How to Save Time at the Grocery Store

We've been sharing a lot of ideas about how you can save money on food by cooking at home instead of eating out. But how much longer does it take to walk up and down the grocery aisles than to order in a pizza? When it comes to grocery shopping, you have a couple of options: you can buy enough food to last you a week or so, or you can make another trip every couple of days. Both can be time consuming, but I opt for buying about a week's worth of food at once so I don't have to go back so often.

Once I'm at the store, I don't have time to browse. The basic solution: make a list and stick to it. I love grocery lists for two reasons. First, they help me avoid impulse buys, which in turn helps me keep my budget under control. Second, they point me to the items I need, so I don't have to spend a long time looking at every shelf trying to remember everything.

At my house, we've found a way to take this supermarket tool even further. We make our grocery lists into spreadsheets.

I know; it sounds super complicated. It's not.

The first column is for our basic list of items (milk, eggs, bread). The second column is for the quantity of each. For staples like milk and bread, we generally don't need to list a quantity because we know how much we need, but this column is important when it comes to ingredients for specific recipes when we might forget how much or many we need.

The third column is the real trick. Here, we list where each item is located in the store. This isn't just about remembering where to find things, either. When the list is finished, it can be sorted by this "department" column, making it super easy to go through the store one area at a time. This way, all the items that are close together in the store are also close together on the list. All the produce is together, all the frozen foods are together, all the dairy is together. You get the idea. Easy.

Here's what a very short grocery spreadsheet looks like:

Calling a department by the term grocery might seem overly broad, but that just means the big section in the middle with all the dry goods on tall shelves. The other departments are self-explanatory, with frozen, dairy, and deli being some other options that aren't listed here. Go ahead and use whatever terms work for you based on your store, and if you know the aisle numbers, even better.

The first time my boyfriend and I used this method, we cut our shopping time down to about 20 minutes for a list that probably would've taken us close to an hour before. No scanning the list over and over to find the items we needed from each department; no doubling back for things we overlooked the first (or second, or third) time. Much faster.

Grocery Shopping in Beantown--How's it compare to YOURtown?

As a grad student, grocery shopping may seem like no big deal, but once all of the pennies are added up, the ounces and the pounds—groceries can add quite a dent in your monthly finances. Says one grad student at Emerson College, “I try to spend around $40 a week…and that includes going out.” So where are the best places to do one’s grocery shopping in a city known for being as pricey as its LA counterpart?

Stop & Shop, Star Market, Shaw's and Trader Joe’s are the main grocery stores you’ll find on the streets in Beantown and its neighboring towns. “I shop at Stop and Shop—It’s basically just like any grocery story—big selection, big isles, big lines,” says Ashley, a third year MFA student at Emerson College. Stop & Shop offers a rewards program card which gives you special discounts on certain items (which change weekly). There is also a red box in every location which makes this grocery store very useful for food and entertainment.

Star Market and Shaw’s are another option for the grocery shopping grad student. These stores also offer the rewards card which help to cut the cost on some items which to change weekly. According to Yelp, one reviewer mentions the lack of fresh produce and limited stock in the freezer section. If price is your main concern, you may find better options at Stop & Shop. Like Stop and Shop, red box is also available.

Finally, Trader Joe’s offers grad students the chance to sample food from around the world—both from the personable employee at the sample station or from sampling the products right off the shelf (though, do remember to ask for an employee’s assistance before sampling). Trader Joe’s is known for its affordability and shoppers agree—according to one Yelper, “In a nutshell, I go to TJ's for a few reasons; VERY affordable (sometimes way cheaper than other supermarkets for things), FRIENDLY staff, [and] environmentally conscious”. Trader Joe’s may not have a rewards card or a red box, but it has quality and affordability which suffice it to say, may be the only true mark of a worthy grocery store to any graduate student.

Grad Student Gourmet: Real Cooking on a Budget

Instant no more!

Yes, it’s possible to survive life as a penniless, overworked grad student without resorting to a life of Ramen Noodles and EasyMac. The instant stuff may seem cheap and easy, but it isn’t satisfying and the nutritional value is negligible. Hardly the way to fuel your brain. But in my first year as a grad student I’ve learned how to cook meals that are cheap, healthy, delicious, and fast.

First of all, you’ll need to figure out where you can buy your cooking ingredients cheaply.

Investigate ethnic markets. Some items will be significantly cheaper there. At C-Mart, for instance, fish sauce, soy sauce, miso, udon and rice noodles were also much cheaper than their Shaw’s or Stop-and-Shop counterparts. An added plus here is that if you can figure out how to make authentic pad thai or tandoori chicken or beef noodle pho yourself, you’ll start to spend a lot less on takeout.

For the Boston-based grad student, doing your produce shopping at Haymarket is also a godsend. Haymarket is held by the Haymarket T stop (on the Orange and Green Lines) all day on Fridays and Saturdays, every week of the year. I go every week, and I might score 9 kiwis for a dollar, a whole pineapple for a dollar, grapes for a dollar per pound, 3 pounds of potatoes for a dollar, 3 acorn squash for a dollar, and 8 apples for two dollars. I’m up to my neck in healthy, varied produce. And I have the opportunity to try so many new foods. I’d never had a fresh fig before I started going to Haymarket, or a chestnut, or yucca. Gourmet cheese, huge rounds of pita, bagels, baguettes and delicious soft Armenian bread are also available for very cheap at Haymarket.

I also recommend trying out Market Basket if you live in the Cambridge/Somerville/Union Square area. Market Basket may be crowded, but it’s way cheaper than any other grocery store. I find their regular prices are comparable with the sale prices of most other stores, and their sale prices are just unbelievable.

And of course there’s Trader Joe’s, if you can find your way to one. Whole Foods-style products at very affordable prices-- and like Whole Foods, they also offer free samples. Always a plus.

Finding inexpensive things to make can still be tricky, especially if you’re also short on time, but fear not. If I can do it, so can you.

• Make your dinner ahead. Reheat it when you get home. It'll still taste good, I promise. And it's a much better option than stocking up on Stouffer's: it won't leave you hungry like so many frozen meals, it won't be chock-full of sodium, and it won't cost you 4 or 5 bucks a pop.
• Use your freezer. Freeze anything you can't use or eat before it goes bad, rather than throwing it away. Don't worry about competing with your roommates for freezer real estate; I have four of them, and I manage. Besides, did you know freezers actually work more efficiently if they're filled to the brim with food?
• Cook on the weekends, in large batches. You'll be able to feed yourself all week.
• Rotate between different types of leftovers so you don’t get bored. (And don’t fear the leftovers-- some things taste better when the flavors have melded a day or two in the fridge, like this Autumn Sausage Casserole.)
• Invest in a slow cooker. This is probably the single best cooking tool a grad student can have. Prep the ingredients and leave them cooking on low while you’re at work or in class, and follow your nose back home to find your dinner warm and waiting for you.

Here are my top 3 tried-and-true sources for cheap and/or make-ahead recipes.:

• Cheap Healthy Good - This site is an incredible resource. Recipes as well as informative and insightful articles on how to make food that is cheap, healthy, and good. All recipes include approximate price per serving. Most come out to less than a dollar. Compare that to the $7 you might pay for a sandwich at a cafe. The chicken with shallot-apricot sauce comes highly recommended. As does the chocolate souffle (did you know you could make souffle for $0.46 per serving?!). Hell, even the DIY Microwave Popcorn.
• $5 Dinner Mom - A collection of recipes that cost $5 or less, total, to make. I wouldn’t swear by all of these, but there are some gems in here.
• A Year of Slow Cooking - One woman’s quest to prepare food in her slow cooker-- from enchiladas to creme brulee-- every day for a full year. It’s not quite Julie and Julia, but this is probably the single best slow-cooker resource out there.

Budgeting Your Money, Supermarket Style

One of the top priorities for every grad student (besides doing well in class, of course) is to save money. We’ve all figured out just how much we’re paying for every course, every credit, every hour of class. And yeah, it’s a lot. So you’re going to want to cut back on your expenditures. You have to get creative when saving money, especially in a city like Boston. One of my favorite ways to stay on track with my money is with my groceries.

For example. Yes, we all love cereal. It’s great in the morning, for an afternoon snack, or during a late-night paper-writing cram session. But do you know how much cheaper the store brand cereals are? Fine, I’ll grant you that they don’t exactly taste the same. But when you’re exhausted from pulling an all-nighter are you really going to know the difference? I vote no.

Sometimes it’s all about where you shop. Everyone loves a good Whole Foods, and not just for the tasty samples they provide. But for the duration of your graduate studies, say goodbye to Whole Foods (except maybe for the samples) and hello to Market Basket. Even if you have to take the T to get to one, it’s worth the difference you’ll be saving.

Once you’re at Market Basket, there’s really only one thing you need to remember: store brand, store brand, store brand! Seriously, you can practically feel the savings in your wallet.

Make sure you buy enough to make your lunch for work because you’re done with going out on your lunch breaks. It’s a great way to save. Just pack it all in a nice little lunch box, though you might want to call it a meal bag. Sounds much more professional.

Maybe you shouldn't say goodbye to Whole Foods completely. I mean, those samples can come in handy for a nice afternoon snack. You can consider it a weekend activity, and a free one to boot. Now you're thinking like a grad student

The one thing I would go name brand on: water filter. This way you don’t have to buy water bottles, which are mucho expensive. One water filter lasts a few months and is definitely more price-conscious than bottles. Now you know how to save money on food and water. What else is there?!