Saving On Meat & Fish

Meat Rule

Our family has a $1.50/lb. meat rule and we JUST decided to move that up from $1.00/lb.   Don't laugh.  We have two large freezers full of meat in our garage all purchased at $1.00 or less!  The secret here is knowing when your store clearances their meat for shelf life.  We live in a small town, so we frequent the Wal-Mart in our town regularly.  They mark their meat to incredible lows just before shelf expiration.  Now, this generally doesn't happen  with their fresh produce beef and chicken... but  we have purchased Jennie-O turkey, all brands of sausages, fish, packages of flash frozen boneless chicken breasts and many, many other  meat products for $1/lb. or less!  There are many times that there will be nothing, but watch for those signs.  When a deal is found, stock up!  As long as it will eventually get eaten, the more you buy, the more you save!  We recently purchased some great center sliced smoked ham for $1.00/lb. and, yes, we bought all we could.  We've even purchased Hillshire Farms Little Smokies for as little as 25 cents a package! 

The deals are out there, you just have to watch carefully and think outside the box.  Don't look at a package of Italian sausage clearanced at $1 a package and only buy three because that's all you think you'll ever eat.  Think about putting it in sauces, grilling it, putting it in pasta bakes, and using it for pizza topping.  Most meats we think of the way we generally eat them, but can be used in so many ways.  Think of new ways to expand your menu.

Save on Salmon

For salmon lovers, another thing to look for is whole frozen salmon.     They are cleaned, but you have to fillet them.  These run about $7 for 4/lb. but this is a seasonal item and since they're not big sellers, they often clearance.  Last year, we purchased about  20 of them because Wal-Mart had them marked down to $4.  That's $1/lb. salmon!!  Yes, I had to learn to fillet it.... but it wasn't that difficult and the savings couldn't be beat.  We enjoyed delicious grilled salmon all summer long. 

Frankly, even at the $7 price, this is a huge savings over the pretty prepackaged fresh salmon you find in the meat section and it's just as good.

Chicken for Less

It's always nice to see boneless skinless chicken breast go on sale, it's so versatile.  The truth of the matter is that what you're paying for is the convenience.  Bone in breast is often on sale.  Even after you factor in the weight of the bones, the price per pound is unmistakenly  incredibly less.  The solution for the frugal minded is, of course, to remove the skin and bones yourself.   Take a little time, and save that penny!  It really isn't all that time consuming or difficult.  I usually purchase a lot when I find something on sale, so I do all my skinning and deboning at one sitting, bag it up and throw it in the freezer.  I find I work much more efficiently if I'm on a roll doing the same thing over and over for a half hour or so.

Another great value in buying chicken is to purchase those large bags of leg quarters.  These are great with a shake and bake type of coating and thrown in the oven as well as cooked on the grill.  The price per pound is generally under 50 cents a pound!

Subsitute Ground Turkey for Beef

Another simple way to save on your grocery bill AND eat more healthy is to substitute ground turkey for beef.  Shopping just this morning, I found 82% lean Jennie-O ground turkey for $1.29 per pound while the 80% lean ground beef was as much as $3.23.    Our family happens to love ground turkey so we use it a lot.  If you're not  in love with it, use it for the dishes that the flavor differences are undetectable, such as taco meat or chili.  In anything where the meat is crumbled and highly seasoned, you'll never know the difference.  It's a very healthy and cost effective alternative over red meat.