In Your Money or Your Life, it recommends writing down the specifics of everything you buy. I've been doing this for years and it really helps to identify where I spent by money and if it's inline with my values and where I want to spend my money ...

However, I only had one category for food. We rarely eat out so I didn't see the point in having an eating out and a grocery category. Lately I re-read part of it and it suggested that I needed to categorize even farther. So I looked over my grocery bills for May - only 5 bills - I shop once a week, and figured out - just out of interest sake and just for this month - how much I was spending on breakfasts, lunches, dinners, and snacks. When I had tallied up I was SHOCKED at how much we spent on snacks. Nearly 1/2 our grocery budget was on snack / lunches for school type food. (We don't have school cafeterias here). Holy Moly Batman! I have to cut back on snacks foods.

These are the types of things that were causing the expenses ...
Fruit leathers
Apple sauce (I buy the big jar and put them into containers)
Raspberry apple sauce
Granola bars
Canned pasta & Easy Mac- (real mac and cheese tends to get mushy in their thermos)
Crackers
Cheese
Canned fruit (I put them into containers myself)
Jello (I buy the package, make it up and put it into our own containers)
Pudding (same as above)
Yogurt (I buy the big container and put them into smaller containers)
Real fruit gummies
Popcorn

When summer hits, this expense goes way down because I no longer have to pack two snacks a day - they don't get a 'lunch break' they get two 20 min snack breaks at school and no peanut products are allowed at school.

I had no idea I was spending so much in this one category. It's a worth while exercise to try for one month and see if you are surprised to see where your grocery money is going.

How do you cut back on snack food? Or if you have any advice on how I can cut back, I'd love to learn.

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I only have a couple of suggestions. Have you tried 'undercooking' real mac & cheese and other pastas a bit and see if that helps to prevent them from getting mushy. Hillbilly Housewife has a great recipe for homemade granola bars, bonus, no preservatives!

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:love:

If you have kids in your house, that's why the snack spending is so high!

I have a frugal tip - I know jbythesea also posted this at one time too. Make your own pita chips! Anyone priced pita chips? It's crazy, they're like $3/bag. I buy pita pockets on the 40% off bakery clearance at my Walmart store (about $.98/package). I cut them open, brush w/extra virgin olive oil then sprinkle w/garlic powder and parmesan. I bake them at 350 until crispy. For 98 cents I get more than double or triple the amount of pita chips that cost over $3 bag where I live. Serve with hummus or enjoy by themselves.

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I agree snacks are super high! And I love Kim's idea-- will have to try! I do similar with popcorn, which my kids love! Buy the 1 lb. bag of kernels and pop in micro for lunches - cheap and relatively healthy! Also, I have good luck at Costco on big sizes - UTZ pretzels for example. Have you also tried homemade (or boxed for me!!) brownies instead of say, Hostess? Also string chees is pretty cheap.

I really just don't buy snack foods. Other then some little crackers for DD. I would look for the things that you can get cheep or find coupons for. When I do buy snacks I buy in bulk from costco. We try to limit snacks. When home good snacks are for me a slice of bread or a piece of fruit. Other things that might be less would be popcorn, carrots and cereal. I also say its best to put together your own snacks like you are doing with the apple sauce on everything. Also thing about making slightly bigger dinners and using left overs as snacks.

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Kimberly Proud Mommy to Bethany Rose April 2006

There are recipes out their to make your own fruit leather but it sounds like a lot of work to me so I just get mine at Aldi's.

You can make your own granola bars.

Gorp : combine items like peanuts, chocolate chips, white chips, raisins, pretzels, goldfish

Buy the cheapest crackers you can find, cover in peanut butter and top with another cracker.

Take a jar of store brand applesauce and add some flavored gelatin to it. Kids like the different colors you can make. (tip from a daycare mom)

Don't buy cheese cubes already packaged. Buy the blocks and cut it up yourself.

Homemade muffins

If you have an Ald's you can get a box of 100 popsicles for $2.99.

I do still buy my kids snacks essp during the summer. We are out and about so much, I try to pack a small lunch each time we go out. That said, I try to buy in bulk or get what I can on sale with my coupons. My kids LOVE carrots so its easy to buy a big bag of them and just cut them into sticks. Meghan loves manderin oranges, Samantha loves pineapple. I buy huge cans of them, then just portion them out into the ziplock snack cups. I can get huge boxes of goldfish and stuff from BJs and again, just put them in snack bags for trips. Oh also Jello, and pudding are good snacks as well. Buy the powder for about .50 a box at the store, and it will make 4 of those snack cups. Just pour them in and let them set, then you can grab and go anytime.

I walked through BJs with a caluculator and tried to decide if I was saving money buy buying in bulk like that. I found that there are some definate savings. For instance, the Motts Applesauce, come to just over $1.50 for a 6 pak, as opposed to almost $3 at the grocery store.

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~Missy~Mommy
Meghan8.Samantha7,Cameron4

My kids are big cracker eaters. I buy them from Family Dollar. I get the generic of Ritz, Club, cinniman grahams, vanilla wafers, Cheez its, etc all for a $1 a box. I do buy fruit snacks, but I get a huge box at Sams' very reasonably and it lasts us a long time. I only buy chips occasionally, and those are HyVee brand for $1 a bag. We always keep the big bags of pretzels that are really cheap too (store brand). I have to admit, that my kids do eat Go-gurts quite a bit, but I buy the big boxes at Sam's and they are quite reasonable. We keep them in the freezer and then they go in the kids' lunches or they stick them in the microwave for a few seconds.. I also buy big jars of applesauce, fresh apples and oranges and banannas.

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I buy the super jumbo sized box of goldfish crackers- the one that looks like a giant milk carton. But I only buy it when it is on sale. I have two very small tupperware containers that I keep with enough for a snack and that is all ds gets for the day. The rest goes into an airtight container until it is used. So I spent about $5 on this box about 3 months ago and we aren't even half way through it.

I always spend more on snacks when i am packing school lunches. What helps me year-round is that I buy cake/brownie mixes when they are on a super sale. If I knew how to cook good from scratch i could do that too LOL Then I bake them up and cut them into snacks for lunches. Also, my favorite tip is to buy whatever cereal is on sale and use that for "rice krispie" treats. I have made them from store brand cheerios, fruity and cocoa pebbles, you name it. For about $2 - $2.50 I can make a huge batch of cereal treats. Also popcorn, I started buying the regular kernels and using my old air popper. It is way cheaper than the microwave bags. Also, my kids like cornbread, so I often make up a couple boxes of the Jiffy mix for snacks. When i have more time I make fake hummus ( I don't bother with the tahini, so i guess it is technically chickpea dip) because I can always find beans on sale. They can eat it with crackers or veggie sticks.