Stretch Your Food Budget

Cost-saving tips from Healthy Kitchens, Healthy Lives

Physicians and other health professionals enjoyed delicious recipes and worked side by side with world-class chef educators at this year’s Healthy Kitchens, Healthy Lives, a leadership conference bridging nutrition science, healthcare, and the culinary arts and presented by the Culinary Institute of America (CIA) and Harvard Medical School at the CIA’s Greystone campus in St. Helena, California. Among the participants were Amy Myrdal Miller, MS, RD, author and a director at the CIA; and Suvir Saran, cookbook author, chef, and restaurateur, who offered these cost-saving ideas:

• When you’re planning menus, check the newspaper ads for foods that are on sale .

• Use coupons but only for items you really need.

• Use more whole foods as opposed to processed foods.

• Use leftovers in soups and for lunch.

• Stock up on staples that are on sale, including frozen foods.

• Compare store brands to national brands. They’re often less expensive.

• Shop for fresh produce in season. It’s usually the least expensive and the most tasty.

• Visit a local farmers’ market to get the best prices and freshest produce.

• Plant an herb garden. It doesn’t take much space and you can snip what you need.

• If you have room, consider planting a vegetable garden.

• Write menus for the week along with a corresponding grocery list.

• Shop once a week to save time and money.

• Never shop when you’re hungry.

For more information, visit www.healthykitchens.org.

— Brenda J. Ponichtera, RD