Got No Dough - Saving Money in Slim Times

In Part 1, we talked about how watching your portion sizes can not only save you money, but it can also help you to lose weight.

In Part 2, we’ll talk about another way to save money and lose weight at the same time.  Although it is simple, it is rather difficult - quit eating out!

Fast food is tempting when you’re tired, unprepared for dinner and want something now.  However, a little preparation can allow you to create homemade meals without a lot of hassle.  Yesterday my kids fell asleep in the car on the way home, so instead of waking them up, I sat out in the car for about 20 minutes.  During that time I created a weeks worth of dinner menus and made my grocery list.  I also made sure to write how long each one took to cook.  Now I can base what we’re having for dinner on how much time I have at night.  For instance, last night I did my grocery shopping and I came home dead tired.  I had very little time to cook and although I was tempted to buy fast food, I was able to glance at my dinner list and see that I had a meal that only took 20 minutes to prepare.  Voila, a delicious homemade meal.

Not only is saving money an important factor, but this is also a tip to help save your health.  When is the last time you took a look at what is in your fast food meal?  My husband and I were eating at McDonald’s the other day and they had a tray liner with the nutritional data on it.   We were quite shocked to say the least that our meals had over 1000 calories EACH!  That’s over half of my daily calories in one sitting!  I won’t even talk about how much fat was in that meal.

So the next time you’re tempted to eat fast food, look in your cupboard instead.  Often times you can find something to throw together to save yourself some money.  If not, make a quick trip to the grocery store instead and grab some basic ingredients for a quick meal.