Combating the High Price of Food Step Three: Sales, Loss Leaders, and the Weekly Menu Plan

So, let's review. So far we have Taken Stock of Our Kitchen and Created a Master Menu List. Now we're ready to move onto a Weekly Menu Plan that will take all the stress out of what to have for dinner.

A great time to create a Weekly Menu Plan is the day your grocery store sale flyers come out. Why? Because you can make your budget stretch farther by planning your meals around what's on sale.

Chicken breasts are on sale? It's a great week for us to have chicken fajitas and chicken and rice. Ground beef or ground turkey is a good buy? Meatloaf and spaghetti get added to our weekly menu. This same process applies to sides dishes and breakfast, lunch, and snack items.

And don't ignore those loss leaders. A loss leader is a "super sale" of sorts that a store uses to pull customers in. The store breaks even or even loses money on the sale in the expectation that they'll make it up on the other things you buy. If you notice a "super sale" you'll not only want to add it to your menu that week, but perhaps stock up for future weeks as well.

If you'd like some menu ideas or a little extra accountability, Laura at I'm an Organizing Junkie hosts a weekly Menu Plan Monday roundup each week. It's worth checking out.

So let the arrival of those weekly sale flyers serve as a reminder for you to plan menus for the upcoming week. You'll relieve your stress and save money at the same time!

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