Revised: Cheap Eating with Cost-Per-Serving

I've seen a lot of worry-worting and grumbling around the blogosphere and chatrooms about global food inflation, and people wanting to know what we can do about it. The fact that people are crying about it tells me that they're not aware of basic frugal food principles, like cost per serving. Rather than lecture anew, I dug through the archives, found this, brushed the dust off, and updated it a little.
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The basic premise: to lower cost per serving of the foods you eat. Start by reducing your initial food costs—make and use a price book if you don’t already.

By buying and eating more carefully, you're taken a major step toward lowering overall cost of food and health care by boosting nutrition—this leads to lower incidences of sickness.

Using the Food Guide Pyramid info as reference, determine how much of what foods constitute a serving, and then calculate how much each serving costs. For example, let’s say you've just bought a 2 pound bag of brown rice for $1.29--that's 65¢/lb. dry cost.

$1.29 (price) divided by 2 (dry weight in pounds) = 65¢

Next, you determine the amount of cooked rice that equals 1 serving (1/2 cup according to the Pyramid). A 2 lb. bag of rice contains 4 cups uncooked rice, and 1 dry measure cup = 8 oz. or 1/2 lb., so each dry cup is worth 32¢.

$1.29 (price) divided by 4 (cups in dry measure) = 32¢

Since rice doubles in size, you'd only have to cook 1/4 c. dry rice to get the 1/2 cup serving size, which will now cost you only 16¢ per serving, since you now need half the amount of dry rice.

$1.29 (price) divided by 8 (cups in cooked measure) = 16¢

Even if you dumped the ENTIRE BAG into the pot, you would get 8 cups of cooked rice for $1.29 and 16¢ per serving--enough to feed many people 1/2 cup at a time, or measure 1/2 cup portions times the number of people you regularly feed, then freeze in zippy bags or food storage containers. Now, all you need to do is thaw your next side dish—the cooking’s done!

Hint: rice freezes well, so go ahead and cook the entire bag. The same cost-per-serving principle applies to pasta, beans, oatmeal, and other dried foods as well, but of these, only beans and rice freeze well.

Portion size is our problem here in America--we eat too much per serving! By measuring out the portion size and calculating out the cost per portion, the cost of feeding goes down DRAMATICALLY. This enables you to know your costs per meal, and to eat for a heck of a lot less than you are now. You certainly don't have to live on beans, rice, and pasta to do it, either. This is what home economics was all about once upon a time.

For meats, there is a little different strategy: you need to determine the actual amount of meat versus bones and fat. A quickie overview—one serving equals 3 oz. or approximately the size of a deck of cards, and we should have two servings per day, according to the Food Guide Pyramid. This means:

For meat with no bone or fat = allow 4 to 5 servings per pound

For meat with little bone or fat = 3 to 4 servings per pound

For meat with medium bone or fat (like a chuck blade steak) = allow 2 to 3 servings per pound

For meat with a large amount of bone or fat (like a turkey) = allow 1 to 2 servings per pound

Meats with no bone or fat (boneless/skinless) tend to cost more, with the possible exception of ground beef. However, there's less waste, so you get more servings per pound of actual meat. Holiday turkeys, whole chickens, and other meats with hollow centers are the absolute worst purchases for cost-per-serving, because those hollow centers are essentially waste—when bought frozen, those cavities collect frozen water, making your purchase by weight more expensive. Why pay for ice? If those cavities were full of solid meat, they’d be a better buy. Suggestion: you might want to re-think your holiday meat purchases and switch to turkey thighs instead—one bone, lots of meat per piece, and little waste.

As for bony meats commonly used as meal-stretchers: chicken wings, legs, backs, and so forth—too much bone and too little meat equals a terrible cost-per-serving buy, no matter how cheap the price. If you were to strip the meat off these pieces and actually weigh it, you’d see that you paid way too much per pound AND per serving for that little bit of actual useable meat. For soups and stews, you’re better off using one whole boneless chicken thigh, diced, than several smaller, bonier parts (or a carcass) for the meat to boil away from. The amount in waste (bones) is greater than the amount in meat—this is not a bargain!

To make your 3 oz. "deck of cards" serving go further, try chopping, shredding, or grinding your meat. Go half-and-half with some beans. Also, 1/4 c. of nuts counts as a protein serving, as well as 1/4 cup of reconstituted TVP.

Did anyone learn this stuff in Home Ec class? I certainly didn't. Our class focused on learning to use that newfangled microwave thingy. This is what we should’ve been learning instead.

Ideas for $1-a-plate (or less) meals: try Taste of Home magazine—they have a regular section devoted to developing bargain meals. Other sources for inexpensive meals:

USDA’s Thrifty Meals online cookbook

The WIC Learning Center, which contains links for a hurricane/disaster cookbook, healthy and economical native and commodity foods, spices, plus multiple links for thrifty meal recipes.

The Lean Plate Club, a WA Post column written by Sallie Squires contains this article about experimenting with food stamp dollar allowances—could her family of four live on food stamps if they had to? See how she shopped and what she bought.

Then there’s my solution: shorten the shopping list. Buy smaller quantities of higher-quality nutrient-dense foods rather than relying on cheap starchy filler foods to get by, and sticking to recommended serving sizes rather than a cover-your-plate meal serving. I also drink iced tea, which is cheaper per gallon than milk. I’m allergic to dairy, and get my calcium from supplements and from spinach in my salads.

These will give you ideas on how to assemble inexpensive cost-per-serving foods into meals fit for a budget plate.