Yes! It does make me cringe to pay $1.99 for a dozen eggs, but leftovers, cooking at home, and growing your own food as "desperate measures"? Welcome to the way people have lived for millions of years. How quickly the collective memory forgets.

I totally agree.  Since losing my job for the 2nd time in 3 years, I take to heart what this article says.  For a family of four, we're trying hard to keep food costs low, around $100/wk.  For us, the key is ethnic food--pasta or rice, less meat and dairy.  I also buy produce from the discounted corner of a supermarket first, then supplement this with Asian market items.  We've always eaten at home and have been brown baggers, too.  This way, there's not much to give up.

Why is it such a foreign thought that people grow and process their own food?  I have had a small garden in my backyard for years and on average I spend $50 for plants and seed.  This results in producing about $300 worth of food.  Yes...it takes a little bit of work, but I haven't bought a jar of jam in 8 years!  Also, by having stock in house, I find I am less likely to run to the grocery store.  Many times we can avoid it by being creative with our own stock.  This cuts down on those impulse buys that seem to be unavoidable at the grocery store.  For the things my family can't live without (and I can't grow enough of myself), I visit the local farms and work out deals with the farmers.  I save thousands of dollars every year by doing nothing more than putting out a little extra effort.  Grocery prices are not going down!  The products don't just magically show up at the store, and right now you can't charge enough for the truck to bring it.  

this issue has made me crazy.  americans are so spoiled!  my dad had two jobs (in the 60's) to be able to buy a house and we ate leftovers.  we always recycled and brown bagged.  going out to dinner was a celebration or special treat.  and i'm still doing many of those same things.  so you have to buy less junk food or go out to eat less, nobody is owed anything!  maybe the public will consume less (esp gas) and it will actually be a good thing rather than a hysterical crisis...oh gawd...

I feed a family of 6 (myself, husband, 4 children) on $75 a week. I shop biweekly, have a 2 week menu developed from what is on sale, make my own bread for about 60 cents a 20oz loaf including electricity, 3 Rhode Island hens in the backyard who give me 16 eggs a week for $4 of feed a month , I grow my own lettuce and spinach in window boxes, and have a 1/4 acre lot garden where I have fit many perennials (asparagus, rhubarb, sage, garlic, onions, raspberries, horseradish, jerusalem artichokes, gooseberries, oregano) as well as annuals like tomatoes, carrots, peas,  beans, peppers, squash, and of course 3 pumpkin plants for Halloween. If I am careful to always use open pollinated seeds, I can save seeds at the end of the growing season, and not even pay for seed. I use intensive, biodynamic gardening so I can fit a lot in (I just put in 10 pounds of potatoes this weekend - bought the bag for 1.99 at Aldi, cut up the eyes, and in they went to make lots for the fall.) Use my scraps for compost(I even visit a local church preparing for church suppers to collect compost like peelings), make my own spaghetti sauce, jams, dried tomatoes (kids eat them like candy), frozen veggies, all baked goods from scratch. Even eat dandelion greens (free food!)I live in a zone 4 growing zone (cold) so almost anyone can grow their own food! Brown bag lunch of course, I don't think I've ever had all 6 of us out to eat, although my husband and I do go out at least once a year for our anniversary!

"COUNTRY FOLKS CAN SURVIVE".......HELLO, ......YOU HAVE BEEN TURNING YOUR NOSE UP AT US FOR YEARS ("SOUTHERNERS, REDNECKS, HILLBILLIES") AND THIS IS A WAY OF LIFE FOR US.  COMMON SENSE??  WELCOME TO THE BANDWAGON!

Amen to all of you! I think having to grow our own food will also improve our health, not only because we'll be eating better, but we'll also benefit from the extra excercise and the sense of pride it gives to eat something we grew ourselves. It also teaches so much to our children. The educational opportunity is priceless. We get to teach them gardenig, budgeting, cooking, etc. WOW!

Bring back 4-H...I learned  cooking, canning, sewing, gardening...all the basics for survival. I have been all these "frugals" my whole life. My parents shopped for groceries once a month, grew food, etc. My idea of cutting costs of eating out is: I can cook at home what I would eat in a restaurant.

From someone who has lived in Texas for almost 20 years but grew up in NYC: there is a trade off between time/work and money. If you save money, you will probably have to do more work and take more time/care because the highest cost input for most products is the labor cost that goes into it (not to mention all of the research and planning). What you can manage to do is heavily dependent on your skill level, how much time you have and your circumstances. If you live in an apartment in the middle of a big city, growing your own garden is not realistic but you have other choices too. If you live out in the exurbs, you can grow your own stuff but you will spend more for gasoline, phone service and water access. If you have a two-income household, you have the ability to afford more/better but you will have less time to do some of the money-saving activities described here. There is ALWAYS a trade-off.

I read somewhere that about 40% of all produce in the US during World War II was grown in  victory gardens. Just imagine what people could do if they put their minds and muscles to it. I live in an area once rural when I was young, now more suburban.  I grew up raising my own food, like my parents and grandparents before me, and I think that even if there are folks out there that  poke fun at country folk, I think there are fewer as we all need to band together and get back to basics (not to mention not using oil to transport our food from far away when we could grow it/buy it locally!) I am always delighted to help a suburban neighbor figure out gardening, or even dig a few perennials out of my own garden to get them started. The price of food will be linked with the price of oil as long as we insist on purchasing food grown out of county/out of state, even out of country! And all that packaging! Beverly, cheer up, some of us never got off the bandwagon!