Concept : FOUR DOLLARS A DAY

Feeding a family on four dollars a day is more what it isn’t than it is what it is.   You can’t feed your family on four dollars a day, at least in the PNW, by purchasing a five dollar jar of tahini and a eggplant and calling it dinner.  I also isn’t too practical to go to the fresh food market year round and buy only fruits and veggies an a couple of eggs and eat .  Those things might work for a single person, but for a family, just plain food on a limited budget is a better fit.

Simplify, buy food at a rbp and in bulk when it makes sense and eat old fashioned regular food that has been updated to be less fat, sugar, salt, hydroginated oils, GMO’s and HFCS.

Its not a concept that is romantic enough to sell books, it is just what works.   It has worked for us for a lot of years.   Good basic food;  we have lived on it for years.  We buy fresh fruit and vegetables on season and when the costs are not prohibitive,

In order to make a four dollar a day budget work, you need to maintain a small stock of recipe ingredients that you have purchased at rbp.   By doing so, you always have food in the house and you are able to make a wide variety of things for meals.  Stick to versatile basics.   On another blog, I lost over 40 basic meals that you can make by averaging costs on four dollars a day and grow stock.  Now, we aren’t feeding a 17 yo linebacker.   We hiwever, have grown a stock enough that we are going on a no spend month,   That means, I’m only buying exactly something we need to complete a meal and fresh perishables.  I’ll take you along,   I generously stocked us in fresh fruit and veggies,   I bought milk, but no sour cream or cottage cheese.  We have eggs and dehydrated eggs,   It’s a game.  We need to eat down the pantry and get ready for the new crop to come in.  The sales on frozen and canned vegetables will be hitting sometime September or October probably would be my best guess.

Studies have shown that your life expectancy diminishes if you have to worry about where the next meal is coming from.  I hate to see any child go through that.

Basics:

• Keep celery, carrots  (whole) radishes, lettuce and tomatoes when they are a realistic price.
• Frozen veggies go on sale for a buck a pound at times,   Stock on corn, green beans, peas, peas and carrots, and mixes vegetables, providing your family eats them  
• Buy protein that is low in cost ( my benchmark is an average of 2.00 a pound for meat.  Buy it in a rotation basis when it is at your buy price,  here, we can get chicken for 1.00 a pound at times, also pork loin for between 1.00 and 1.69.   Hamburger is more, but we only eat it once a week.   Pinto beans are .67 a pound when you buy a 1.5 pound bag at the DT.  They are cheaper by about a dime at Costco, but you have to buy too much for our family of four that eats beans.  I want to pay between 2.00 and 2.50 a pound for cheese.  There is supposed to be a glut  of milk in the country but , surprisingly, cheese is as much as 4.00 a pound.  Eggs are cheap now.  
• Buy vegetables and fruit in season on sale.  No surprises here, we have done that for years, 
• Buy your dairy when it is on sale,   Most of the dairy has a month or so pull date.  Buy the months worth, being careful not to overbuy   You can get a good idea of what and how much you will use,   If you are approaching pull dates, make a concentrated effort to use it up.  Make pudding.  Make a lasagna type  dish, butter can be frozen.   Yogurt can be out in muffins. Google the item in the on line Betty Crocker cookbook. It is free. 
• Pasta sauce is cheaper than making it from scratch,   Buy it on sale and watch for sales and Ibotta.  I got it for .50 the other day   
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• Diced tomatoes are a versatile tomato.  Instead of keeping a stock of a zillion different types of tomatoes, buy just the diced ones.   They can be used in nachos, in salsa in a pinch, and of you need tomato sauce, just put them in a blender or food processer.   
• Canned vegetables are a good back up.   They are the cheapest in the fall, buy I can usually get them cheapest at the discount type  stores.   (Winco here).   Consider buying a case or two depending on your family size.   I usually juice just get green beans and corn.
• Making your own mixes cuts costs dramatically. Baking mix, muffin mix, cream soup mix, white sauce mix, seasoned rice mix. 
• Buy pasta , the best quality you can find when you find it at a dollar or less.  Pasta has an 8 year shelf life.  Its better to use it before that time  but don’t hesitate to buy in bulk if you can .  
• It is a very versatile ingredient that stretches a buck.  
• Remember that in order to feed your family on  four dollars a day, you need to eat on less than four dollars a day so that you can buy enough ingredients.  Just because your meal costs four dollars, it doesn’t cover the staples you use on a regular basis or the fact that you can’t buy 2 tablespoons on an ingredient.    
• Good basic food bought at a rock bottom price.   Try to keep a four to six week supply of things you use on a regular basis.   That means that, for instance, if you eat beef once a week, you need to have enough beef for 4-6 meals.  Things like mayonnaise , and mustard, ketchup, I keep one ahead,  I don’t want to drop everything if I am out of mayo and I’m making a pasta 
• salad.  
• You can eat well on four dollars  a day by shopping wisely and taking advantage of any bargain you see.  You, however, can’t buy your food at the Big bucks food store.   
• Shop two stores a week,  that gives you the best of two worlds.   You get a better access to good produce cheap.   
• Learn to scratch cook efficiently.  Buy yourself good tools when you can.   

I hope these ideas help you to your journey,   Don’t try to incorporate all of them at the same time.  You will burn out,  this has happened for us over time and a lot of trials and tribulations,   Take one step at a time.   I’ve tried to give you the best ideas and not share my disasters.