5 Easy Ways To Reduce Food Waste And Save Money

Each year, it’s estimated 108 billion pounds of food is wasted in the US, which means roughly 40% of all food in America is thrown away.

Inflation is still at an all time high, and the cost of groceries are increasing rapidly.

In fact, grocery prices have increased by 12.2% over the last year… which I guess explains why I spotted some sad looking raspberries for $7 the other day at the store.

So now more than ever, it’s important to make your weekly grocery shop stretch, and avoid wasting food where possible.

And by not wasting your groceries, you’ll be saving yourself a decent amount of money each week, potentially even up to $2,000 each year💰

So… how can we stop food waste and start saving that cash?
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‍#1 ORGANIZE YOUR FRIDGE

One of the main reasons we waste food is simply because we forget about it.

How many times have you chucked a load of food to the back of your fridge and then when you finally stumble across it, you can’t eat it because its passed the use-by date?

If you’re feeling ✨personally victimized✨ right now, it’s time to get organizing your fridge.

And it doesn’t need to be the way Kris Jenner organizes hers (although, that would be the absolute dream).

You can simply just start by creating a separate shelf for all the food that needs to be eaten that day.

Let’s call it something real catchy like the “needs eating now” shelf 🍲

Easy.
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#2 USE-BY VS. BEST-BEFORE DATES

If you don’t know the difference between a best-before and a use-by date, you’re probably throwing a lot of food away that’s perfectly fine to eat.

The best-before date is more about the quality of the food, whereas the use-by date is more about the safety.

Generally speaking, you shouldn’t use food that’s gone past its use-by date but you’ve got a lot more wiggle room with the best-before stuff.

Obviously, writing the blog for a money app doesn’t exactly require a food safety and hygiene certificate, so maybe don’t take my word for it... check out what sell-by, best-before and use-by dates mean.

And if you’ve got food going out of date soon which you know you won’t be demolishing in time, read the label to see if you can freeze it 🧊

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#3 MAKE A MEAL OUT OF ‘NOTHING’

If you regularly have leftover food you absolutely no idea what to do with, there’s a free nifty ‘zero waste recipe generator’ tool called SuperCook you can use.

Literally all you need to do is select the ingredients you have, and it’ll chuck out a load of recipes 🍲

Smart, eh? And it even tells you the nutritional value 👏

#4 PLAN YOUR MEALS

By planning your meals, you’re less likely to go over your food budget, and because you’ll already have a list of what to get, you’ll no longer be spending money on stuff you don’t need.

Typical meal planning can be pretty time consuming but we’ve got a hack which is not only more time efficient, but it also helps keep the costs down.

If you follow us on TikTok (if you don’t, hello… what are you doing? Definitely check us out), you'll see we've got a video on how you can use meal subscription services without paying a single dime 🤩
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A Hello Fresh example:
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🥦 Go to Hello Fresh and select ‘Our Menus’

🍗 Check out the recipes on that page and find some you like. When you click on them you’ll see all the ingredients you need listed. You’ll even see a lot of the same recipes have similar ingredients

🥟 Grab a pen and paper and write down the ingredients you need. Then write down each day of the week and the meals you’re gonna make on those days

🍕That’s literally it – now you’ve got a FREE meal plan for the week‍
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#5 SET A GROCERY BUDGET

Lastly, but most importantly, set a grocery budget you can actually stick to.

And if you’re looking for a super simple way to do this, you can download our free budget app, Cleo.

The best money app in the world.
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Why?

💙 Because it’s ridiculously easy to set up (takes 2 minutes)
💙 Your spending is broken down into categories
💙 You’ll get monthly targets based on your spending
💙 The app makes it easier to manage your bills
💙 There’s an AI assistant to help you stay on track
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Once you’ve downloaded the app, select the ‘Budget’ tab and you’ll find the ‘Spend Limit’ section. You’ll then be able to set a spending limit for different categories like shopping, groceries, eating out… basically all the super important things 💅
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And to help your money stretch even further, here are 6 hacks for getting free food 🍔‍
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Enjoy this post? Definitely give it a share or send it along to a friend. You never know, it could make a big difference. And of course, if you want to try the best money app in the world for free, just hit this link right here.

‍Big love. Cleo 💙