5 Easy Ways to Save Money on Food At Uni

For most people, moving to uni is the first time they’ll do a food shop. Or if you’re like me and have done the food shop before, you probably haven’t actually paid attention to prices. Doing your own food shop can often be very eye opening. Food can be so expensive! Especially if you don’t pay attention to what you are buying or how much each item actually costs.

After rent payments, food will most likely be your next biggest expense. Yet it is one area you can be super frugal on and keep it low. For context, my current food budget is £40 a month – which works out at around £10 a week. Through planning and strategies this low budget is completely achievable.

Here are five easy ways to save money on food!

Always make more than one portion

When I’m cooking I always make more than one portion, often if I’m following a recipe I’ll make four. This habit started by accident when I first moved to uni, as I was so used to cooking for my family of four at home, I had no concept of portion size and would end up with loads of extra pasta or rice. Saving these extra portions for lunch the next day or to freeze for another night is a great way to get the most out of the food you have in.

You will thank your past self when you don’t want to cook and have meals in the freezer, literally minutes away from being ready to eat. Bulk cooking is an easy way to save money on food shopping as you will be getting the most out of everything you buy.

Make a meal plan

If I don’t make a meal plan I will survive on snacks and avoid cooking at all costs. I am definitely a natural grazer! Not wanting to cook is down to a combination of being lazy and lacking inspiration on what I want to eat. Having a meal plan means I don’t have to decide what to cook each night.

Make a meal plan before you go food shopping and form a list of exactly what you need to buy to make all of your meals. This means you’ll save a lot of money on food because you won’t end up with wasted food and random tins in your cupboards.

Further, I find having a meal plan makes me more responsible. By having a plan I am less likely to skip meals, eat fast food and waste food that I have bought.

READ MORE: Do you need to take your car to uni?

Never go shopping without a list

This goes hand in hand with having a meal plan, and is a very simple, easy way to save money on your food shop. Make the meal plan first then your list will basically form itself. Going food shopping without a list makes it so easy to over-spend and buy random things that don’t actually form proper meals.

This tip is as important as avoiding going shopping when you’re hungry. Both always end up with buying loads of snacks and having to go shopping again because you don’t have the ingredients to make dinner.

Shop as infrequently as possible

Cooking for one can be very expensive, batch cooking and freezing additional portions is the best way to get the most out of your shopping trips. This tip goes with having a meal plan, if you are organised enough you can limit your food shop to once a month and make the most of a tiny budget.

Often supermarkets have deals where buying one tin costs a certain amount but if you buy a pack of four tins you can often get four for the price of three. Lets take buying beans as an example. Currently at Lidl one tin of beans costs 30p, whilst a pack of four costs 98p. A 22p saving may seem trivial and tiny, but little savings really do add up.

Personally, I try and stick to a £10 a week food budget, which seems ridiculous and impossible, but it is 100% achievable. Even more so if you look at it as a monthly budget of £40. Phasing it like this makes it seems easier and more achievable.

Download Comparasaurus

This app is AMAZING! It is totally free and allows you to see any product from all the major supermarkets in the UK on the same page. It is great for seeing the differences in price for the same items depending on where you buy from.

Use this app to see which supermarkets you should shop at to get the best price. Further, use it to estimate how much your shop is going to cost, based off your meal plan and shopping list. Knowing roughly how much you are going to spend is a great way to keep your budget in check.

This way you will already know if your meal plan is too expensive or if you can extra money to play with. Instead of getting to the checkout and realising that you have gone way over budget.

Knowing the individual prices of things is a great way to be able to put special offers into context and know whether you are getting a good deal or it just seems like one.

BONUS: Find a job where you get free food

Bonus easy way to save money on food is too get free food! I managed to get a job where I could get free food on my breaks. This is amazing as it not only allows me to have a free lunch but also eat ‘naughty’ food and satisfy my cravings for convenience food, as I worked at a branded cafe.

Having a job throughout uni is often essential for many students as often your maintenance loans will not even cover rent. If you fit this description, jobs in the service and hospitality industry often come with free food and other perks, like staff discounts. This is a great way to reduce spending and save money on food!

These are the 5 easy ways to save money on food shopping. Food doesn’t have to be crazy expensive, it is one of the easiest categories to cut down on in your budget. Remember to always shop at discount supermarkets and bulk cook to stretch even the tinniest of budgets.