on groceries, you have to figure out how to eat healthy on that amount of money, and I've figured it out, at least for us.
Also, we spent a LOT more money on food when we were both eating crap all the time, because the stuff we bought went so quickly. I also make all of our bread, pasta, etc. from scratch, and that saves us a bit of money too. And I think it tastes better.

Wow...share your secrets...please! I know I could cut my bill down. Mine includes household items as well, laundry detergent, shampoo, cleaning supplies,etc. I would be absolutely ecstatic to get under $500

Well, making bread and pasta and things like that helps a lot. I like to do that because then I know that we're getting true whole grain bread, and I KNOW what went into it. We eat a lot of pasta with fresh tomatoes. We're also lucky, because my stepdad is a crazy gardening machine, so we get about half of his harvest, because they can't eat all of the stuff he plants. So we always have fresh produce during the summer, and I can or freeze a lot of stuff to tide us over the winter and spring. I also buy a lot of big bulk packages of meat and then individually freeze them into portions. That helps a lot too. A big family-size box of brown rice will last us a whole month, and it's really filling.
Oh, and I wasn't including household items. Those cost quite a bit during the month. With an 11-month old, we do a LOT of laundry. :bigsmile:

So essentially what you're saying is that you're getting free veggies.
And you weren't including household items.

So it really costs about 300+ or so a month for food (give or take cause I don't know what your family eats in terms of veggies).

It costs what I said it costs. The question was asked whether it was cheaper for us to eat healthy, and I stated my story that it was. Yeah, it's great for us because my stepdad gardens, but if he didn't, we would, and it would still be cheaper for us.