How to eat healthy in a cost-conscious world
Without question, the cost of living is through the roof. This increases household expenditure and stress. I have written in the past about the importance of doing a ‘cashflow analysis’ (still hate the word ‘budget’), check my website for this blog. However, one area of expenditure that is continuing to increase (aside from fuel), is food. The temptation is to look for ‘cheap’ alternatives which often leads to highly processed foods that come in a packet or a can.
If you sacrifice your nutrition, you will begin to impact your health and wellbeing. This in turn can lead to things like:
- Increased sickness/illness due to reduced consumption of basic nutrients and minerals
- Increase in body weight (weight gain)
- Headaches and tiredness
- Inability to concentrate
- Long term health problems if this way of eating is maintained
So here are a few hacks to eating healthy without breaking the bank:
- Only eat in season fruit and veg. This should be in abundance and with increased supply, the price should remain lower then when out of season and the items needs to be sourced from interstate, or worse still, overseas.
- Shop for your fruit and veg at farmers markets. Let’s cut out the middleman and go direct to the grower. Farmers markets will supply well priced organic fruit and veg (that is in season)
- When walking down your shopping isle, look up and down. ???? The companies that pay the most to have prime spot on the shelves will be positioned at eye height. Look for alternative brands that are stocked higher up, or lower down.
- Meal prep is a great way to cut the cost of your weekly lunches. Buy in bulk and set aside some time on a Sunday night to prepare the meals for the week. Or freeze the meals and use them at dinner time.
- Buy your meat in bulk. Locate a farm that sells portions of beef (you can also source bulk pork). Buy a ¼, ½ or if you have a big enough freezer, buy a whole cow. Look for grass fed, grass finished and no antibiotics. Cuts the cost of meal by half.
- Don’t be wasteful. When foods like berries and bananas are getting a little ‘over ripe’, freeze them and use for cooking or smoothies.
Go back to how our parents and their parents used to eat. Times have been tough for other generations, but they ate well and cheap. They were not reliant on smashed avocado, Uber Eats and almond lattes.
