**UPDATE: How We Saved $7000 Annually on Our Plant Based Grocery Bill **
This post will either be really boring or really informative…Since two major roadblocks to eating less processed food that people cite are the cost and confusion about what to buy, I thought it might be useful to post our grocery lists, the cost, and an overview of what I made with it for the week. Unfortunately, our scanner is broken so I have to type it all out, gah!
We eat enough for a small family: Derek eats between 6,000 and 7,000 calories a day and I eat between 2,200 and 3,500 depending on what workouts I’m doing. I also make food for our two 60-ish pound dogs. Given those facts, I think our average grocery costs of about $200-275 per week is pretty damn reasonable.
I achieve this, in part, by:
- Buying dried instead of canned beans and pressure cooking them
- Bulk bins for things like pumpkin seeds, nuts, beans, oats, etc
- Making most of our soymilk – that alone used to cost $80/month
- Buying very few processed foods overall
Tuesday we shopped at Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods for the week.
Trader Joe’s
| Cut butternut squash diced | 3.29 |
| Squash Zucchini 18 oz | 2.99 |
| Corn 4 pack | 3.79 |
| Crushed Garlic | 1.79 |
| Brown Jasmine Rice | 3.29 |
| Ready to Eat Edamame | 1.69 |
| Broccoli Florets Frozen | 1.29 |
| Greens Southern Blend | 3.49 |
| Frozen Strawberries x 3 | 1.69/ea |
| Shredded Green Cabbage | 1.59 |
| Almond Butter, Raw Crunchy | 4.99 |
| Organic Old Fashioned Oatmeal x 2 | 2.29/ea |
| Jumbo Pitted Kalamata Olives | 2.99 |
| Baby Bok Choy | 2.49 |
| Ruby Red Grapefruit, 5 lb | 4.49 |
| Organic Tofu 19 oz | 1.49 |
| Extra Firm Tofu x 2 | 1.79/ea |
| Pineapple Frozen x 2 | 1.59/ea |
| Organic 3 Grain Tempeh | 1.69 |
| Vanilla Soymilk 1/2 gallon | 2.99 |
| Unsweetened Soymilk 1/2 gallon | 2.99 |
| Fennel, 2 | 2.49 |
| Roma Tomatoes, 18 oz | 2.99 |
| Green Beans “Haricots Verts” | 2.69 |
| Broccoli | 1.79 |
| Organic Carrots, 1 lb | 0.89 |
| Asparagus, 2 lb | 3.98 |
| Cauliflower | 2.29 |
| Yellow Bell Pepper | 1.29 |
| Red Bell Pepper | 1.29 |
| Fuji Apple, 5 @ .59/ea | 2.95 |
| Avocados | 4.49 |
| Sweet Potato, 2 lb | 1.79 |
| Grape Tomatoes | 2.99 |
| Jumbo Red Onion | 0.79 |
| Bananas, 14 @ .19/ea | 2.66 |
Total with Tax |
$101.59 |
Whole Foods
| 4.06 lb Bulk Garbanzo Beans @ 1.69/lb | 6.86 |
| 3.54 lb Bulk Great Northern Beans @ 1.69/lb | 5.98 |
| 1.72 lb Bulk Pumpkin Seeds @ 5.99/lb | 10.30 |
| Bunch Spinach | 1.99 |
| Baby Spinach, 16 oz bin | 4.99 |
| Spring Mix, 16 oz bin | 4.99 |
| 3.12 lb Bulk Lentils @ 1.69/lb | 5.27 |
| Gardein Crispy Tenders | 4.49 |
| Gardein “Chicken Fingers” | 4.49 |
| Sprouted Whole Wheat Bagels | 3.99 |
Total with Tax |
$54.68 |
Grand Total: $156.27
We had some staples at home already, like salad dressing, more brown rice, whole wheat pasta, nuts, protein powder, protein bars, and a few bags of sprouted whole wheat bagels. So the actual total for the week is closer to $200.
What I made/will make with all this food:
Soups: fennel, butternut squash, cauliflower, broccoli
Breakfasts: Fruit/protein smoothies, steamed greens and/or carrots and oatmeal, oat groats or sweet brown rice
Lunches: Leftover soup from the night before with most meals and a green salad with every meal, tempeh noodle salad (3 days worth), brown rice and tofu stir fry (leftovers), sweet potato and white bean chili, lentils and brown rice with pine nuts and onions (leftovers), quinoa and tempeh with baby bok choy
Snacks: Sprouted bagels with almond butter, grapefruit, almonds, protein bars. Plus two of Derek’s 1,000 calorie gainer shakes a day.
Dinners: Soup and salad with every meal, Gardein and asparagus – 2 nights, tofu omelets filled with broccoli and sweet onion, cashew cream sauce whole wheat linguine with vegetables, homemade vegan sausauge with fresh tomato sauce and zucchini, tofu, cabbage, and dried shiitake stir fry with brown rice, lentils and brown rice with pine nuts and sweet onions
Dog Food: 4 days worth – whoops, I underestimated. Brown Rice and TVP dog food for Joe, our golden retriever, and Chickpea dog food for Gretchen, our yellow lab mix. Joe-Joe does not like chickpeas and Gretchen is allergic to all grains (she gets ear infections). They also get our vegetable scraps plus their own “dog broccoli”, as we call it, with their dinners. I also buy a supplement for them called VegeDog to make sure they’re getting the right vitamins and minerals. Gretchen has been vegan for about 9 of her 12 years and Joe has been with us a year – with luck he’ll be as healthy as she is at her age.
View Comments (11)
Thank you so much for this I have been looking for ages for something like this !
Thank you so much for your time. SO helpful.
Great site! Thanks for all the useful info.
Thank you so much for this breakdown of what you buy and eat! My partner and I have recently adopted a vegan diet and lifestyle. We're both very active-- he does a lot of weightlifting and is aiming to gain right now, and I just love improving my overall fitness with weightlifting, running, and circuit training. I just found your blog today and it's been so helpful! It's certainly something that I haven't found many resources available for (most fitness websites are all about whey, meat, and eggs). My partner has been having trouble gaining lean mass on a vegan diet so it looks like adding Derek's gainer shakes might be great for him!
I truly appreciate this breakdown of your menu, shopping list and expenses. It's just so terrific to know you can eat a whole foods plant based diet, achieve your highest fitness goals, stick to a very good budget and even feed your pets the same way. Thanks!!!
you cant feed a dog vegan food, there carnivores
But aren't humans considered carnivores also?
Um, no.
You CAN'T feed carnivores, like cats, a vegan diet...however, dogs are OMNIVORES.
I always wanted to go this direction with my diet but I found it difficult to put a good list together. Any further recommendations can you refer them. Thanks for the info.
Thanks for taking the time to type out your shopping list for us. I am recently vegan and have been looking for good tips on eating healthy on a budget, your article helped me out a bit!