Frugal Tip 32: Eat Less Meat

Earlier this year, I started posting a more in depth look at each of the frugal tips. Over the next few weeks I will publish the frugal tips that I have collected. Please note that not every tip will work for everyone. Chose as many of the tips that will work with you and your family and start implementing them. Today we will proceed with Tip #32 Eat less meat

Let's face it. Meat is probably the most expensive item in our daily diets. For the longest time, I have ate more veggies (and junk food) then meat. It's not that I am a vegetarian or anything like that. It's just that I don't like some cuts of meat. Although the cuts I do like I really enjoy. Roasted turkey, ham, bacon, pork sausage, hamburger and some chicken. All are very delicious in my diet. However, one way I was able to eat on less then $100 a month was the fact I didn't eat meat every day. As one can see in my $1 a day challenge. Now that I am married and with gas prices rising so high (which has a direct result on food prices) it is becoming harder and harder to keep that food budget down. However, the first way to do so is to cut the amount of meat you use in your diet.

In 2009 Frugally Green wrote a column on this very topic. Below is a brief excerpt of that post.

When you compare all the work and resources it takes to raise a cow to maturity and get it onto your dinner plate versus what would be required of, say, a cucumber, there’s no difficulty in seeing why you’re probably used to paying about 150% more for ground beef than your typical vegetable.

An animal like a cow requires enormous amounts of space, water, grain, hormones, antibiotics, and time to reach the status of tasty and consumable. The statistic that a vegetarian requires 300 gallons of water a day to produce their daily food compared to 4,000 gallons necessary for a meat-eater is just one shocking metric.

Looking back on my last few weeks of meals, I’ve realized that I probably eat meat, in one form or another, at least once a day, often twice. This is costing me a small fortune! If I scaled back my meat consumption to just once every other day, a small and easily achievable goal, I could really save some money. A quick back-of-the-napkin calculation brings it to around $37 a month! If I were to go wholly vegetarian, I’d save closer to $50.

I could save about $600 a year by practicing vegetarianism. Ya know, I’ve been meaning to do more traveling, and two years of vegetarianism would cover the cost of a round trip ticket to almost any major airport in the world. Compelling.

Don’t get too caught up with the money. It’s highly motivational for some, but there’s another very legitimate reason to evaluate your meat consumption.
- Frugally Green

So how about it? Can you cut some of the meat out of your diet? You don't have to become a total vegetarian or vegan. Just cut down to one meal every other day with meat or perhaps only eat meat twice a week. Whatever, I am sure there are ways to cut your meat intake down and save some cold hard cash in your budget at the same time.
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