Yah, I am definitely not giving up on my health. You only get one body and better take care of it. I let myself get too caught up in work and was a bit disgusted with spending so much money on food

I'm back to working out (3x a week, 2x a week cardio) and my wife and I are trying to make a weekly meal plan and stick to it.

And, we just started our own veggie garden today. Tomorrow we need some more soil, peat moss, vermiculite and compost to get the raised bed setup properly.

I personally think that fruits are probably the best thing to buy organic. So many pesticides and such used. I wish I could grow peaches in my backyard... that's my favorite fruit!

ps - starting to really like this forum.

To keep things affordable, I really suggest you shop around. I don't know how the stores work (nor what the dollar is to the CAD), but we shop around a lot, between Henry's (now Whole Foods......darn it!), Trader Joe's and Whole Foods. Everything we can't get at Trader Joe's we go to Whole Foods and then Henry's (smaller selection, a little more expensive than Trader Joe's). We end up spending about $250 to $300 a month on grocieries (and under $100 for eating out).

But that amount for groceries doesn't include the CSA Our CSA is a flat $26 per large box, payable every quarter. See if you can find one that's reasonable throughout the year. Though 750 through the summer doesn't seem TOO horrible....I guess that would depend on what you think you would spend going to the store....but keep in mind all the produce that you will be forced to eat from the CSA that you would never have bought! And how much more nutritious it is.... Oh that red chard we had tasted wonderful, and we never would have thought to buy it!

One more thing...on organic meat, we just started buying organic dark turkey meat. (We get the dark because it is the only one not previously frozen) It is significantly cheaper than organic beef and is quite flavorful. I think the spaghetti that we made a week ago with the turkey was the best I've just about ever had....

Good luck finding ways to make healthy eating cheaper I know how hard it is (I also have diabetes, and so have specific needs....protein all the time!)

Natch

We buy from the local farmer's market every weekend, plus with our own garden, and we have a trader joe's nearby, so that pretty much covers our veggie needs. I don't budget that much for food, so we tend to stick with normal chicken, though it will be nice when we can afford free-range.

I spotted this list http://www.foodnews.org/methodology.php a year or two ago and try to mostly buy organics from the "most contaminated" and traditional/cheap from the "least contaminated."

Most Contaminated: peaches, apples, nectarines, strawberries, pears, imported grapes, Sweet bell peppers, celery, spinach, lettuce, and potatoes.
Lease Contaminated: onions, sweet corn, asparagus, sweet peas, cabbage and broccoli, avocados, pineapples, mangoes, kiwi, bananas, and papaya.

In my world, that means apples and peaches are ALWAYS organic, but I don't worry much about mangos or avocado. And in our local "farmer's market" (think warehouse supermarket of awesome food) they only sell organic bananas, for about $0.05 more per pound than the regular grocery store sells conventional bananas, so I buy those organic even though they're low-risk.

For items on neither list, it depends on the price & availability of each, and on whether I think my toddler will be eating a lot or only a little bit of the food in question.

Thanks Natch... I have a similar rotating shopping system. We hit the asian market about twice a week, costco twice a month and the save on foods whenever the asian market is out of something.

Hopefully this year our garden can provide some extra veggies... I just spent the whole day turning our clay and rocks into a real growing medium

Just as a quick side "Natch" is a sound (well, typed phrase...) of general dislike or disgust that I make! Not my name Wow.....
(My name is Jamie, but my user name is almost always Jely520, or some form of it....gotta love u/n's made in middle school!)

~Jamie

Hahaha, well thanks for clarifying. I've never heard the name natch before but hey, I don't discriminate either way

Shane