Cheap Grocery
The secret of being a successful credit crunch beater is to find ways of actually enjoying saving money. My first handy tip is a perfect example of this. Now is the time to make use of all those celebrity chef cook books that have barely been opened since they were given to you last Christmas, or some other distant Christmas past. Also, this really is a tip in which no suffering whatsoever is involved. In fact the quality of your life will be greatly enriched once you abandon the microwave in favour of the oven and begin shopping for food in a more imaginative way.This is also the first of my tips in which you can benefit both yourself and the community. So not only will you feel that you’ve improved the quality of your life and saved some money, you’ll also get that unbeatable glow of self-satisfaction that only comes from depriving your local multinational superstore of some of your hard earned cash. I’m of course talking about visiting local markets and independent shops.
The first objection to this piece of advice is usually that local markets and shops charge more. Well, you might be pleasantly surprised. The giant supermarkets are extremely cunning in how they price their food. For example, you may be able to get tinned and processed foods for less, but if you actually compare the price of fresh fruit and vegetables with a local market supplier, guess who comes out on top. My theory on this is that the cunning supermarkets have worked out that consumers are less likely to make price comparisons with loose fruit and vegetables (it’s too much like hard work) then they are with, say, the price of a can of baked beans. They’ll win you over with cheap-as-chips, chips, but then catch you out with really pricey potatoes.
And your local market is a far more life-affirming environment: there’s no clever advertising trying to make you buy crap, just ruddy-faced old blokes shouting “Get your tomatoes here!!”
So after your refreshingly straight-forward trip to the market, you’ve got home with two bulging bags of fresh veg, meat, fish, or whatever gloriously unpackaged, uncooked, un-messed-up food you fancy, so now all you’ve got to do is make it edible.
This isn’t a cookery website, but I am a pretty damn good cook, so I will just point out that even the most unprepossessing bag of nobly veggies can be turned into the most delicious heart-warming soup with the minimum of effort, without you even having to open those still unopened cook books. Once you’ve fried some onions and garlic, half fill the large saucepan with water, added chopped-up veg and a stock cube or two, boiled for half an hour, thickened with corn flour, and then seasoned to taste, you’ll have a healthy, rich soup which will make the tinned stuff taste like, well, tinned stuff..
OK, so that’s not a recipe – it wasn’t meant to be – it was just meant to give you some idea of how easy this cookery business can be. But the real joy of this whole experience will be how much satisfaction you’ll get from the double whammy of making a meal which will cost 50% or more less, taste 50% or more better, and give you a real sense of creative satisfaction which will only get better (just as your food will) the more you do it. Post your own favourite cheap recipes!
But sadly local markets and independent shops are becoming rarer things, so even the best intentioned, idealistic shopper has to occasionally still head for those strip-lit aisles. But as long as you obey the Number One rule of shopping in a supermarket, you’ll come out the winner. That oh so important rule is to not do what all supermarkets so cunningly try their very hardest to make you do – don’t impulse buy! If you don’t normally buy a family-sized pack of Chewy Chocolate Monkey Snacks then don’t buy it just because it’s a ‘buy one, get one free!’ offer. Just write a list of what you need – maybe by planning your week’s meals in advance – and then put on your blinkers and nose peg (that omniscient smell of freshly baked bread that supermarkets pump out could cause you to bring home all manner of delicious but expensive pastries and cakes!) and treat you trip to the supermarket like a careful planned commando mission. Don’t let those greedy sons of bitches sell you anything you didn’t set out to buy!
However, when you’re breezily looking around your local Greek Deli, the military operation rule of shopping no longer applies. As long as you are buying separate, unprocessed ingredients the likelihood is that you’ll save money and end up with a superior meal. For example, if your local deli has fresh basil, buy fresh basil! It will turn the humblest plate of spaghetti into an aromatic feast. And late on a Saturday afternoon your local market may have a pile of aubergines going cheap which you can turn into a three-day moussaka. And when you do, please don’t hesitate to invite me round for dinner.
Eventually you’ll become as intuitive and brilliant at making cheap and delicious meals as I am. Then you will be ready for the greater challenge of making sensible impulse buys in that danger zone of rampant consumerism, the supermarket. They too will have items reduced in price towards the end of the day, but as long as you stick to raw produce such as mince, chicken or fish, you will limit their profit margin at the same time as increasing your options of the meal you can end up with. Please do post your favourite mince, chicken and fish recipes, here.