(Happy Throwback Thursday! Given how expensive food has gotten lately, I thought a little shopping reminder would be in order. This piece, which originally ran on Feb. 7, 2021, is one in an occasional series of articles focusing on saving serious dough. A little background can be read here.)
The “locavore” movement is based on the idea of eating only foods grown within a 100-mile radius of where you live. I’ve got my own version, which I call being a “frugalvore.” It’s pretty simple: You shop mostly (or completely) based on what’s on sale that week.
This isn’t exactly a new idea. Plenty of people shop that way their whole lives. But it might be new to you if you grew up in a home where no one read the supermarket ads, created menus and then worked to get the most bang for each grocery buck.
Frugalvorism both simplifies and complicates your approach to eating. On the one hand, it’s easier to shop because you plan menus around that week’s most affordable foodstuffs.
However, if you’re the kind of person who always shopped by grabbing whatever looked good, then you’ll need to rethink your supermarket habits.
Fortunately, it’s fairly simple. Not always easy, but simple.